Joel Spolsky: Thanks or No Thanks - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/magazine/20090101/how-hard-could-it-be-thanks-or-no-thanks_Printer_Friendly.html?partner=fogcreek <comment><USER2> My best friend came up with a system that saves the company he worked for around $100,000 a year. His boss took notice and gave him two free tickets to a movie theater. He quit that afternoon. He told me a sincere thank you would have been ok. He was getting paid to work there already after all. The token bonus was taken as an insult, as if that was the value of his contribution. If you give a bonus make sure it matches the value of the action. If you can't measure the contribution in dollars, find some reward that isn't in dollars.

<comment><USER3> I say that's insulting for the reason that its value is low. A 2 free tickets or an XBox is a reflection of how bad a manager is, rewarding sincere efforts disproportionately.

The friend wasn't hired to save a business. If an external company was hired to do that, they would have been compensated accordingly.

Why would making him a partner or offering him a 'good' percentage of the generated revenue be out of the question?

<comment><USER4> Interesting side no.te:

If you ask a bunch of people on a project to estimate modestly how much they 've contributed, you almost always get >100%

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There's a classical study from Harvard business review that basically states that incentive and reward schemes don't work. The study found that employees simply focus their effort on the measure of reward instead of trying to do what's best for the company.

If the incentive is measured in turnover sales people will sell at a loss to get their bonus, LOC as an incentive for coders will produce long and crappy code, etc. Whatever the incentive was it turned out that people would game the system and the end result for the company was that compared to a baseline (no compensation besides pay) the results were negative.

<http://apj.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/33/2/20> (exec. summary)

A related study (that I can't find the source for right now) found that when asked employees wanted recognition for their work more than anything else. A simple thank you or wow that's awesome works much better than a monetary reward.

So in answer to Joel's question - the fact that he wrote the article and thereby gave lots and lots of public praise is as good a reward as any.

<comment><USER6> Don't read the article, just read the book. It's called Punished by Rewards, written by Alfie Kohn. Think of it this way: if you're not reading books, you fail. And if you're reading books but not books like this, then you're reading the wrong kinds of books and you also fail.

And while you're at it, also read No Contest and The Schools Our Children Deserve. They are three of the most important non-fiction books written within the last 30 years.

<comment><USER7> Still, I wonder if Alfie Kohn accepts sincere praise as payment for all of his consulting gigs...

<comment><USER6> If you are going to troll at least read the subtitle of the book:

"The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A's, Praise, and Other Bribes"

<comment><USER7> Sorry if that came across as "trollish." It's just that adequate compensation _is_ important, meaningful recognition matters, etc.

Being enthusiastic about your job matters, but the big tech companies that recruit the cream of the crop (Google, Amazon, etc.) pay well above market rates, and don't seem to be suffering a lack of quality.

<comment><USER6> And nowhere does Kohn say that adequate compensation isn't important.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> What's so wrong with simple profit sharing? The only place I've worked at (or even heard of, for that matter) that implemented a form of true profit sharing was Outback Steakhouse. Servers got tips, so are exempt, but hosts, cooks, and bussing staff got cold hard cash on their next work day that came straight from the profits of the entire restaurant from their previous work day. Simple, effective, and gloriously rewarding.

For an IT shop, each worker's salary/wage sets their base pay and is confidential, while a biweekly or monthly "bonus" check could be the profit sharing reward. In that environment, everyone knows when business is going well and everyone knows when it isn't. Profit sharing can (and should) be open for discussion among all employees.

So, take Joel's example: Noah helps make an additional $1 million in a year for Fog Creek. What's that going to translate into for each employee's profit sharing check? I'll assume that Joel's generous, and that the ads are wonderfully profitable, so let's say an additional $400/mo/employee (average) while the ads are active. Holy shit, Noah, thanks! So, Noah get's more. Noah gets recognitions. Noah's coworkers get more. The company makes more. Hell, even Joel gets to make more. It's win/win/win/win.

And don't get me started on company stock. Stock is fine in many cases, but that's not what successful organizations make. They make money! Share it with the employees. They deserve it. 'Cause here's the thing: If your take-home wage isn't tied to your performance or the performance of the company as a whole, what exactly is everyone's motivation? Oh, sure, _some_ people are going to do a great job no matter what, but that's not what really makes a company great, now is it?

<comment><USER9> I would love to hear a reply to this. One of the most successful businesses in my neighborhood is a cooperatively owned bagel shop. They've got a bunch of locations now, and they always hustle to make your bagel.

I'm not very familiar with the business model though, especially with regards to businesses that don't sell bagels but make software, or sell services.

<comment><USER8> It's not really a new business model or anything, but the simple idea (which some companies successfully implement) that some portion, say 30%, of the organization's net profit of each pay period is divided up by the number of workers (non-management, non-executive employees) and dispersed to those workers at the next pay period.

Bonuses, retirement plans, health benefits, and all other incentives are still set at management's discretion, but are funded with the other 70% of the profit. It's really that simple.

Realize too, that simple profit sharing coexists with the normal grading of wages based on whatever position/seniority algorithm the organization uses. So you're guaranteed, as a developer or designer or whatever, to make your normal wage and be considered for increases. But every pay period would have that profit sharing bonus that shows you how the business is doing and exactly how much your organization values your contribution.

Stock-based incentives are supposed to fulfill this role, but they're often given out after some major event and then only to the most visible members of the contribution. Arbitrarily, in other words. Holiday bonuses are nice, too, but they are supposed to be confidential in most organizations (creating uncomfortable speculation and comparisons) and can lead to unmet expectations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think there are a couple of relevant points that were not mentioned in the article:

1) The only reason those ads could sell is because of the brand that Fog Creek had already created. That brand requires an entire company to maintain.

2) The job board produced 1 million in revenue for Fog Creek. Since Fog Creek had existing revenues, a better way to quantify that is to say that revenue increased by X percent. So rather than say that an employee brought in an extra million, it's more accurate to say that he/she made an X percent increase in revenue.

With this logic, Here's a compensation idea - give the employee the same percentage increase that the incremental revenue represents. If you increase company revenue by 10%, you get a 10% raise.

<comment><USER11> _If you increase company revenue by 10%, you get a 10% raise._ </quote>

You've missed the point.

There are direct _and_ indirect contributions to revenue. Only because his contribution was direct it doesn't mean one should reward him more than another programmer that made not so easy to spot contribution.

If one can't measure indirect contributions in dollars then one should not reward direct contributions in dollars too.

Additionally see intrinsic vs. external motivation in the article.

<comment><USER10> You make a good point. Everyone contributes to the bottom line. However, in this case we are dealing someone who goes above and beyond their role to create value for the company. The intern wasn't brought on to create a new business model, but he did it anyways. There would have been no penalty had he never even mentioned the idea. That's why it deserves special compensation. Both to reward the person, and to ensure that other employees will speak up when even when they have no obligation to do so.

<comment><USER12> It still doesn't mean he deserves compensation. He was not extrinsicly motivated at all, so he although he would probably like the money it's not what he "deserves". I'd say he deserves recognition for his contribution, and that was throwing in the idea of ads. It's not a new idea, he just brought it convincingly with the knowledge that ads at 37signals cost $250. Well, he got plenty of recognition now.

<comment><USER10> Wouldn't companies want to reward people for assuming an extra role and creating value, regardless of whether it is deserved?

The more I think about it, the difficulty of implementing a policy like this could be the show stopper here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Reward: Noah Weiss gets to claim this on his LinkedIn profile. <http://www.linkedin.com/pub/5/987/ba3>

</comment><comment><USER14> The one concept I had while reading this was to give a bonus to _everyone_ in the company. This would reward Noah, and avoid the morale-destroying hazard of elevating one person's contributions. If the team has "jelled" properly, benefiting your teammates should mean almost as much to you as benefiting yourself, and the example set would potentially lead others to be more forthcoming with their ideas.

<comment><USER15> The company I work for does this sort of practice as well, but in a less direct manner. When the company does really well, eg, a great sales year of new products, all employees receive _generous_ contributions to their 401k based on relative salaries. Probably the best reward I can think of, because it benefits your _future_ ; a generous contribution now, especially for the younger employees, can turn into a _huge_ contribution by the time of retirement.

<comment><USER16> Yea, but you also need to discount the value you get in the future. Even so, it sounds like a great deal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> His second reward-- more valuable, since he probably will stay at Google-- was to have this article written about him.

<comment><USER18> Nay, according to his linkedIn profile, he's already left google.

<comment><USER19> Nope! Reread that. Now he's an associate project manager.

<comment><USER20> You caught OpenMIKE red-handed. Quick, let's all downmod him to -31337!

Edit: in case it wasn't clear, the purpose of this comment was to block the impending group-downmod of OpenMIKE. He was already at -1 when I posted this. That already happened once today to a brand-new member of HN (rambo), so I'm rather passionate about preventing that kind of behavior.

<comment><USER19> Yeah.

Sorry, OpenMIKE. I didn't mean to be calling you out. Just pointing it out.

<comment><USER20> Hehe, sorry, to be clear, it was very good that you did. I just meant to discourage the downvoters, and certainly not to blame anybody.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> There's something I find morally and intellectually dishonest about this article. Although Joel ultimately decided Noah deserved a bonus in this case, he never outright rejects the argument that bonuses aren't deserved for such cases in general. Rather, he argues that a software company is an idea factory, therefore he was already paying Noah for his ideas.

That is patently absurd. He was most definitely NOT paying Noah to come up with ideas for new business opportunities. To the extent he was paying Noah for his ideas, it was with regard to their existing products and the work he was assigned to. Noah went above and beyond his duties, and fairly compensating him for that is not the act of benevolence that Joel makes it sound like.

There's also some shocking cognitive dissonance on display here. On one hand, Joel repeatedly refers to Noah's contribution as a million-dollar business. On the other, he wonders what an appropriate bonus would be and even contemplates giving Noah a video game console worth a few hundred dollars.

The elephant in the room is that Noah deserved a fair portion of the new-found profit. Now, this compensation may well be unsavory for any number of reasons, not the least of which are Joel's business concerns. But shouldn't that argument be made, rather than pretending that an idea literally worth a million dollars is hard to quantify?

<comment><USER22> One point you (and a lot of people) are missing: Joel was the one who took the business risk of posting those ads. It may seem risk free in retrospect, but they didn't know that in advance. It could have pissed off all his software customers, cheapened and diminished his brand. It could have had technical problems and become a nightmare with people wrongly charged or spammed. Just about anything _could_ have happened. Noah took no risk, he just suggested an idea. Joel paid him to implement the idea, he didn't go "above and beyond" in that sense.

So in all this righteous speak of what is a "fair" reward for Noah, keep in mind that his contribution, vital though it was, is dwarfed by that which Joel had to make to enable it to be realized.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Noah did a great job here, but I think Joel may be overstating the magnitude of his contribution.

I could start a blog and add a job postings section. No problem. But I would not be able to fill it with postings at $350 a pop. Is this because I don't have Noah's ideas and programming skills, or is it because I don't have a blog that reaches thousands and thousands of talented developers?

<comment><USER24> If I'm understanding the article, the point is that Noah said, essentially, "here's one way you can convert all those eyeballs into cash", and then actually went and did it. That's pretty significant.

<comment><USER23> I agree. Monetizing something that is already there can be extremely insightful. And writing any good production oriented code takes talent.

So this really comes down to how remarkable an insight you feel the "one way to convert eyeballs into cash" truly is. It sounds like Noah noticed that 37Signals was leveraging its popularity with developers to run a profitable job site, realized that JOS could do the same, and convinced the boss to do it.

So yes, it is significant. It's really a matter of _how_ significant it is... sounds like I'm saying it's significant, and you're saying it's very, very significant.

Reminds me of a time where Ebert thought a movie was the best of the year, and Siskel just thought it was a damn good movie. Those arguments are kind of strange, because there's very little to really disagree about. You have one person saying "how could you not see how awesome this is", and the other saying "well yeah, it's definitely really good."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Bonuses/rewards are so hard to do "fairly" it seems like someone will always feel shafted (deserved or not).

One place I worked at handed out bonuses on a curve. Come bonus time the curve was thrown off because every manager was "grading" at the same time, and the bonuses that people were expecting (and could watch on the intranet) changed rapidly, usually for the worse. There was a pretty huge uproar over the process, but the system is still in place today. It was so messed up that people were complaining about getting _free money_.

In the past Joel had mentioned a profit sharing scheme for every employee, which seems like a good idea, but still has downsides for the big-idea guys, like Noah in the article.

Has anyone worked for a company that had a really good bonus plan?

</comment><comment><USER26> While this article and discussion is about bonuses, it should really be about what produced the value of the job board. It wasn't the software he built, it was Joel's large following and years of brand building. The idea to capitalize on it was good, but not all that valuable on its own.

<comment><USER27> Yeah. Considering it's mostly Joel's writing that has pulled people towards the forums (and thus the job board), one could make an argument that the $1 million should mostly be Joel's anyway.

<comment><USER28> "one could make an argument that the $1 million should mostly be Joel's anyway."

It probably is.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Interesting backstory: Back in 2002/03 myself and a couple of other regular visitors to JoS forums used to post jobs due to the fact that there were many interesting people that we would have liked to work with.

Joel sent out an email mentioning that posting jobs reduces the signal-to- noise on the forums -- he was right.

So, Simon Lucy (<http://www.linkedin.com/in/simonlucy>), another regular visitor to JoS sets up ijustheard.com for the forum visitors to post jobs. Here's the archive.org page for it ([http://web.archive.org/web/20030219230747/http://www.ijusthe...](http://web.archive.org/web/20030219230747/http://www.ijustheard.org/)); I think Simon shut it down in 2005 since it never did end up getting any traction, and interestingly Fog Creek makes a million $ out of it -- good for FC!

<comment><USER30> I don't think you were implying anything, but for what it's worth, Fog Creek is probably right; job ad posts always annoy me on forums.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> The one thing not mentioned is that the million dollars didn't come just from the product. It came from the brand recognition Fog Creek has and the fact that it had the community. What were the things that attracted the community and enticed people to post the ads in the first place? That had the most value.

Edit: Whoops, just saw johnrob noticed this too.

</comment><comment><USER32> I almost expected the conclusion that for his own good they decided to not reward him, because it would have completely destroyed his motivation ;-)

</comment><comment><USER33> I had a job with a small start-up. They advertised "performance based bonuses" when I was hired, so I figured I would make up for a not-so-hot salary with the bonus. We had a good first year. The owner even sent out an email thanking the four non-founders for our effort, and stating how many million dollars they made.

A few weeks went by after the email (Christmas was fast approaching), and I still hadn't received a performance review. Two days before Christmas, the owner walks into my office and mumbles something about a little extra in the check. Well, I got $400. I considered it a slap in the face, and found a new job.

A couple months later, right before I quit, the gave me a review, and a 4% raise, but it was too late.

</comment><comment><USER34> Read Robert D. Austin's book Measuring and Managing Performance in Organizations (<http://www.dorsethouse.com/books/mmpo.html>) for an absolutely devastating analysis of this problem.

</comment><comment><USER35> I've asked this question months ago, but I never received a satisfactory answer:

What is the value of stock in a private company? Do you receive dividends on the stock? You can't sell the stock to other people? The only time it's of value is in a liquidity event. Suppose Fog Creek's not planning one in the future, what does this stock do?

<comment><USER36> Stock is obviously part-ownership of a company. When a company makes a profit, it has basically two options - 1) re-invest some or all of the profit back into the company, or 2) divvy it up amongst the owners (ie. stockholders), which is more or less a dividend.

My old man runs a small business with about five stockholders. It's a mature business and he has no real plans for expanding, so every year he divides the company profits up between the shareholders.

You could sell your stocks to other people, but this would depend on the rules governing the buying / selling of shares as set out by the company when you acquired the stocks. Often this is just by agreement because there isn't a very liquid market for shares in private companies (for obvious reasons like lack of transparency and difficulties in valuation).

If I were to buy shares in a company, my valuation would depend on the company's earnings and the opportunity cost of putting my money in a "risk- free" investment (like treasury bonds)... which would dictate the base price- earnings ratio for which I would be indifferent to investing in the company or bonds. Of course, the company's potential for growth would affect the valuation (ie. higher P/E for growing companies).

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> This is a great article and Joel is a smart guy, but how many times has he written this article? I guess it's new because he put a new anecdote about an actual person, but he's been harping about this for years on his blog. He makes a good point but I wish he'd put new stuff in his Inc column.

(sorry for the rant)

</comment><comment><USER38> I'm not sure if it really was an "idea" in true sense of the word. Real contribution of Noah was to make Joel aware of his inability to spot a small but profitable segment (no disrespect intended). If you happen to be a part of company that's on the verge of becoming a "real" company then you're bound to spot such segments ignored by high-ups given you're aware of industry trends and keeping your ear, eyes and brain open. I guess people at FogCreek must have applauded Joel for his contribution in that he listened (thought, reflected and then executed) to what an intern had to say in the first place.

</comment><comment><USER39> I feel like I'm in a slightly similar situation at the moment.

I very recently told the founders of the startup I work at about a business idea I had that relies on our core technology. Our company really needs a new market, and this one looks like it could be huge. After explaining more of the details to them, they got very excited. We are currently investigating the feasibility of using our product for this application, etc., but if it works, it might "save the company".

Assuming it works out business and tech-wise, I have no idea how this might affect me (besides still having a job to go to).

</comment><comment><USER40> Would they have eventually thought of this anyway? Then the extra value is that he thought of it sooner. Also - he could have tried to negotiate, maybe go through a third party (I talked to a guy at company X who has says he has a great idea for our site) to get compensated. If you give up your idea without any agreement, you are losing any leverage you might have.

</comment><comment><USER41> To reward or not to reward is a tough dilemma. That's why I would just give him a certificate "A donation has been made in your name to the Human Fund". This way, there is no jealousy from the coworkers. One's contributions are appreciated (or seem to be), and you save your money for things that matter.

</comment><comment><USER42> Why not ask 'em? Say something along the lines of "You're really helping the company with your work. We really like it. Is there anything we can do for you?"

source: <http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/12/28/1929229>

</comment><comment><USER43> Joel, why didn't you beat Google's offer? Seems like it's worth it based on your article.

<comment><USER44> I doubt it was the money that really mattered in that decision. Fog Creek sounds like a great place to work but there are jobs at Google that involve working on some very interesting stuff.

</comment></comment><comment><USER42> Joel should have constituted "Noah Prize" and distributed 10,000/N shares among his N employees.

</comment><comment><USER42> I am with Noah Weiss. Be opportunistic rather than ambitious in the current economy.

</comment><comment><USER45> the reward given for such a contribution is proportional to the decision- maker's desire that such contributions will be made in the future. in 2009, we are all motivated primarily by money.

</comment><comment><USER46> I have a similar story. I was hired as an intern at a company that did marketing research (among other things) and, using genetic algorithms on a complex survey-design problem, managed to slash field costs by about $250k per month.

I had a middle manager who resented that I was getting time to work on the cool projects in a language he didn't understand (Java; I wasn't a real programmer yet). So he yanked me out of R&D and put me closer to the day-to- day grunt work.

Three months later I was looking for jobs elsewhere, and a month after that I was fired for interviewing. I got two weeks' severance... and they're still making $250k+ from my work.

<comment><USER47> A lot of entrepreneurs have stories like this. If the experience motivates you to stop working for someone else then it's all worth it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> guy adds $1 million to bottom line.

guy gets stock options, but only if he agrees to work there full-time?!?

does anyone else see the ridiculousness in joel's proposal? no wonder the dude walked - that is a horrible deal. anyone in that position could now assume that any future huge contributions to the company would be rewarded in an equally miserly way. joel should have given him the shares outright - otherwise they're not a reward.

and joel should be freakin embarrassed to even be telling this story - what a crook.

<comment><USER49> That actually sounds like a really fair deal. Part of the reward is the knowledge that Fog Creek really wants him to stay.

Every performance-based reward I've gotten from Yahoo has been in the form of a retention bonus. "You did really great on that project. Here's a pile of stocks/cash that you'll get in 12/18/24 months if you're still around."

A retention bonus provides a fair monetary award, while at the same time building the intrinsic motivation that comes from knowing your employer likes what you're doing. Rather than eroding the intrinsic motivation, a delayed extrinsic motivator can actually _increase_ it.

<comment><USER50> Yahoo got too dependent on their "super-secret" retention bonuses. The first couple times they did it, it made you feel special. But, eventually it became clear that it was just a way to avoid giving raises and promotions. Maybe you haven't hit that point, but trust me, lots of us got demotivated by it.

<comment><USER49> You're claiming that "secret" retention bonuses are a way to avoid "giving" promotions and raises? Wow, there's a lot wrong with both parts of that statement.

Almost every company encourages their employees to never disclose their pay to their coworkers. It promotes an information imbalance where the employer wins. Unless you sign something saying that you won't disclose it (which would probably be contestable anyhow), or you're sharing it with someone who doesn't want to know (which would just be rude and potentially disruptive), they can't fire you for telling people what you make.

Don't do it, plain and simple. If you didn't agree to keep it a secret, then it's not a secret. With all of my raises and bonuses-that-not-everyone-gets, I was discrete, just as my bosses asked of me. I _only_ share my compensation information with anyone and everyone who wants to know. It's time we changed this stupid "secret salary" custom.

Also, promotions and raises aren't given, they're taken. You're a grownup, why should your employer care more about your career than you do? Want a promotion? Take more responsibility. Be more essential. Be a leader. Want a raise? Get a better offer, and ask your employer to match it. Write essays, share code, increase your skillset, help your juniors, always be finding ways to make the product better, ways to make the team's processes more efficient.

If you just want to do your job and stay warm, that's fine, but don't expect to get special treatment. A yearly 2-7% cost-of-living pay increase is probably about right.

It sounds harsh, I know, and I'm sure this might not have been your angle at all. I just get annoyed hearing about employees who dutifully do no more than they're told, and wait and hope for review time as if it's christmas, and then get upset when they're treated like cogs in a machine, when they've been acting _exactly_ like cogs in a machine.

<comment><USER51> >they can't fire you for telling people what you make.

Yes they can. Unless you are talking about Western Europe or something.

<comment><USER49> I'm talking about the US.

To be clear, in California at least, you can be fired or quit for any or no reason whatsoever. So, yes, to correct what I said, an employer _could_ fire you for sharing your salary, or for the car you drive, or for the color of your hair, or just because they don't like you for no specific reason. (But not for your gender, race, disabilities, or religion. Doesn't that seem odd?)

However, very few employers _will_ fire you for this. And, if they're that serious about keeping their employees in a disadvantageous position, maybe you ought to find a more respectful employer.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Neural Implant Enables Paralyzed ALS Patient to Type Six Words per Minute - <AUTHOR> http://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/biomedical/bionics/neural-implant-enables-paralyzed-als-patient-to-type-6-words-per-minute <comment><USER2> Please don't just submit from one site. We want users to post articles that they personally find intellectually interesting, not just because they have something to promote. If you'd like to mix up these submissions with others from around the web, that'd be great—there are never enough interesting stories!</comment>


In Bitcoin's Orbit: Rival Virtual Currencies Vie for Acceptance - <AUTHOR> http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/dealbook/2013/11/24/in-bitcoins-orbit-rival-virtual-currencies-vie-for-acceptance/

<comment><USER2> None of the altcoins really interest me right now besides Zerocoin, which should be launched in a few months.

<comment><USER3> Why zerocoin? The major one everyone talks about is Litecoin but even the article prefers peercoin. Am I missing something?</comment></comment>


The Unpredictable Era of Editing Human Embryos - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/blog/welcome-to-the-unpredictable-era-of-editing-human-embryos

<comment><USER2> A heavy-hitting list of authors recently put forth[1] the following recommendations regarding human germline genome editing (verbatim from _Science_ ):

"In the near term, we recommend that steps be taken to:

1) Strongly discourage, even in those countries with lax jurisdictions where it might be permitted, any attempts at germline genome modification for clinical application in humans, while societal, environmental, and ethical implications of such activity are discussed among scientific and governmental organizations. (In countries with a highly developed bioscience capacity, germline genome modification in humans is currently illegal or tightly regulated.) This will enable pathways to responsible uses of this technology, if any, to be identified.

2) Create forums in which experts from the scientific and bioethics communities can provide information and education about this new era of human biology, the issues accompanying the risks and rewards of using such powerful technology for a wide variety of applications including the potential to treat or cure human genetic disease, and the attendant ethical, social, and legal implications of genome modification.

3) Encourage and support transparent research to evaluate the efficacy and specificity of CRISPR-Cas9 genome engineering technology in human and nonhuman model systems relevant to its potential applications for germline gene therapy. Such research is essential to inform deliberations about what clinical applications, if any, might in the future be deemed permissible.

4) Convene a globally representative group of developers and users of genome engineering technology and experts in genetics, law, and bioethics, as well as members of the scientific community, the public, and relevant government agencies and interest groups, to further consider these important issues, and where appropriate, recommend policies."

1\. [http://www.sciencemag.org/content/348/6230/36.full](http://www.sciencemag.org/content/348/6230/36.full) Baltimore, David, et al. _A prudent path forward for genomic engineering and germline gene modification_. _Science_ 3 April 2015: 348 (6230), 36-38.Published online 19 March 2015 [DOI:10.1126/science.aab1028]

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps better name would be 'gene transplant'. It is not creating new gene, but replacing one gene with another gene, which is known to work. Both genes are natural and occur in other people. And we know that particular sequence works well for 99.99999% of population who have it.

</comment><comment><USER4> Relevant other story from today: [http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/alzheimer-s- origin...](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/alzheimer-s-origins-tied- to-rise-of-human-intelligence/)

I almost had a post here about how we might be able to easily fix defects, but the more I learn about genetics the less concerned I am about immediately churning out "superbabies". But then hours later, this article comes along to point out that even "fixing defects" could have unanticipated negative side effects....</comment>


Epigrams on Programming (1982) - <AUTHOR> http://pu.inf.uni-tuebingen.de/users/klaeren/epigrams.html <comment><USER2> > Functions delay binding: data structures induce binding. Moral: Structure > data late in the programming process.

What is meant by that?

<comment><AUTHOR> Personal interpretation here, but I believe it's because when you structure data too early into the program's process you wind up constricting yourself too tightly.

An easy example would be when you have sections of your program hardcoded. Alternatively, when your code is too generic - you can simply lock it down when needed.</comment></comment>


Example implementation of Common Lisp's list-length function - <AUTHOR> http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/HyperSpec/Body/f_list_l.htm

<comment><USER2> That is a nice implementation indeed. It makes me want to be able to cdr '() in scheme.</comment>


Linux kernel booting process, part 3 - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/0xAX/linux-insides/blob/master/Booting/linux-bootstrap-3.md

<comment><USER2> Cool article, one thing that's been irritating me lately is how everyone is taking this table on faith:

| Type | char | short | int | long | u8 | u16 | u32 | u64 |

|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>-|-----|</comment><comment>|----|-----|-----|-----|

| Size | 1 | 2 | 4 | 8 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 8 |

Here are the corrected tables, now a relic of history:

32 bit:

| Type | char | short | long | int | u8 | u16 | u32 | u64 |

|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>-|-----|</comment><comment>|----|-----|-----|-----|

| Size | 1 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 8 |

64 bit:

| Type | char | short | long | int | u8 | u16 | u32 | u64 |

|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>|</comment><comment>-|-----|</comment><comment>|----|-----|-----|-----|

| Size | 1 | 2 | 4 | 8 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 8 |

Instead we traded convention for programmer convenience, so that companies like Apple could mandate 64 bit binaries under the pretense that programmers wouldn't have to do much work to convert from 32 (since they mistakingly kept int 4 bytes).

The fact is that originally long was 4 bytes and int was the native width of your processor (int should be 8 on most CPUs today, as they are 64 bit). Using long before a term like int doubled the length and created confusion as well.

<comment><USER3> Changing sizes on different processors is a bad idea- most uses should be fixed-size for ease of portability, and using 64-bit ints for a "default" type isn't always the best for performance.

Also, it's unclear from your post, but to clarify: the C standard mandates that sizeof(int) <= sizeof(long).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nice series. Waiting for an episode or two about Linux kernel on ARM.</comment>


Anonymous Gets Into The Pycon Incident  - <AUTHOR> http://pastebin.com/ubmznGhn

<comment><USER2> It's a very mixed opinion from Anonymous, the first paragraph about Adria being an extremist is very fair and direct. Adria DID over-hear a PRIVATE conversation that wasn't meant for her, took a photo of two individuals WITHOUT their permission and posted it to her twitter account, accusing them of harassment. What Adria has done to the feminism community is not justice, but damage.

The whole point of feminism is about bringing equality - That there should exist no discernible separation lines between both the genders. But what Adria has done is made sure the males in future are extra-careful and scared of their female counter-parts when in a professional event, which itself is a terrible, subtle kind of discrimination. As a matter of fact, searching on Twitter reveals that many women do agree with this - She has damaged feminism, more than doing anything good.

I can only imagine the outrage of the same incident inverted - had those two men taken a photo of her and shared it on their Twitter accounts and had Adria been offended, the situation would be totally different and both these men would have been brought down their knees, this soft attitude towards Adria for violating someone else's privacy by itself is a sexist approach IMO.

I think, we all need to maintain a strict platform for justice - Don't be too soft on a woman because she's a woman, at the same time, don't be too hard on a man because he's a man and vice-versa. Regardless of gender, I believe justice should be served.

As a matter of fact, Adria has been deleting comments on her blog about people who tried to bring up a sexist remark that she made, yet she got away with (you can search for her name on twitter and can confirm this).

What Anonymous is doing here is a bit extremist in my opinion - Bringing down a whole company because they stood behind a dishonest employee and failed to offer any fairness or justification on their part. But, maybe if they were doing something illegal, I think they might as well go down. And I hope this serves as a very valuable lesson for others in the tech as well - Be it males or femals, to follow the path of righteousness instead of hating one another and waiting for a moment to simply bring the other gender to shame.

God, I just hope that there will be a day when I can sit next to a person and sit beside them and talk to them like a normal person without imposing restrictions on myself on my behaviour, appearance / characteristics instead of constantly trying to be aware that I am talking to {gender} instead of a _person_ which is the situation as of now.

</comment><comment><USER3> These idiotic harassment and anonymous lynch mobs don't do anything to fix the situation.

<comment><USER4> They do about as much to prevent the situation as the twitter shaming does to prevent lewd jokes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'd like to suggest that we flag and not upvote this. Someone who would do something spectacularly idiotic like this has given up their pass for reasonable discourse and does not deserve attention on their words.

<comment><USER6> People aren't up-voting it because they support the action, but because it's relevant. After all, many HN readers are either sendgrid customers, or users of services that are. Whatever the rights and wrong of the situation are, it's an important development to a lot of people.

<comment><USER7> No, a statement from anonymous is not a development. It's whether people are sharing and reading it that fuels them to carry through with their plans.

The only news is if they have actually gotten the information they say they have, and if they actually harass people. Beyond that it's just words.

Don't feed the trolls.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Seems to have had the desired effect? <https://www.facebook.com/SendGrid/posts/10151502570463967>

</comment><comment><USER9> I can't really explain it, but this doesn't read like the "voice" of Anonymous. I realize that there isn't supposed to be a single voice, but they usually have a flavor that is missing here. Can't anyone just claim to be Anonymous?

<comment><USER10> That's probably why it says "I do not represent, speak for, nor am associated with Anonymous" in the post.

<comment><USER9> Ah, thank you. I never made it that far. My eyes were rolling too much, I had to stop reading.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> What a pretentious load of shit.

</comment><comment><USER12> What a bunch of juvenile retaliatory bullshit. It's an unfortunate situation, but "raiding" is NOT the appropriate response.

Adria made a mistake and these people want to destroy her life over it. Don't they see the irony in that, given the nature of her offense?

</comment><comment><USER5> Ah, _finally_ a voice of measured reason. Oh wait.

</comment><comment><USER13> It's hard to work out whether this is actually the voice of anonymous or just an individual upset by the unfortunate turn of events.

<comment><USER7> The distinction is whether or not there is an audience. If people believe that it is anonymous, then it is the voice of anonymous.

Getting the internet mad about the statement is what fuels them to put words into actions, which is why they're best to ignore.

They may have a unified voice for large campaigns, but for smaller shit like this it's just a random person volunteering a press release.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is possibly one of the best things that could happen to Sendgrid, as it is likely to generate public sympathy.

</comment><comment><USER15> This seems really petty, even for Anonymous.</comment>


Google throwing errors on Nexus One order already? - <AUTHOR> http://www.nexusoneforum.net/forum/nexus-one-general-discussion/218-unable-place-order.html Slight overload... seems they go through eventually after trying a couple times. <comment><AUTHOR> Techcrunch looks down too... and Twitter's been intermittent all day. Nexus One overloading the interwebs.</comment>


The Comprehensive Guide to Quitting Google (2018) - <AUTHOR> https://lifehacker.com/the-comprehensive-guide-to-quitting-google-1830001964 <comment><USER2> I thought the title referred to how employees can quit their job at Google.</comment>


Stephen Fry on cloud computing - <AUTHOR> http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/oct/04/dork.talk.stephen.fry

<comment><USER2> I think he had a good rational argument. It wasn't the usual Cloud = Teh Evilz or the Cloud = Awsomatedness that articles on the Cloud tend to revolve around. I also like his last point; my data is at much less of a risk in Google Docs than they are stored on my hard drive, hence me having a triple backup as it's only a matter of time before one of my HDD corrupts and I lose a document equivalent to a months work.</comment>


How a spare server turned into Twitpic, the $1.5M+ a year startup - <AUTHOR> http://mixergy.com/twitpic-noah-everett/ <comment><USER2> That whole story is just one big WTF to me.

It seems most things sailing in the wake of twitter simply defy all logic and common sense. There have been literally dozens of picture sharing services before twitpic. The only difference I can see is the name ("look, we're for twitter!") and that he basically integrated an url-shortener.

The entire site looks like about a week's worth of work. 700k in annual profit? Not sure if I want to laugh or cry.

<comment><USER3> _The entire site looks like about a week's worth of work. 700k in annual profit? Not sure if I want to laugh or cry._

Laugh. Be happy. Learn from this that you don't have to make something people want _that nobody else could make because it's so complex and you're awesome_. You _just_ have to make something people want.

<comment><USER4> The other takeaway for me is that it was an insanely risky bet.

Twitter could easily have built the functionality to share pictures into twitter (Like facebook did). Heck - then they might have a reasonable revenue stream.

If Twitter had done that, twitpic would have been stomped on.

<comment><USER3> Right, but if the entire site really was about a week's worth of work (or anything like that order of magnitude) then I wouldn't say this was insanely risky, I'd say "why the hell would I _not_ try this?" ;)

<comment><USER5> Of course he was solving his own problem in the process - so worst case scenario : An educational programming experience that leads to a useful personal tool.

<comment><USER6> I wish I could vote twice, just occasionally.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Thanks for the comments everyone! I hope that you will find the information in the interview useful in some way.

Feel free to hit me up on Twitter (@noaheverett) if you have any questions.

<comment><USER8> Is "O-off" a subtle dig at OAuth, or an audio transcription typo?

<comment><USER9> Typo, it's fixed in the Etherpad version

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > Noah was recently offered 10 figures for the business

Bullshit.

<comment><USER11> There were a few times in this interview that my BS detectors went off. Andrew asked a question regarding which VCs Noah had spoken with and Noah said he couldn't respond due to NDA. After some probing the story changed to say that only some of the VCs required NDA at the point of discussing monetary figures. Andrew did a nice job by continuing to ask questions like "what did they want you to do with the money?" and Noah again vacillated. It just struck me as odd that he couldn't remember what the discussions were about, it seems like something that should be really easy to remember. Of course, he could have just been nervous as well, but it really smelled fishy to me.

 _Disclaimer: I don't know Noah, I have never used TwitPic, I have nothing for or against Noah and / or TwitPic, so take all of this with an ENORMOUS grain of salt since this is nothing more than pure speculation_

<comment><USER12> I've met Noah on at least one occasion. He's a very nice, and very bright guy. But he is a completely accidental entrepreneur, so I'm not surprised at all that he struggled in an interview like this. In fact, this might be the first big real-time interview he's done.

My reading of the situation tells me that he's just really uncomfortable talking about the conversations he's had with VCs, and doesn't know how to convey that without being awkward.

That said I've never really understood his motivation for handling TwitPic the way that he does, but that's definitely not my place to criticise.

<comment><USER13> most companies are started by accidental entrepreneurs. steve jobs was a hippie basically, larry+sergey were doing phd work, zuck wanted to get laid at harvard instead of studying for finals, etc.

<comment><USER14> In fact, it seems to me most of the succesful folks are motivated by the fact they are going to do something cool and have fun and not necessarily by the idea of making billions. That is the one thing I cannot stand about mixergy: it's always about millions, billions and gazillons.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I would have sold, at any time twitter could basically undermine his business, actually the more successful it becomes the more likely twitter would be to integrate it.

<comment><USER16> To wit, Twitter switched the default URL shortener from tinyurl to bit.ly, and now bit.ly is the largest URL shortener on Twitter.

This is what happens when your business is a commodity (and you're not the one who commoditized it).

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Lucky guy. Twitter could have killed him in a glimpse by just offering an image/video storing site themselves.

<comment><USER18> Yeah, right after building their own URL shortener.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is just one of those pot-luck ideas. It was already out there, he just hit the jackpot.

</comment><comment><USER20> Question for noah, if he's willing to answer it:

You said that currently you have $1.5M+ revenues, and margins of 70%. What are the current cost breakdowns right now? Other than salary, what other ongoing costs do you have?

<comment><USER21> You have to serve a _lot_ of content to make $1.5M in advertising.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> 2010 turns out to start full of good news about small teams. First Balsamiq story, now this one. Anticipated is a new wave of optimistic first-time entrepreneurs with financial projections built on these cases :)</comment>


Professor makes his mark, but it costs him his job - <AUTHOR> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090206.wprof06/BNStory/National/home

<comment><USER2> This article reminds of another Canadian university prof named David Noble who doesn't give grades either. He seems to have found a way to do it without getting fired though.

 _Giving Up the Grade_ \- David Noble

[http://www.policyalternatives.ca/MonitorIssues/2007/05/Monit...](http://www.policyalternatives.ca/MonitorIssues/2007/05/MonitorIssue1639/)

 _Throughout the 30-odd years of my university teaching career I have always found ways around grading, primarily by giving all A's, thereby eliminating grades de facto, if not de jure. Last year for the first time, after long bemoaning my "anomalous" practice, York University officials formally prevailed upon me henceforth to designate my courses "ungraded " (a pass/fail option without the fail), thereby taking them off the radar screen and perhaps unintentionally establishing a promising academic precedent._

</comment><comment><USER3> As someone intimately involved in the art of assigning grades in a university setting (I'm a TA), let me let you in on a little secret...

Around 10 years ago, universities across the country awoke to a surprising new fact: they we're no longer bound by the expectation of being a benefactor of humanity. No! They were free to become thriving enterprises. And what was the product they should sell?

Grades

<comment><USER4> Can you elaborate on that? Do people brazenly purchase grades? At my university, I have to fight damn hard for an A.

<comment><USER3> Economics involves more than just the exchange of money...

For example: Student X, a member of the sports team (any sport will do), has been missing classes, not paying attention to the material, and doing poorly on the assignments. Then, X sleeps through the big exam. X comes to me, saying that (s)he should still be allowed to take the exam. I send X to the dean, and not more than 15 min later receive a phone call from the dean: "Couldn't we just let X take the test?" Me: "X is a poor student, has shown no remorse for missing the exam, and by all right should fail..." Dean: "Yes, but couldn't we let X take the exam?"

True story...X did get to take the exam, and got a C in the course.

The school has sold X a grade in exchange for X playing on the team, which brings revenue in to the school. Even when X isn't an athlete, the school is exchanging tuition revenue for grades.

...it's a shame, but people were really sweating last time the accreditation board did their once-in-a-blue-moon review. All the higher-ups wanted to skate a thin line between remaining accredited and still allowing as many students to get by with Bs and Cs as possible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If he wants to teach his students that grades "poison our educational environment", why is the solution to give everyone an A+? He's just using grades as currency to buy his students' support for his experiment in anarchy. I wonder how many of them would have still participated in his class if he had announced on the first day that everyone would get a C, a D, or an F?

</comment><comment><USER6> Good for him. The idea that trying different techniques in education (i.e. Not giving grades) seems silly. The system will not fall apart. College is not vocational school, although you can hardly tell the difference. Imagine if science had a rule: we'll do things the old way so it doesn't cause problems.

<comment><USER7> _Imagine if science had a rule: we'll do things the old way so it doesn't cause problems._

I'm pretty sure that's called "engineering".

<comment><USER8> No, that is manufacturing. New technologies are developed by engineers. But then, there is manufacturing engineering, so you may be correct for a subset of "engineering".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The important sentence in that story is _Prof. Rancourt's suspension is the most serious step in a long series of grievances and conflicts with the university dating back to 2005_.

Still, even if one-third of his colleagues have complained about him, I doubt they'll be willing to set the precedent of tenured profs being fired, they'll strike for him if the union requires it.

<comment><USER10> Honestly, this is my biggest problem with Unions. I've never had an issue with them conceptually. For jobs that aren't in high demand it's strategically foolish not to band together when dealing with an employer.

But for some reason Unions always end up answering to the lowest common denominator. So you have a group of people who largely want to do their job well being forced to walk away from that job to defend the idiots who do their jobs badly.

<comment><USER11> You really think this guy is an idiot? Have you attended college, seen what grades do to those who already have a passion for the topic at hand?

<comment><USER9> I think there's such a thing as choosing your battles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm not sure arresting him was justified but other than that I agree with the University.

He might not like grades but they are a basis by which employers judge job candidates. They represent a skill (hard work among other things) that employer's value. By doing away with them in his classroom he is compromising that whole system.

University teachers like this one need to realize that they have two tasks. To open student's minds AND to ensure they are qualified to function in society. He's completely ignored the second task and thinks he's a hero for having done so.

<comment><USER12> I'd dispute the statement that good grades are a useful measurement of ability to function in society. All grades really measure is students' abilities to get good grades. There are lots of factors that can go into getting a good grade, especially in courses where the grading process is necessarily subjective: writing in a style which appeals to the grader, building a relationship with the grader, studying in an optimal way for taking exams, being dedicated to your studies, etc.

Parts of this skillset are obviously useful in general. A person who is able to figure out how to appeal to their audience will do well in many fields. Some are more tricky; for instance, one might assume that someone who studies optimally for their exams will be able to figure how to perform other tasks optimally as well, but this is often not the case. One particularly misleading thing about grades is that they are often seen as an indicator of how dedicated/good of a worker students are. This might sometimes be the case; some students get good grades primarily because they work very hard. But some students get good grades without much effort, some only work hard because they have someone driving them (such as their parents), and some do well in an academic atmosphere but will burn out in a more job-oriented one. The biggest of these fallacies is that a student with low grades is a poor worker or bad in their subject; there are students who worked hard but just had a bad teacher, students who are overworked, students who prioritize certain classes over others, and students who are disenchanted with academic work but who will do well in a "real-world" atmosphere".

As an anecdote: I go to a fairly alternative liberal arts school that is nonetheless highly ranked (not that rankings are good judges of schools, but here's the US News page: [http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/college/items/...](http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/college/items/9645) ). My school accepts a fair number of students who in high school did not perform well academically. Many of these students pick up their grades while here; nearly all of these students are very smart and capable.

The problem with grades is that they fail to provide any breakdown of the factors which contribute to them, which is the truly useful information. Even in the cases where a student got all A+'s or all F's, where it seems that the student is probably overall competent or incompetent respectively, there are still external motivations which are not taken into account but which are nonetheless vitally important.

Another big problem with grades is that they fail to take into account differences between environments, school policies, and graders; that is, even when grading policies are objective, they differ from place to place but are compared nonetheless. Different graders grade differently; some may give A's to everyone who is qualified, while some may give them to only those who are _most_ qualified. Some of these effects can be damped through normalization, but usefully normalizing grades seems difficult as well. Imagine trying to normalize grades between MIT and community college students. Additionally, the information required to do any significant statistical tricks is often not avaliable to those who could use it, and those who could use it would probably not take the time to even if they could.

Finally, I feel like you completely missed the professor's point. (I'm assuming he believes arguments similar to mine.) Since grades don't provide signifcant metrics of anything, using them to judge people is both discriminatory and a bad idea. Thus, the responsible thing to do would be to get rid of them altogether (or at least reform them so that they actually measured something). But since he doesn't have the power to do that, he does the closest thing he can: give everyone the best grade possible. This has several positive effects: it lessens the potential future discrimination against his students; it, as you said, "compromis[es] that whole system", making more obvious how arbitrary it is and hopefully leads to its undoing; and it (he believes) makes students learn better.

He hasn't ignored the second task at all.

<comment><USER10> Honestly, though I know you are well meaning, I think you (and hte professor) missed the point. You (and he) could be completely right about grades. But It's not his place to do away with a system simply because he believes it to be ineffective.

In fact, that mentality is nothing short of disasterous.

To give an example, I live about 2 miles from my work. In that 2 miles there are 9 stop lights. They are timed so that you hit each one. This was done on purpose to prevent speeding. I feel that's ineffective (they're timed at 45mph meaning speeders can go 65 mph and get greens).

But I don't run the lights. If he truely feels grades are ineffective he should lobby his industry and get things officially changed.

<comment><USER12> You're comparing apples and oranges. In many cases, it really is a bad idea to circumvent the current system. But there are a couple of big differences between traffic lights and school grades.

For one, traffic lights work. When people obey them, they (excepting a faulty light) don't get into wrecks. They may not be efficient, but they get the job done.

School grades _don't work_. Because people make comparisons between things that aren't really comparable, a lot of people get jobs when perhaps they shouldn't or don't when they should. This is much more like a system where traffic lights are sometimes all green than ones which are timed in an annoying way.

What's the right thing to do when traffic lights are malfunctioning this way? The first thing you should do, obviously, is call the authorities. But what if the authorities don't believe you? You tell them that the lights are all green, but they _know_ their system works perfectly.

This is further complicated in the case of grading, because there isn't one central authority. There are thousands of schools and employers who all work with this system; getting them all to switch is no mean feat. So let's instead imagine that every traffic light is independently owned and operated, and that while the traffic light operators _feel_ like they are all working together, there are some subtle differences between their algorithms which obviously lead to screwups.

Since the people who run the traffic lights aren't responding to you, what should you do? Obviously, for your own safety and the safety of those around you you should stop at every intersection regardless of the light color. And if you have the ability, it would probably be a good idea to climb up and cover up the lights yourself, so that others who come to the broken intersection don't get confused.

<comment><USER10> Again though, the whole basis for your argument is that you are unquestionably right. Many people believe grades work just as well as traffic lights. I'd argue the majority of people in academia do (since they haven't been abolished). Employers hire based on grades so many of them do too.

The only way your argument makes sense is if we take your contention that "grades don't work" and treat it like gospel

(For the record, I'm not a believer in the grading system. I agree with much of what you are saying. I simply don't believe my opinion justifies throwing out the rules in and of itself)

<comment><USER12> I see what you mean, but I don't think I agree. For one, direct action seems to often be the best way to at least get started the sort of revolution that would have to occur to get this change made. (I'd argue that the only reason that the majority of people who believe in grades do is that they haven't taken much time to think about them.)

In addition, this isn't a case of, say, someone believing that people would be better off if they were occasionally hit with water balloons and thus deciding to throw them at random passerbys. (Whether that person would be justified in pelting everyone is subject to debate.) Instead, this is a case which only effects the people who chose to become his students. And how is he hurting them?

He isn't hurting their future prospects of getting a job (though I guess that maybe you could argue that he is diminishing his school's reputation or something like that). He isn't hurting their ability to learn--I think he's right that not using grades helps students learn better, and either way we generally give teachers the right to choose how to teach their students, since they're usually the most qualified to make that decision. The only possible way that he's hurting anyone is if later on one of his students get hired when they shouldn't have (or visa-versa), and arguably that decision isn't on him; if he's truly wrong about grades, then the rest of the students' grades should reflect that.

(Perhaps you could say that if some of the students wanted a grade, they should be given one, but I feel like he would be willing to give them feedback/change their grades if they asked him.)

<comment><USER10> I broke up the points here:

On Direct Action: Action can mean a lot of things. Maybe...MAYBE if he'd worked for years to abolish the grading system and gone out and debated proponents of the system and still failed...then maybe his actions might be justified. But he hasn't done that.

People who act unilaterally aren't trying to start debate they're afraid of it.

On hurting the Students: The question was never "is he diminishing the prospects of his students" it's "is he diminishing the prospects of other students." His students are getting A+ grades so it's unlikely they'll be hurt? But what about the person from another university who is trying to get a job where grades matter? What if that person got a B at their university and is competing against one of this professor's students who got an unjustified A+?

Systems exist to create a scale by which people judge. Even if that scale is as flawed as you contend it's the scale that exists and he doesn't have the right to tip it based solely on his own arrogance.

<comment><USER12> There are a number of people who have worked to abolish grades over the years, so I don't think your direct action point makes much sense. Additionally, this seems like the sort of issue that, simply due to inertia, won't be changed without some sort of revolution.

Again, I'd argue that he's not diminishing the prospects of other students (assuming most other graders grade "normally"), simply because other grades will balance them out. One A+ isn't going to make or break an interview. Besides, this sort of thing happens constantly anyways, simply due to the fact that different graders grade differently.

I think your last point comes down to a moral value judgment. You say that he doesn't have the right to try to fix the system on his own; I'd say that he has not only the right but the responsibility. I think this especially makes sense when you consider that, if grading is as flawed as I say it is, using grades to judge is _discrimination_ (and I mean it in the pejorative sense).

Think of it like racism. If there really is an intelligence gap between different races, and you are supposed to label peoples' races so that employers could judge them, then my moral intuition would line up with yours; it would be wrong for you to label everyone as white (or whatever the best race was supposed to be) just because you believed that race was a good indicator of intelligence.

But if race _isn't_ an accurate indicator of intelligence, but people were using it as a measurement of intelligence anyways, then my moral intuition says that you would have a responsibility to do everything you could to fight against racism, which could include labeling everyone as white.

Actually, it seems a rather sticky point.

<comment><USER10> One last point. Again, having done a Google Search I couldn't find a page that even debated the issue as much as we have here.

So if there's no record of the issue being debated even as much as we have in the last 6 hours or so how can people claim it's time for drastic action?

<comment><USER13> Try Googling "Alfie Kohn." He's an educator who's a big fan of abolishing letter grades, and also homework.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> One of the professors during my degree used a different method. It was difficult to fail his subjects; he could not fail a student because of a poor showing in a three-hour test. But to get an A, you had to show him that you knew exactly what you were talking (writing) about.

</comment><comment><USER14> _He has also been an outspoken critic of "Israeli military aggression" and is not shy about expressing those views with students._

I am certainly seeing a pattern here, first victims of the aggression are critical, world doesn't listen to them. Then neighboring countries are afraid and criticize Israel for being an aggressor. Then slowly decades pass by, smart people of other developed-countries start criticizing them for human- rights violation and then slowly most people will listen to the smart people of their own country and change their mind about Israel. So according to me, it is just a matter of time before everyone is critical of Israel (you can't fool all the people all the time).

</comment><comment><USER15> A couple of my professors at Rutgers did something like this in advanced classes, albeit at the end of the course.

</comment><comment><USER16> It sounds like this guy is a bit of a nut job and this was just their excuse for getting rid of him.

</comment><comment><USER17> wish I could've had him for physics...</comment>


Wireworld computer [Flash] - <AUTHOR> http://www.rezmason.net/wireworld/ Simulation of the Wireworld computer, calculating primes.<p>A description of how the computer works can be found at http://www.quinapalus.com/wi-index.html <comment><USER2> This is a good demo of how cellular automata don't always have to look or behave like the Game of Life. Wireworld has four cell states—dead, wire, head, and tail—where dead cells stay dead; heads decay into tails, and tails into wires; wires become heads when excited by one or two heads; and wires stay wires otherwise. You can easily see how this gives rise to the "electrons on the subway" effect.

And in this system it's fairly straightforward to actually build systems that compute things—albeit glacially slow. Contrast that with the Game of Life, where computation is more of an interesting emergent behaviour that's about as easy as butterfly programming.

</comment><comment><USER3> For a better demo of this, download Golly and open Wireworld/primes.mc. Start it playing and hit + a few times to increase the speed. [http://golly.sourceforge.net/](http://golly.sourceforge.net/)

Golly has other cellular automata computers too, in the JvN folder.

</comment><comment><USER4> Doesn't seem to do anything? I thought the counter would increase in a flurry of pulses but after watching it for a good five minutes, nothing happened.

<comment><AUTHOR> Try the overdrive mode (butten next to the bunny) if you are impatient.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Now just need an svg/canvas version and a way to cheaply print it to silicon.

<comment><USER6> Try FPGA/CPLD.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> So can you make logic gates in this?

<comment><USER8> Yes. See, e.g., [http://mathworld.wolfram.com/WireWorld.html](http://mathworld.wolfram.com/WireWorld.html) which has examples of OR, XOR and AND gates, and a little 8-bit multiplier.

<comment><USER7> Oh, but what about NOT gates?

EDIT: never mind, found not gates here: [http://karlscherer.com/Wireworld.html](http://karlscherer.com/Wireworld.html)

This wireworld rules, never heard of it before, and initially thought it was invented just now by the maker of the Flash app but now know better :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> >[Flash]

As if.</comment>


SUVs Are Worse for the Climate Than You Ever Imagined (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/suvs-are-worse-for-the-climate-than-you-ever-imagined/ <comment><USER2> The SUV craze needs to end. Even if all SUVs were electric they would still have the fatal flaw of killing more pedestrians than sedans due to their height and visibility issues.

</comment><comment><USER3> The type of content that gets people running in circles like headless chickens with a false sense of purpose.

</comment><comment><USER4> Lol why would you resurrect this terrible article.

<comment><AUTHOR> Care to formulate your criticism with some arguments?</comment></comment>


Defensive Coding Techniques You Should Use Today - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/swlh/2-defensive-coding-techniques-you-should-use-today-4225cacc1c29 <comment><USER2> TL/DR: When you start applying suggestions from this article, you are already on the wrong path.

What, you've got too many arguments so you wrap it in an object (AuthorSpecification)?

You're not even sure what input your method/function might get?

If it is an internal one, learn (I know that laziness is a virtue in a developer, but you'll carry revalidating the same data in every function if you do not). Oh look, I need to pass AuthorSpecification (already validated) into this other method, which will revalidate it as part of the defensive programming paradigm.

If it is an external facing one, sure, do some validation and publicize error conditions.

Asserts are also a lazy way to raise custom exceptions: nothing wrong with them, it's just that if your code will naturally fail (eg divide by zero), there is no need to hide that exception with an assert beforehand.

But the author does not even use actual assertions, he demonstrates with a trivial if, so I am not sure of the point.</comment>


Show HN: Analytics, reporting and BI for transactional emails and campaigns - <AUTHOR> https://mailintel.io <comment><USER2> I like this service but not enough to pay for it, and delegate something so crucial to closed source code, not to mention gdpr complications. Is there anybody here doing this already with something simple and open sourced?

<comment><AUTHOR> I actually started it as opensource but maintenance and monetisation was difficult. The source is still a good start point to build anything off Amazon SES/Mailgun analytics [https://github.com/suetco/suet](https://github.com/suetco/suet)</comment></comment>


Taking Swift For A Test Flight - <AUTHOR> http://www.bnotions.com/taking-swift-for-a-test-flight/?

<comment><USER2> Given the similarity between Swift and Scala syntax-wise, I'm wondering if in the future we'll see a common language for streamlining Apple and Android dev (i.e. same code with option to compile libraries to C and/or to JVM). Just a thought...</comment>


In 50 years, Steve Jobs will be forgotten, Gladwell says - <AUTHOR> http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57449162-71/in-50-years-steve-jobs-will-be-forgotten-gladwell-says

<comment><USER2> Forgotten may be too harsh of a word. Less revered or idolized might be more like it. If SpaceX and Tesla continue on their path, Musk might join the likes of Carnegie and Gates.

</comment><comment><USER3> Interesting - I was thinking about this just the other day. When you look at the wealthiest people of all time (of which Jobs is certainly not even close, nor is Gates) most of them aren't exactly household names. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_historical_f...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_historical_figures). Thomas Edison is kind of a parallel with Jobs, in that many of his 'inventions' weren't originally invented by him, but he was responsible for their commercialisation and refinement. 100 years on Edison is certainly well remembered, but Edison was a much more prolific inventor that Jobs was, and perhaps his inventions were more significant. Electricity > iPad/iPhone/Mac. Hopefully I'll still be around to see how this one plays out.

</comment><comment><USER4> To be remembered for 50 years is more than most people in the world could ever achieve. Including world leaders.

</comment><comment><USER5> If Jobs leads to a transformation of the corporate landscape, where more large companies stop paying so much attention to their share price and start paying much more attention to delighting their customers with great products, then Jobs will certainly be remembered as the instigator of this shift for the better.

Apple itself, with all its awesomeness, may only be worth a small footnote, though the "return of the Founder" is a powerful myth and that alone may lead to Jobs and Apple being studied in MBA courses for decades to come. However, the start of a wave of Apple-like companies (if it does start, which is by no means guaranteed) would probably earn Jobs a place in business history as one of the great influencers of his time.

</comment><comment><USER6> What does "forgotten" mean in this context? There are plenty of people that if I hadn't read about them in history class, they would, too, be forgotten. Is Gladwell saying people will stop writing about Jobs, or any popular literature that mentions him will be burned?

And from the article: "no one will even remember what Microsoft is" I guess that assumes we'll all be dead in 50 years. Actually, less time than that. This assumes that at some point in the future, Microsoft disappears, and shortly thereafter its memory. After reading that I stopped reading the article.

</comment><comment><USER7> Steve Jobs will most likely become the Edison of our times.

In every way.

</comment><comment><USER8> This is like 6 minute abs but in reverse for Gladwell. Outliers require 10000 hours, but if you want to outlive the pyramids, better start earlier than kindergarten.

<comment><USER3> Perhaps to be remembered 50 years after your death you have to be a meta-meta- meta outlier.

<comment><USER5> As a businessman, for sure. As an artist, the bar is a bit lower. You just have to be Great.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> How many years before we can forget Gladwell?</comment>


How mirror neurons affect the experience of fandom - <AUTHOR> http://nautil.us/issue/59/connections/why-some-sports-fans-have-more-fun <comment><USER2> Isn't it possible that mirror neurons are ... nothing special ? In the sense that they're not different at all from any other neuron, they just happen to be located in places where they encode very high-level concepts.

For instance, in deep reinforcement learning, you have ... let's say "half- mirror neurons", in the sense that they fire when the network is trying to execute an action and when it is placed in that action, then they fire just the same.

Neurons are unary. They fire when they observe some high-level concept happening. Doesn't it make sense that once you go high-level enough ... it doesn't matter anymore whether it's "local" or not.

<comment><USER3> Yes, this made me think of the story about how a biologist would identify the function of parts in a radio, posted here some time ago, [1].

> A more successful approach will be to remove components one at a time or to > use a variation of the method, in which a radio is shot at a close range > with metal particles. In the latter case, radios that malfunction (have a > "phenotype") are selected to identify the component whose damage causes the > phenotype. Although removing some components will have only an attenuating > effect, a lucky postdoc will accidentally find a wire whose deficiency will > stop the music completely. The jubilant fellow will name the wire > Serendipitously Recovered Component (SRC) and then find that SRC is required > because it is the only link between a long extendable object and the rest of > the radio. The object will be appropriately named the Most Important > Component (MIC) of the radio. A series of studies will definitively > establish that MIC should be made of metal and the longer the object is the > better, which would provide an evolutionary explanation for the finding that > the object is extendable.

[1] [https://bml.bioe.uic.edu/BML/Stuff/Stuff_files/biologist%20f...](https://bml.bioe.uic.edu/BML/Stuff/Stuff_files/biologist%20fix%20radio.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> ... Ingo Swann introduced me to the 'mirror neuron' concept -- at his 2004 talk in Las Vegas iirc -- and suggested that these are part of the biological explanation for certain phenomenon: (so-called) extra-sensory perception, telepathy, etc.

from the article:

> The mirror neuron system is a network of neurons that activates both when > you watch someone do something and when you do it yourself

Ingo also pointed out (iirc) that the effects of mirror neurons are what makes pornography so compelling for (some) men. Even though pictures are no substitute for the experience, mirror neurons allow the observer to get more stimulation than they'd get otherwise.

my earlier comment about Ingo Swann: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12997711](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12997711)

<comment><USER5> > extra-sensory perception, telepathy, etc.

Eh? Barring brain implants that have yet to be invented, these are in the realm of fantasy/quackery/pseudoscience.

<comment><USER6> Yeah, but mirror neurons could be what cause people to _think_ they can read minds. Imagine watching someone over a period of time, and you subconsciously pick up on subtle cues and microexpressions that give you a more detailed picture of that person's mental state than you would otherwise be able to guess. To someone unfamiliar with the role of mirror neurons -- even to yourself -- this would be almost indistinguishable from mind reading (or at least Counselor Troi style "empathy"). It reportedly happens a lot in the scam psychic trade, wherein a charlatan comes to believe that, like Oda Mae Brown from _Ghost_ , they've actually developed the powers they have heretofore only pretended to have. Such charlatans are called "shuteyes" in the business.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Are mirror neurons really a thing? Why can't the neurons which govern _my arm_ be used to help predict the actions of other people's arms?

<comment><USER8> My rough understanding is that's essentially what happens. Mirror neurons (it's a relatively small area) are not, and could not be, a completely isolated replication of all the other subsystems in the brain. They just connect observation or imagination of what someone else might be experiencing to your own respective motor/cognitive areas. If there were no filter/activation subsystem for what someone else was experiencing, you'd be experiencing everyone else's experiences all the time. Or experiencing none of it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > A Calm Look at the Most Hyped Concept in Neuroscience - Mirror Neurons

[https://www.wired.com/2013/12/a-calm-look-at-the-most- hyped-...](https://www.wired.com/2013/12/a-calm-look-at-the-most-hyped- concept-in-neuroscience-mirror-neurons/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Mirror neurons aren't talked about enough. The repercussions in every field of human psychology (then economics, religious, etc) are huge. and really important today. I suspect we will hear about them a lot more in the future.</comment>


Tips On Tech Writing - <AUTHOR> http://blog.semilshah.com/2012/12/19/tips-on-tech-writing/

<comment><USER2> From the linked article, here is the first suggestion from the first scenario:

"Trying [sic] writing in outline form, like they made us do in grammar school with numbers, nesting, and Roman numerals."

And I should take your advice on writing?

The ur-question is, why do people with no writing skill or aptitude seem compelled to post advice columns on writing?

Here's my writing advice:

1\. Learn how to write.

2\. Write.

Not the other way around.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi lutusp,

Thanks for pointing out the typo. Your advice is good, too. I wrote this because I am often asked this question.</comment></comment>


US intelligence reports from January and February warned about a likely pandemic - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/us-intelligence-reports-from-january-and-february-warned-about-a-likely-pandemic/2020/03/20/299d8cda-6ad5-11ea-b5f1-a5a804158597_story.html <comment><USER2> Any intelligence service worth its salt would have kept a close eye on the situation developing in China, so in that respect this is not unexpected.

Personally I knew this could be very bad when I started hearing news about the Chinese qarantining first Wuhan, then the surrounding cities. This involved huge numbers of people and was done quite swiftly and on a scale never seen before in modern times (to my knowledge anyway). Quite frankly it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I did wonder at the time how long before it reaches our shores (not that long) and what would our response be like (nowhere near as organised and focused although I guess things are picking up). I'm in the UK.

<comment><USER3> The newsworthy bit isn't that intelligence services noted the potential threat. It's that the White House chose to ignore them.

<comment><USER2> The White House ignoring sound advice and doing its own thing... we've had a few good years of that. How is that news? (By White House I mean one person, and I'm saying this in a jokey way)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Part of the problem was that we thought this was just another virus that we could control. We were over confident and it didn't help that our president thinks he knows everything. We have seen that most countries were unprepared for the avalanche this virus is turning out to be. I think that only the countries that have gone thru a previous epidemic have it under some control. The world was caught unprepared.

</comment><comment><USER5> To be fair this has been on Reddit and Twitter since late January. So it wasn't exactly a state secret.

Here is the post that first alerted me to the possible pandemic 55 days ago.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/eusojf/conc...](https://www.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/eusojf/concerning_the_recent_wuhan_coronavirus_outbreak/)

</comment><comment><USER6> Didn't the intelligence community warn of a likely pandemic with sars and swine and...

<comment><USER7> >Didn't the intelligence community warn of a likely pandemic with sars and swine and...

Yes, and MERS as well, and these warnings were listened to. Actions were taken. Experts deployed. Testing enacted. A whole machine of pandemic expertise, sitting dormant, shuddered to life, and pinched off the supply of fresh hosts for the viruses.

This time, not so much.

<comment><USER8> I seem to recall that we were told that those people could be hired back really quickly if needed while disbanding the part of the NSC that was supposed to take point on this.</comment></comment></comment>


How long does it take to create an Android app? - <AUTHOR> http://www.chunkapp.com/blog/how-long-does-it-take-to-make-an-android-app/

<comment><USER2> 30 hours.

[http://startpad.org/blog/diving-android-development-the- pock...](http://startpad.org/blog/diving-android-development-the-pocket- enigma-machine)

<comment><USER3> Cool, I'd be interested in hearing how you got on. We're currently 15 hours in (or 2 pizzas and 1 indian meal if you use those units).</comment></comment>


DNS Blocking: A Viable Strategy in Malware Defense - <AUTHOR> https://insights.sei.cmu.edu/sei_blog/2017/06/dns-blocking-a-viable-strategy-in-malware-defense.html <comment><USER2> Sort of off-topic, but I brought this up in a cybersecurity info session at my organization. I questioned whether it would be viable to block all incoming ads in order to save bandwidth, and also mitigate the possibility of any incoming malvertising attacks. We already do a lot of DNS blocking to begin with, I thought maybe blocking ads through DNS would be helpful.

The response was that it would hinder user experience on the browser, and we are doing a good enough job at blocking malware as it is right now and the amount of effort to block ads would not be worth the return.

I still remain curious as to what would happen if we did block ads company- wide using DNS.</comment>


Amazon launches in Mexico - <AUTHOR> http://www.amazon.com.mx

<comment><USER2> I'm not familiar with the TLDs in Mexico. Is it common for sites to prefer ___.com.mx over just ___.mx? When I visit amazon.mx, it redirects me to amazon.com.mx.

</comment><comment><USER3> That link just screams "I'M A VIRUS! CLICK ME!"

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm surprised it hadn't launched there already. I guess I _shouldn 't_ be surprised...</comment>


Show HN: Simple way to access various statistics in Git repository from bash - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/arzzen/git-quick-stats <comment><USER2> Nice idea, but why depend on dialog at all? Surely the Git Way™ would be to accept switches or subcommands to pick which stats you want to see, perhaps with an _optional_ interactive mode.

Additionally, judging by the name this is meant as a Git custom command. It should therefore be possible to run it with `git quick-stats`, like any other Git command. I'd suggest updating the docs to confirm that this usage is possible and recommended.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your comment, i edited it.</comment></comment>


Unwitting users of WeChat aid the app's blacklisting of sensitive images - <AUTHOR> https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3018725/how-unwitting-users-wechat-aid-chinese-messaging-apps <comment><USER2> Still not clear how users are 'helping' exactly? Seems like they just have their chats filtered. What am I missing?

This is a frustrating article to read. Every sentence and paragraph from the start to about 3/4 down just repeats the same information as is in the headline over and over again in a different format.

</comment><comment><USER3> After reading the article it seems to me that, contrary to the title, the users don't do anything to actively "aid" the built-in blacklisting in the app?

<comment><USER4> If the image classification for censorship is applied to all images sent worldwide, but only China-based accounts get censored, then just by using the app among non-China-registered accounts to share images that would be sensitive in China, uncensored users are unwittingly helping to build the censored image database before users in China ever try to share the material.

<comment><USER3> By that logic every internet user everywhere is "helping" because wechat can train their algorithms on any public picture "before".

It's just a false claim that the "users" are helping.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> abbridged: hash of an image, ocr to detect forbidden phrases, manual post-fact clsasification by contractors and:

"Image filtering only occurred when at least one of the chat participants had an account registered to a mainland Chinese number"

</comment><comment><USER6> Users don't do anything because they don't care. Chinese people have the mentality that makes them think, I didn't do anything wrong so what am I afraid of?

<comment><USER7> The same mentality can be seen in the West too.

<comment><USER8> > _The same mentality can be seen in the West too._

Most demonstrated, IMPE, by the phrase, " _You have nothing to fear, if you have nothing hide._ "</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What is your download speed? - <AUTHOR>

In any order: Download speed, Upload speed, Location? and ISP. Also would be nice to get more details about how your connection is set up. <comment><USER2> Germany near Hamburg 500MB/s down and 600MB/s up ISP: DFN

</comment><comment><USER3> [http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3174979000](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3174979000)

Current ISP: T-Mobile (using a broadband dongle)

Location: UK

UP: 0.57 Mbps

DOWN: 0.53 Mbps

Cheap - £30 for 90 days with "no limits" (but with limits). Sucky image caching. Sucky client (but you don't have to use it). Awful customer support.

</comment><comment><USER4> [http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3183694188](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3183694188)

Skövde, Sweden

Down 90.32 Mbps

Up 10.02 Mbps

That's over my Wifi, I could probably get it up to 100 Mbps (that's what I pay for) if I connected a cable to my router.

</comment><comment><USER5> This is an average Malaysian internet connection.

[http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3185041626](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3185041626)

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Download: 1.33Mbps Upload: 0.53Mbps

It's around RM140 = 40++USD per month.

</comment><comment><USER6> Currently ADSL with something like 8/1 but in the proccess of moving to cable 100/10\. I believe I can get 500/50 or so from my cable company though that costs more than I would like.

Current ISP: Telia.

New ISP: Comhem

Stockholm, Sweden.

</comment><comment><USER7> Southamerican here, guess you would be interested, considering most will come from the Us.

Max download speed in transmission(mac) in optimal conditions: 5Mb/s On average: 1Mb/s

Up.speed: Can't tell, i barely upload anything. ISP: Antel

</comment><comment><USER8> [http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3201480754](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3201480754) Airtel Broadband, India Download speed : 0.66 Mbps Upload speed : 0.48Mbps

</comment><comment><USER9> [http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3180321085](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3180321085)

Tigard, OR, USA

Down: 25.48

Up: 20.93

ISP: Frontier Communications

</comment><comment><USER10> On a good day I get around 15Mbps download and 1Mbps upload. I've gotten upwards of 40Mbps download and 8Mbps upload while tethered to my phone though.

Location: Los Angeles

ISP: Time Warner Cable

</comment><comment><USER11> [http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3180558017](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3180558017)

Helena, MT, USA

Down: 72.77 Mbps

Up: 45.06 Mbps

</comment><comment><USER12> Down: 28.08 Up: 4.66 US ISP:Cincinnati Bell [http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3180272022](http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3180272022)

</comment><comment><USER13> Download speed is'nt what matters its the quality. [http://actual- experience.com/bbfix](http://actual-experience.com/bbfix)

</comment><comment><USER14> 681 Mbps down, 641 Mbps up. ([http://www.speedtest.net/result/3174926712.png](http://www.speedtest.net/result/3174926712.png))

</comment><comment><USER15> UK: 37Mbps / 2.4Mbps

[http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/3178007556](http://www.speedtest.net/my- result/3178007556)

</comment><comment><USER16> Down: 100 Mbps

Up: 20 Mbps

Location: Canada

ISP: SaskTel

It's a fiber connection. I'm not sure why they limit the upstream so much.

<comment><USER17> > I'm not sure why they limit the upstream so much.

So that you don't run a data center from your house, which would saturate the network, which they are likely overselling, and so you don't cannibalize from the hosting services they would also be happy to sell you ala carte.

Also, in general web usage, the UPstream data requests are usually much smaller than the DOWN. E.g., "GET [http://youtube.com/video"](http://youtube.com/video") is very small, even with headers and whatnot added in, compared to the size of the video returned. It's more like 100:1 than 100:20, so unless you're trying to run services from home, you're likely coming out ahead.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Down 10Mbps, Up 1Mbps, USA, Brighthouse. Connection is through cable TV infrastructure.

</comment><comment><USER19> Down 40Mbps, Up 25Mbps, UK, Virgin Media.

We have an optical-fibre line from them.

</comment><comment><USER20> Down: 50 Mbps, Up: 20 Mbps Location: Tasmania, Australia ISP: Internode (NBN)

</comment><comment><USER21> Down: 100 Mbps Up: 10 Mbps Location: Netherlands ISP: UPC

Cable :)

<comment><USER22> Exactly the same here (NL too). Don't think I need this kind of speed, but it was included in the package... Note that this costs you about EUR 55 per month, including landline phone AND cable TV. Not too bad compared to other countries!

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> South Europe: Download speed around 10Mb/s, upload 1Mb/s</comment>


Facebook breaks all applications - <AUTHOR> http://bugs.developers.facebook.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2007

<comment><USER2> Something about this bug makes me just desperately want to close it as "worksforme", but I'm speaking as a facebook user rather than a facebook developer :-)

</comment><comment><USER3> hopefully this is a feature not a bug

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> For at least the last 2 hours, users haven't been able to add any applications. If you're developing for Facebook (like me!), please vote for the bug (see link). And if you work at facebook, please fix it!

<comment><USER4> it seems like this is fixed

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, looks like they fixed it about half an hour ago.</comment></comment></comment>


Material Design 2.0 in React Native with React Native Paper - <AUTHOR> https://callstack.github.io/react-native-paper <comment><USER3> If I ever invent a new physical actual material or structure, I'm going to call it "syntax error" or "for loop". Then when people complain over the Internet that their syntax error is leaking water, I finally get my revenge!

<comment><USER4> If you make something physical, you should call it "abstraction", and wait for people to complain that it leaks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Material Design makes more sense in mobile apps. It meant for extremely simple UX/UI which mobile apps are naturally fit for. Thanks for the great work!

inline ask-HN : Do you guys really prefer it for complicated web apps ? Do you think it provides better user experience ? is everything flat and chromeless better on eyes when there is so much stuff on screen?

<comment><USER6> I hate it for web apps. Material design is designed primarily for simpler interfaces with a small screen and imprecise inputs, yet I use most web apps from my desktop or laptop where I have a large screen and very precise input methods. You cannot consolidate the two.

I'm not a fan of material design for mobile applications either. I find the animations obnoxious and annoying. It has also been my experience that mobile applications tend to have incredibly low information density and they require jumping through tons of hoops to perform even simple tasks. If I have the choice of installing a mobile app or using its website I always use the website.

<comment><USER7> Exactly.

By the way, we used to have a very precise input method on mobile - <USER2> stylus. In the times of Windows Mobile (original Windows Mobile, not renamed Windows Phone) with resisitive screens. The information density of those 240x320 3" screens is hard to achieve even today - google 'SPB Diary' for examples. Combined with stylus, multi-level menus and physical QWERTY keyboards (with shortcuts!) that were the very efficient machines actually.

Maybe recent revival of stylus, thanks to iPad Pro will tend to abandon the 'huge control elements' UI paradigm.

Samsung with their S-Pen on Note models would have a really value-adding and interesting stylus-oriented UI (as an option) instead of awful TouchWiz for years, but they never did it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> We just released React Native Paper 2.0

\- Material Design 2.0

\- Accessibility improvements

\- RTL Support

- New components

Check it out and don't forget to give us a star!

</comment><comment><USER8> From what I can tell from a Google search, Google has never released material design 2.0. What does it mean to have material design 2.0 incorporated here?

<comment><USER9> It's an unofficial term for the updated material design guidelines, revealed at Google I/O this year.

<comment><USER10> I much prefer the text inputs in the new style.

Does anyone know of any good implementations in regular React of this newer style (2.0)?

material-ui seems to only implement the previous style: [https://material- ui.com/demos/text-fields/](https://material-ui.com/demos/text-fields/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Great work!</comment>