Ask HN: Why are many software engineers on a "later" schedule? - <AUTHOR>

Most of the programmers I know would rather wake up late and stay up until 4 AM programming then get up early and go to bed at 10 PM (myself included). Is there any reason for this? Am I living in a bubble? <comment><USER2> If you start working at 8am, your whole day is going to be interrupted with impromptu meetings and emails. If you start at 6am, you only get 2-3 hours uninterrupted. If you've been writing software for a while you learn that the interruptions are intentional and are about control. When people see a software engineer working without their help, it is troubling for them. It means the problem can be solved without them, hence interruptions. Most non- developers actually have family lives and start getting calls from their spouses about 4:30PM. By five they're gone and work can proceed.

</comment><comment><USER3> For me, rush hour traffic sucks. I like to get to the gym around 8:30 (most people have left or are leaving by 8:30). So I can get a nice 60 to 90 minute workout in w/o having to wait on the squat rack. Then have a nice leisurely drive into work at 10 or 10:30. Answer all my emails that I think I need to answer, make my Pomodoro list for the day, go to lunch, and get back around 12:30 or 1 and dive into coding till 8 or 9 o'clock. My girlfriend is the same way so our schedules are in sync, and we both generally eat late dinners. Soon when I'm living in NYC, my options for late dinner will be better :)

</comment><comment><USER4> pg nailed it in a comment from a while ago:

" _For me this is the most critical part. It's not enough just not to be interrupted. I have to feel like I couldn't be interrupted_.

 _That's the great thing about programming at night. If everyone else is asleep (except other people who don't want to be interrupted) they won't even think of interrupting you._ "

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3146815>

<comment><USER5> This is absolutely brilliant. It perfectly and precisely depicts how I feel.

Most of the time, I love to talk and interact with people. Everyone has a story to tell and networking rarely hurts. As a current freelancer, it's fascinating to hear people say, "I need X. How can we make this happen?" My mind instantly fills with a wide variety of solutions, which are then filtered down to the best possible few. Then we talk back and forth and determine what is best for the both of us.

Now we get to the point of actually coding. I appreciate solitude when it comes to this. I need some time to get in the 'zone.' I need time to fix errors to create a great product. I ultimately need uninterrupted time to enter the world of brackets (I'm an iOS guy - you guessed it!) to create something that people will enjoy.

After this entire process is over, something new has been conceived and I get to continue to do what I love. It is the best job I could have for myself right now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> My personal expirence matches: "Why Programmers Work at Night [1]".

[1] [http://www.businessinsider.com/why-programmers-work-at- night...](http://www.businessinsider.com/why-programmers-work-at-night-2013-1)

<comment><USER7> Thanks for posting this (as I sit here coding at 5am).

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I've never really thought about why it's common, but I see it all the time. Maybe it's a culture thing? Developers like to go to bed late because other developers like to go to bed late? Although that's pretty dangerous circular logic.

But oftentimes programming evolves from staying up late while still in grade school, hacking or gaming or what have you into the wee hours of the morning. At least, that's the pattern that I and many fellow developers I know follow.

</comment><comment><USER9> Most dev people I know, including myself tend to get more done when everyone else is asleep.

<comment><USER10> Rephrasing a bit:

      Most people I know get more done when they aren't interrupted

I'm a morning person, but unfortunately it is much easier to get an uninterrupted block later in the day (6pm and after) than it is early in the morning (6am onward).

If I could function better late at night, I'd switch my schedule in a heartbeat.

<comment><USER11> My favorite time of day is 4am. No one else is up, and it's early enough to stay that way for 2-4 hours.

I get foggy and uninspired after 11pm, but in the morning I can fix the world.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> In addition to minimal interruptions, I find that there is a related benefit that fewer people are utilizing resources: my database server can much more quickly nswer my questions, the bandwidth to my neighborhood isn't being used by lots of people streaming movies, and if I need to make a change, in addition to affecting fewer people, I have more idle capacity to handle rollbacks or failovers.

</comment><comment><USER13> HN user 'Swizec' actually wrote a small ebook on this, called 'Why programmers work at night":

[http://swizec.com/blog/why-programmers-work-at- night/swizec/...](http://swizec.com/blog/why-programmers-work-at- night/swizec/3198)

<https://leanpub.com/nightowls>

</comment><comment><USER14> Too much thought pollution during the day.

</comment><comment><USER15> I tend to get into work at 10:30 AM which is later than all the other developers at my workplace, but they all have families so their schedules may revolve around other responsibilities. I've tried getting up earlier, but I always revert to the 10:30 schedule after a day or two. I always end up doing something or getting more sleep that undoes the early plan. While I understand the lack of interruptions is a benefit, I'm not even sure why I get up at 8-8:30 AM. Perhaps it's just a random habit.

</comment><comment><USER16> My peak time for performing focused sedentary work starts at about 4pm and runs for four to twelve hours. Earlier in the day, like now, I am wound differently and more readily distracted.

</comment><comment><USER17> People don't interrupt me at 3am.

</comment><comment><USER18> Is it only about interruptions? I dont think so.

<comment><USER19> Nor do I. I think it's a combination of things, habits formed from playing games late as a kid is one, but I think that wanting to solve a problem enough to stay up late for it is another. As is a natural procrastinating spirit that many developers have. I get my best work done between 12pm-2am because I finally STOP INTERRUPTING MYSELF. When it's just me finishing that user story that's standing between myself and sleep, I tend to stop going on reddit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I work from about 5:00 am to about 4pm.

<comment><USER21> In my opinion, you may be working too hard or I hope you take lots of breaks.</comment></comment>


A Little Known SQL Feature: Use Logical Windowing to Aggregate Sliding Ranges - <AUTHOR> https://blog.jooq.org/2016/10/31/a-little-known-sql-feature-use-logical-windowing-to-aggregate-sliding-ranges/ <comment><USER2> This technique applies to many RDBMS, not just Oracle (as others have noted). Teradata, PostgreSQL, MS SQL all have 'analytical' functions like this. Analytical functions (over, partition by, etc) are extremely powerful and can help simplify architecture/design for the data science/analytical communities.

One of the persistent issues on my team is the reliance upon a dataframe representation w/ R or python to do this type of aggregation and windowing. Most people will eschew learning the 'advanced' SQL and instead bring data locally to do imperative style munging on it.

This creates a few issues, mainly adding complexity to the analytical stack: \- Instead of querying the data and doing ETL/feature engineering in the db- you are moving data around (usually to less powerful machines, such as a laptop) for simple exploration.

\- This wastes time and usually results in more dependencies (dplyr for example- no hate Hadley), sometimes even limiting you to single threaded operations. Teradata, for example, is massively parallel and will perform these operations in short order. I've seen Data Scientists wait 6hr for R to do the same thing a SQL query against a prod system returns in 3min.

\- Code is not portable. A query can be executed and results retrieved through ODBC, JDBC or native connections. Without these, data engineers are often asked to install R (including libs) on some intermediate machine just to do munging/ETL/feature engineering. If SQL driven, moving from quantitative exploration to operational is quite easy (maybe just a query tune).

All that to say, I'm glad this post is highlighting some of the advanced SQL that I hope more people rely upon. All of these ideas are better articulated in MAD Skills [0]

[0] [http://db.cs.berkeley.edu/papers/vldb09-madskills.pdf](http://db.cs.berkeley.edu/papers/vldb09-madskills.pdf)

<comment><USER3> One minor nit - normally a prod db is subject to availability restrictions that limit your ability to run 3 minute-long queries on them that suck up a bunch of resources. Nightly mirror to a staging/analysis db of sorts is a bit better practice.

Window functions are extraordinarily powerful, as are Common Table Expressions (CTE's). I encourage anyone who uses SQL with any regularity to learn them immediately once they are comfortable with the more straightforward queries and clauses SQL offers. Once you've mastered windowing and CTE's, you'll wonder how you functioned without them.

<comment><USER4> The admins at my work have always told us (i.e. people wanting to run data analysis) to avoid executing complex queries on production servers.

The workflow I use is to run simple select queries on prod databases. To bring the subset of data I'm interested in down locally Once I have the "extracts" I'm interested in I'll transform the data locally using SAS.

SAS has pretty powerful time interval routines which is what I'd typically use to compute something like the example in the article.

My work has just started looking at "big data" we have a new hadoop databases which is supposed to be used for that so I assume if I ever need to start looking into data stored there it will make more sense to run the SQL "on the database". So the article has some useful info there.

<comment><USER5> One thing to note here might be that if network is the bottleneck you'd likely be asked the opposite. In my experience if people pay attention to indexes/partitioning they can win dba's hearts, but dbas often don't explain these things because most people don't listen. So to them its easier to say "don't run complex queries".

<comment><USER3> Part of the problem with people paying attention to indexes/partitioning is that there's no very easy way to display that to the end user. A person knowledgeable in SQL can query the right tables to determine this but at that point you're pretty much thinking like a DBA in the first place. If major vendors had a nice visualization of such a thing built into the interaction tools like SSMS/SQL Developer/PGAdmin3 etc. then it might be easier (these might exist, I'm just not aware of them).

So yeah, the end result is DBA's give the generic "don't run SELECT * and use a WHERE clause when you're querying large tables"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I have made a lot of window function converts. It's amazing how many devs don't know about them. When I see a whole series of CASE statements + subqueries, it is almost always possible to dramatically simplify the query with one or more window functions.

</comment><comment><USER7> This (in perhaps a slightly different syntax flavor) works on Hive/Presto/SparkSQL as well by the way. Also in Apache drill.

[https://drill.apache.org/docs/sql-window-functions- introduct...](https://drill.apache.org/docs/sql-window-functions- introduction/)

<comment><USER8> Presto implements the SQL standard, so the syntax is identical: [https://prestodb.io/docs/current/functions/window.html](https://prestodb.io/docs/current/functions/window.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Windowing functions in standard SQL databases are like putting lipstick on a pig. You created a design based on sets then later tried to slap on the idea of order to sets. kdb is based on the concept of ordered lists, not sets and makes windowing functions on time and order based queries ridiculously easy. If this kind of thing interests you I recommend checking it out these comparison queries between kdb and standard SQL: [http://www.timestored.com/b/kdb-qsql-query-vs- sql/](http://www.timestored.com/b/kdb-qsql-query-vs-sql/)

Unfortunately kdb is very expensive.

<comment><USER10> > Windowing functions in standard SQL databases are like putting lipstick on a > pig.

I have always thought the underlying Relational Algebra of SQL databases to be quite beautiful ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_algebra](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_algebra)). This doesn't make it the right tool for every job, but let's try to shy away from calling it a, "pig".

> You created a design based on sets then later tried to slap on the idea of > order to sets.

I have some questions here.

It sounds like you are implying that sets and order are mutually exclusive, but this is not my understanding of the math. Could you elaborate?

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partially_ordered_set](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partially_ordered_set)

* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_order](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_order)

From the second reference on Total Order:

> "The lexicographical order on the Cartesian product of a family of totally > ordered sets, indexed by a well ordered set, is itself a total order."

This quote seems to actually contradict this implication...especially in respect to Relational Algebra which relies heavily on Cartesian Product.

Thanks in advance for your response! I enjoy improving my own understanding of the underlying Computer Science/Mathematics whenever I can.

<comment><USER9> >>It sounds like you are implying that sets and order are mutually exclusive, but this is not my understanding of the math. Could you elaborate?

The concept of sets and order may not be mutually exclusive in the mathematical theory but in terms of how actual databases were conceived and implemented they were very far apart. Early on many databases actually took advantage of the fact the operations were set based and that order was not guaranteed to achieve a number of speed optimizations. How long did many databases take to get row number support? "partition by" support?

Take a look at this SO post for doing a running sums calculation: [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14953294/how-to-get- runni...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/14953294/how-to-get-running-sum- of-a-column-in-sql-server)

This is the same kdb code: update runningSumB:sums b by a from t

Instead many people ended up turning to cursors to allow ordered calculations.

<comment><USER10> > The concept of sets and order may not be mutually exclusive in the > mathematical theory but in terms of how actual databases were conceived and > implemented they were very far apart.

I may be wrong, but it was my understanding the original Relational Databases were very much based on the Relational Algebra originally pioneered by E.F. Codd[1]. So I think it is a stretch to say that they were "conceived" separate from the mathematics.

Further, it was my understanding that E.F. Codd took his relational algebra which he developed while working as a researcher at IBM and applied it to an implementation of an RDBMS also at IBM (now known as IBM DB2)[2]. So similarly, I think it is a stretch to claim that databases were originally implemented "far apart" from the mathematics.

I think there is a valid point that actual DB implementations may be lacking, but isn't that a reason not to use that particular implementation rather than a knock against Relational models?

I may be wrong, but it seems like your problems aren't with the Relational Model but rather with potentially lacking/incomplete implementations of it.

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

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_DB2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_DB2)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I don't use SQL that much in my day to day work but I have a need that Windowing will satisfy. Thanks to @mariuz for submitting this.

I use Oracle mostly so I don't even have to worry about syntax differences.

</comment><comment><USER12> Itzik Ben-Gan wrote a whole book just on SQL windows functions and it's brilliant. He writes for SQL server usually, but he made this one more generic, he had to because at the time SQL server 2012 was missing much of the functionality he described, unlike Postgres or Oracle. Postgres has incredible capability here - Window AND Frame partitions/ordering, also row based ranges or value based ranges. And as a huge bonus unique to Postgres, the wondeful - Filter by clause - so much more elegant than sub queries.

<comment><USER13> This one?

 _Microsoft SQL Server 2012 High-Performance T-SQL Using Window Functions (Developer Reference)_

[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00JDMPHKY](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00JDMPHKY)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> _How many payments were there in the same hour as any given payment?

How many payments were there in the same hour before any given payment?

How many payments were there within one hour before any given payment?_

I have two serious questions.

(1) In which realistic scenario would you ever need to ask such questions in the first place?

(2) Even if you did need to do so, for example for risk management, occasional reporting or some kind of adaptive scaling supposition, then surely you would be calculating once per time unit (eg. hour/day) or recomputing a sliding- total?

As I have actually personally written a number of relatively high profile, large scale, publicly deployed, major brand digital entertainment content rental and purchase systems (including complexities resulting from things like multi-device, multi-DRM cryptography) for brands like LG, Nokia, Samsung, etc. - these are not flippant questions.

Looking further... uh-oh... author uses Java.

 _Sakila example database was originally developed by Mike Hillyer of the MySQL AB documentation team. This project is designed to help database administrators to decide which database to use for development of new products. The user can run the same SQL against different kind of databases and compare the performance._

So the Sakila project referenced is not supposed to be a real project, it's a personal re-interpretation of a test project designed specifically by a database nerd with zero domain knowledge to show off database features...

 _jOOQ is an innovative solution for a better integration of Java applications with popular databases_

... and this is what the author is working on, the world's billionth RDBMS ORM layer.

IMHO readability is far more important than efficiency. Programmers should generally avoid using these types of obscure, frequently partly platform- linked techniques and consider their drawbacks against other potential solutions.

Five minutes of life wasted.

<comment><USER15> Huh? Windowing functions are part of the SQL standard (as of SQL2003).

Also, these types of queries are the bread and butter of analytical queries (not really as useful for transactional purposes).

<comment><USER14> There is 'standard' and there is 'reality'.

If it doesn't work everywhere (eg. on sqlite) then it's not 'standard' in that it's not familiar to all developers (minimum subset).

The further you go from that subset, the higher price your developers pay to grok your code. Yes, that includes stuff as simple as foreign keys, indices, etc.

Contrary to your bread and butter assertions, in my experience this stuff is end-of-the-branch, end-of-the-twig, end-of-the-leaf, only-present-at-winter- solstice level common in web and CRUD applications.

<comment><USER16> I've worked on multiple true relational SQL and 'analytics' backends and they have all supported analytic functions of varying complexity. Everyone around me was using them as well because the queries were orders of magnitude faster, and smaller and _more readable_ than using nested SELECT ... GROUP BY statements to achieve the same result.

Note that for reporting and analytics workloads, 1) even batch queries can be much faster using analytics functions because the optimizer can do many of them for essentially free as part of the scan rather than requiring a subquery and 2) interactive workflows become much, much quicker in my experience. Data exploration is much less useful if running a query takes 5 hours rather than 30 seconds.

Defining sqlite as the 'standard' SQL and refusing to use any other features available on your platform out of fear of confusing new developers is misguided. Sometimes analytics functions are the best tool for the task, and good engineers should judiciously weigh their utility against the risk of losing access to that tool.

Keep in mind though that the cost of migrating your db backend is generally so high that if you _are_ forced to do so, rewriting queries that depended on analytics functions will likely be a small rounding error within the total migration cost.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> tl;dr Oracle.

<comment><USER18> The article highlights the Oracle flavor of this functionality, but similar windowing operations are available in PostgreSQL[1] and SQL Server[2]. Edit to add that I have no idea if JOOQ supports windowing functions in non-Oracle systems.

1: [https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/static/functions- win...](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/static/functions-window.html)

2: [https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/ms189461.aspx](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/ms189461.aspx)

<comment><USER19> _Logical_ windowing is not available in those other databases, i.e. only Oracle can specify a window whose size depends on the content of the current row, rather than a fixed number of rows.

<comment><USER18> I'm not sure that's entirely correct. This is from the SQL Server MSDN docs, "Alternatively, the RANGE clause logically limits the rows within a partition by specifying a range of values with respect to the value in the current row."

Source: [https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/ms189461.aspx](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en- us/library/ms189461.aspx)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why Words Are So Important - <AUTHOR> http://anniemurphypaul.com/2012/12/why-words-are-so-important/

<comment><USER2> Word learning process almost reaches a plateau after leaving school, interesting to see vocab given more importance than math</comment>


Getting started with Dwarf Fortress (book) - <AUTHOR> http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920022565.do

<comment><USER2> If ever there was something that needed a technical manual, Dwarf Fortress is it.

<comment><USER3> I find it even funnier that O'Reilly would publish it too.</comment></comment>


How to run your own open source Skype replacement - <AUTHOR> http://www.sipwise.com/news/technical/byov-skype-replacement/

<comment><USER2> Alternatively throw up an instance of apprtc[1], which is a few hundred lines of JS using the new WebRTC APIs. NAT traversal, background noise reduction, gain boosting, bandwidth adaptation all come for free.

[1] <http://apprtc.appspot.com/> [2] source: [http://code.google.com/p/webrtc- samples/source/browse/trunk/...](http://code.google.com/p/webrtc- samples/source/browse/trunk/apprtc/)

</comment><comment><USER3> the idea that it's a skype replacement while simultaneously warning the reader about avoiding NAT is funny, 50% of the skype secret sauce is the NAT traversal.

<comment><USER4> > 50% of the skype secret sauce is the NAT traversal

And the other 50% is the network effect.

<comment><AUTHOR> The real secret sauce is their dead-simple way to sign up and use the client. As you can see in the post, the setup process with the Jitsi client is still a bit awkward, because it is supposed to be a provider-agnostic multi-protocol client. There is still a huge potential in stream-lining this process to get a broad end-user adoption. Flexibility really isn't key in this case, rather than proper UX.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I applaud this effort. Jitsi is nothing new and predates all the Skype hype. My guess is it may even be true "end to end," i.e. it relies on no third party "service" that Joe User would find a little too much hassle to run himself, such as XMPP (or even SIP, for that matter).

But the first problem I have with Jitsi is that the source is still not open. Looking at current website you have to be a "project member".

It's Java-based, right? I want to see that code. If the solution I'm using is less than a few hundred lines of C (quite manageable for any security analysis), why should I blindly (i.e. without seeing the code) switch to Jitsi?

These p2p threads are continually entertaining because they prove time and again how many people still think NAT traversal is some sort of "magic" requiring special expertise (e.g., that only Skype or some other private company has).

That might just be a myth.

Example: Proving a negative. If I can't find a piece of code to do some task does that mean it does not exist? Maybe I just can't find it?

agranig himself mentions a couple of things that are in wide use but "little known". Not every solution is going to be widely known. That does not mean such solutions do not exist.

re: p2p stuff

Read the code before you read the marketing copy.

<comment><AUTHOR> Doing a simple " svn co <https://svn.java.net/svn/jitsi~svn/trunk> jitsi" works perfectly fine for me. Same with the source snapshots at <https://download.jitsi.org/jitsi/nightly/src/> . We also had no issues getting our bugfixes into their upstream while we did all the testing. I was wondering about the "observer/member" thing they mention on the website as well, doesn't seem to be relevant though.

<comment><USER5> Cool. I will have a look then. Thanks again for the tutorials and fixing Jitsi bugs. This is definitely a step in the right direction for moving beyond Skype. Great to see it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> note that it's just advertisement for a free+commercial solution based on Asterisk (<http://www.asterisk.org/>)

It makes the setup and maintenance easy, basically.

Personally I use Asterisk with all the standard SIP clients (CSIPSimple on Android for example)

<comment><AUTHOR> The only thing Asterisk does in our system is acting as a voicemail server.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why make it particularly SIP and not for example Jingle based? And there is no need to build anything. Just use regular XMPP servers infrastructure. Security can be achieved with ZRTP and OTR, though current implementation of secure XMPP/Jingle clients is still lacking.

</comment><comment><USER8> I have a Skype-in regular phone number. I did not see how to set that up and without some sort of local number availability, for me at least, this is no "Skype Replacement"

<comment><AUTHOR> There is a "next steps" section at the bottom of the post pointing this out. You can check the handbook at [http://www.sipwise.com/doc/2.6/spce/ar01s04.html#_creating_p...](http://www.sipwise.com/doc/2.6/spce/ar01s04.html#_creating_peerings) to learn how to do it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> A bit bold to talk about running your own server to replace Skype. You'd need to get 32 million users to switch over.

<comment><USER10> Given this quote:

In this post, we attempt to build a free, secure, SIP based communication system to provide encrypted voice and video communication, buddy lists, instant messaging, presence and remote desktop sharing/control on a self- hosted system.

I think they mean "in the context of a few private users using skype to communicate with each other", such as a startup or maybe even a tech-happy family.

<comment><AUTHOR> One of our customers serves north of 1 mio overall provisioned subscribers on two servers with this software, so it's quite scaleable vertically already. It's easier when UDP is used though, because with TLS things add up quite quickly.

To go big, we've horizontal scaling mechanisms using subscriber partitioning by load-balancing SIP and provisioning requests over multiple pairs of such servers (usually placed in blade-center servers).

The key here is to keep as much CPU heavy things like media relaying end-to- end where possible, because the signaling part is pretty light-weight in SIP. To scale out and keep reliability up while keeping complexity low, we have a shared-nothing approach wherever possible. Works well for us.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think that the most likely thing to disrupt Skype is going to be WebRTC and getUserMedia/PeerConnection.

</comment><comment><USER12> What about android clients for this?

<comment><AUTHOR> The Jitsi guys are currently working on an Android version, let's see what comes out of that.

In general, the reason for the slow adoption of SIP beyond just pure voice telephony is that the SIP/SIMPLE standard with its companions for buddy lists etc. is really crappy, and as a result so are most clients (or the interoperability between them). It doesn't make it better that the mobile device/equipment vendors forked off their own OMA standards, so the situation is pretty bad in that regards.

I still don't give up all hopes to see a proper Android/IOS SIP client supporting voice, video presence etc. while at the same time adhering to the standards.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> It appears to be based on Asterisk, with Mysql and Apache.

<comment><AUTHOR> The real work-horses are actually Kamailio and Sems, which are quite little known but power a LOT of your ISPs' VoIP systems.

Provisioning is built on top of Apache/Perl/Catalyst with a MySQL backend. The billing system is in C and Perl, and the Media Relay is in C with an own kernel module on top of iptables.

Asterisk is pretty insignificant, but it's surely the best known part in the VoIP world.

<comment><USER13> Thank for the info.

Have you considered of using Freeswitch to replace Asterisk and maybe even your own media relay module?</comment></comment></comment>


TaskRabbit Gets $17.8M, Wants To Grow Internationally And Beyond - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/13/taskrabbit-gets-17-8m-for-aggressive-expansion-wants-to-grow-internationally-and-beyond/ <comment><USER2> It's interesting to note that 2008-onward is the perfect economic environment for Taskrabbit to have started in.

The tasks I've posted, for cleaning and office work, have gotten offers by Stanford and Harvard grads at rates of around $15-20/hour. Most Taskrabbits seem to have college degrees and they often bid at rates of around, or below, minimum wage in SF ($10/hour). They usually have tons of time available, not just an hour or two a day. This wouldn't work so well if unemployment weren't so high right now.

But as a product, it works amazingly well! I highly recommend trying it out, for anything you want done. You can google for a $20 off first-time user code. (I have no affiliation with the company.)

<comment><USER3> Wait wait wait, Harvard grads for $15? If that is seriously available in quantity, all my SEO buddies just had simultaneous kittens. That's cheap enough that if they can operate a Wordpress interface it is worth using them for pretty much any writing task you could think of.

I'll see if I can find someone interested in elementary education to start fleshing out BCC's site, since I haven't added new cards this year.

<comment><USER4> Surprised you haven't found someone for this on Fiverr (which you tipped me to). I've gotten book jacket designs done for $5 - and they're good.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> How can you expand beyond being international? Is their long-term goal to be an inter-planetary task service?

"The wages of pedantry is pain." -Carroll O'Connor

<comment><USER6> I've noticed that a lot of people make a distinction between "going global" and "world wide". Being a global company often just means having a reasonable foothold in two continent (say, North America and Europe).

local < regional < national < global/international < world-wide

(or something like that)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Now hiring TaskRabbits <http://www.taskrabbit.com/main/taskrabbits>

And Ruby (or iOS or Android) engineers <http://www.taskrabbit.com/engineeringjobs>

</comment><comment><USER8> <http://gigboard.com>

</comment><comment><USER9> Besides Zaarly, what other local service marketplaces are out there?

<comment><USER10> coffee and power is another one</comment></comment>


Anti-bullying program focused on bystanders helps students who need it most - <AUTHOR> https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/02/160202110714.htm <comment><USER3> From my limited experience - bullying is prevented by having friends. Groups of people don't get bullied, loners get bullied.

Once you develop a little circle of friends, you'll largely be left alone.

So the key is to give people enough time to develop friendships - in Russia, I had the same classmates, give or take, for years. The students were separated into gradations of capacity where those who got straight As (in Russia it's a 2-5 gradation, for F-A) were put into the same class after a couple of years.

This way, smart kids end up with smart kids and those who don't do so well, end up with those who don't do so well, but then their curriculum is made a bit easier so everyone is happy.

What I experienced in Canada is that you are thrown from one set of kids to another every year and as a result, you know everyone but you don't know anyone. The 'cool' kids here were determined by looks and clothes largely because most classes were a complete waste of time.

If you made school challenging enough that those who did well were respected and those struggling, made to feel like they need to keep up and give kids enough time to get to know the same people (5+ years) - a lot of these problems would go away.

Russia is far more aggressive than Canada and violence much more common - <USER2> yet everyone I knew was ok. You come to Canada, everyone is babysat their entire lives to a point where people remain infantile in their actions and worldview - to a point where you need to implement rules of conduct in a workplace. Do you really not know how to act by the time you're 25? Should've gotten beat up a few times as a kid...

<comment><USER4> This is largely untrue. It is prevented by having "ingroup" friends. I had a circle of 5-8 fellow "weirdos" who I had a grand time playing with.

Collectively we were the target of bullying. Our academic excellence (and thus copious free time) was the direct cause of being targeted. When you pound out the 50 problem worksheet in 20 minutes, and have the remaining 30 min to draw, imagine stories, and live in a shared fantasy world with that small group it's REALLY easy to be targeted.

<comment><USER3> I hear you. Where I grew up (Russia), those who excelled were put into classes where you were challenged.

To give a simple example: when I came to Canada, I was in grade 7. I didn't learn a single new math concept until grade 9, where we spent the entire semester learning 'slope' which I got the hang of within a week.

That's the Canadian school program being 3 years behind in 5 years. A disaster, and I'm not that smart.

Furthermore, I was sent to math competitions twice a year where I couldn't solve a single problem - those who could solve those problems, were sent to special schools where the brightest were again, challenged.

That's a systemic solution Russia had that I'm in favor of. In terms of making it work within the system you grew up in - it sounds like you found a group of friends.

You make it sound like the reason you were targeted is because you had free time. If you had been part of the soccer team for instance, would that have also been the case?

When smart kids complain about getting bullied solely for being so smart, I have to wonder. I am the smartest of the dummies or the dumbest of the smartest but I was also quite alright at sports, so I had that going for me.

I'd say the problem with smart kids who do find a group to be a part of and still feel like they were in a tough spot - your parents should've put you into a sports team or some form of athletics and that would've likely alleviated a lot of the problems.

<comment><USER4> So I think you're onto something with moving kids to where they will be challenged in school. Systemically it keeps everyone engaged in the task of learning and I wish we would adopt it in the states.

I don't think that would stop bullying, only reduce particular kinds of it. Bullying serves the purpose of enforcing social norms. Putting people in a situation where ability is less of a way to break norms will reduce the bullying, but it won't eliminate it.

Quick clarification I'm not claiming I was bullied for being smart. I was bullied for being weird. Being challenged, or joining sports would have reduced that weirdness, and spare individual children some pain, but doesn't really change the problem of students electing to enforce social norms by humiliation and violence.

RE: Sports teams. We couldn't afford any of the organized sports available in my area(all of them had a few hundred dollars of gear and annual fees to participate in). By the time I was in middle school and had "free" access to sports I was so behind in developing the basic play skills that it simply marked me out as a newb

<comment><USER3> Yeah, I feel your pain.

There is no way anyone can eliminate bullying completely as you yourself mention - nor do I think it to be a worthwhile pursuit.

Some amount of friction is good.

Being weird is definitely going to be a problem - I have a buddy who to this day (almost 30) has trouble relating to people and he ranks it as the number one challenge in his life. His parents could afford to put him in sports but didn't think it was a good idea...

You mention how you guys couldn't afford to put you in a sports club. To that I'd say two things: one is that sports should absolutely be free the same way school is free and two - it's a bummer that your parents had kids and couldn't afford these things.

To bring it full circle - it boils down to the parents so often, doesn't it? If your parents could afford to have you participate in extra-curricular activities that you excel in, so much of this childhood angst would be alleviated.

It breaks my heart to hear the shit my friends have gone through and how incompetent so many parents are. The only silver lining is that hopefully - you'll recognize how to make sure your own kids don't have the same difficulties and as a result - the world's a better place :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "Many K-12 school efforts to reduce bullying have proven not very effective, leading educators to wonder what bullying prevention approach works best."

Could that be because the efforts have focused on having students, mostly those not subject to bullying, stop the bullying? My view is that only teachers and administrators can stop it, and further that teachers and administrators have informal policies that actually foster and increase bullying. Teachers and administrators know who the bullies are, they just don't do anything at all to stop them, probably because the bullies and the teachers and admins are all part of the same power structure.

<comment><USER6> The official policy from schools lately has been "zero tolerance" for violence, meaning if someone hits you and you defend yourself, you get suspended for just as long as they do. It's set up to let the school wash their hands of any responsibility, but without having to have an uncomfortable "Your kid is an asshole who keeps starting fights" / "My kid is a perfect angel and I'm suing you for suspending him" conversation.

It's not designed to solve the victim's problem, it's designed to make it not the school's problem.

<comment><USER7> > The official policy from schools lately has been "zero tolerance" for > violence, meaning if someone hits you and you defend yourself, you get > suspended for just as long as they do.

While I think most would agree that endorsing violence is generally bad, I'd advocate children defending themselves in that type of situation. It's not the only thing to do (someone needs to call an adult/teacher/etc) but if kids are penalized for coming to the aid of a fellow in need, what less are we teaching them? [1]

> It's set up to let the school wash their hands of any responsibility, but > without having to have an uncomfortable "Your kid is an asshole who keeps > starting fights" / "My kid is a perfect angel and I'm suing you for > suspending him" conversation.

> It's not designed to solve the victim's problem, it's designed to make it > not the school's problem.

Bingo. That's the issue with a lot of these so called solutions to social problems. They only solve the legal problems of the org where they're taking place.

[1]: _Spoiler: The lesson is don 't get involved in other people's problems._

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I was bullied in middle school (though not as bad as others) and stood by as other kids were bullied.

When I saw other kids bullied, I just stood by because I was scared that I would be bullied more than I was already. I think in a lot of cases, most kids are bystander who are just afraid to do anything because of the fear of reprisal, the loss of status of associating themselves or defending someone who is less cool than them. They're also scared to stand out by being the only one to protest against the bullying

This kind of program helps I think for a couple different reasons:

1\. By imagining what they would do in situations when someone else is bullied and how they would intervene to reduce bullying, kids are more likely to defend the bullied when it happens. (see commitment and consistency by Cialdini)

2\. Kids see other kids who say that will stop bullying in the future, they then feel more confident that if they speak up they will not be alone.

<comment><USER9> Not only that, but they are _encouraged_ to stay out of it by teachers/administrators. Think about it like this:

"I can step in, and try to stop the bullying, and possibly get beat up. At the very least I'll get detention. Or I can just sit-back and watch."

And, IME, the kids that were bullied, were the "weird ones" (that was me!). So it generally doesn't improve your social status to help that kid. So bystanders have all the incentives to stay out of the bullying.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Reddit discussion:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/45sqf9/antibullyin...](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/45sqf9/antibullying_program_kiva_that_focuses_on/)

PDF from Sci-Hub (donate for free access to scientific research here: [http://sci-hub.io/donate](http://sci-hub.io/donate)):

[http://psycnet.apa.org.sci- hub.io/psycarticles/2016-03231-00...](http://psycnet.apa.org.sci- hub.io/psycarticles/2016-03231-001.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER10> Maybe such a program would be helpful. What I see in depictions of physical bullying is that most people nearby not only don't intervene, they record the incident for subsequent online posting (i.e. self attention-seeking) -- not only a lack of empathy but a self-centered response. Society would certainly benefit from some evolution on that plane.

<comment><USER11> If the bystanders weren't the kind of people that record the incident instead of helping, you wouldn't have seen the depictions.

So the good news is that the amount of physical bullying that happens is probably overestimated. The bad news is that non-physical bullying is underestimated.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> The way this problem is framed is as if bullying were limited to school children and should only be addressed within the narrow scope of the classroom. The reality is bullies grow up and becomes adults and help run society. You cannot separate children from the influences of society at large.

Bully: a person who uses strength or power to harm or intimidate those who are weaker.

synonyms:persecutor, oppressor, tyrant, tormentor, intimidator

It seems to come down to the question: "does might make right?"; The same question (among others) which led to Socrates execution.

<comment><USER13> Honest, critical feedback. I can't put it any other way. Based on reading multiple posts by you over the past few days.

You're not nearly as quality of a communicator as Alan Watts, not nearly as good of a thinker, not nearly as insightful as he.

Since you're still green, I recommend just making a new name, and then continuing to do the internet forum philosophizing you do under some other name. That's my best honest recommendation, not trying to say you're bad at communicating, thinking, or being insightful, when compared to everyone else in general.

Just it bugs me to see someone posting regularly, philosophizing, under that name. So let your content exist, but under a new name. While you're still green.

<comment><USER12> The menu is not the dinner. The username is not the user. Who do you think you really are, hnmcs?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> There's too much cultural baggage (in the United States at least) about bullying for anyone to be able to discuss it rationally. There must be a thousand movies and a million television episodes (most from the 80s) where all sorts of absurd lessons are taught. The bully is misunderstood and bullied himself (not always true), if you stand up for yourself it will stop (never true, often never possible), etc.

</comment><comment><USER15> I went to school in Vermont for three years, from age 10 - 13. I came from Sweden.

I was busy surviving socially and didn't have any resources to "step up". Every day I went to school was Terror on Elm Street.

Sure, friends would have helped. But friends are not made by an external party.

Today I know that it is guidence about who you are that makes a difference.

This can come in many forms. But just knowing that someone is thinking about you in school, for example, like a guidance counseler or a teacher, will make a world of difference. I see an indifferent or inexperienced class of teacher as a big part of the problem.

Being a teacher also means actually seeing your students, seeing as in making sure they are noticed, seen, talked to. That will give each student some form of strength to handle what's coming once he/she steps out into the school corridor.

It's your inner strength that will stop any bullying. Confident ppl are usually not targeted.

</comment><comment><USER16> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_system) can prevent bullying in schools</comment>


Out of the deep: why lost civilizations under the waves fascinate - <AUTHOR> https://aeon.co/essays/why-lost-civilisations-under-the-waves-still-fascinate-us <comment><AUTHOR> Most interesting aspect was the details of Doggerland, a large area inhabited in the Mesolithic buried by a rising North Sea. More on that in Europe's Lost World: The Rediscovery of Doggerland [https://www.amazon.com/Europes-Lost- World-Rediscovery-Dogger...](https://www.amazon.com/Europes-Lost-World- Rediscovery-Doggerland/dp/190277177X)</comment>


Frugal innovation: What GE does in Bangalore - <AUTHOR> http://business.rediff.com/slide-show/2009/jun/17/slide-show-1-what-ge-does-in-bangalore.htm

<comment><USER2> "General Electric, the world's leading maker of aircraft engines, carries out __all __such tests on computers in an industrial estate in Bangalore at a fraction of the cost and time."

Except, you know, they don't.

Unless [Peebles, Ohio] relocated to Bangalore when I wasn't looking? - ([http://www.geae.com/aboutgeae/presscenter/other/other_200705...](http://www.geae.com/aboutgeae/presscenter/other/other_20070521.html))</comment>


Unverified claims Clinton State emails fwded to China. Trump buys it, tweets it - <AUTHOR> https://www.npr.org/2018/08/29/642882058/trump-claims-without-evidence-that-china-hacked-clinton-email-server <comment><USER2> The real question should be, is there any truth to this? There were reports that some of the US intelligence assets in China during this period went dark. This was in several headlines.

I think it is really difficult to verify anything in this age of sensationalism.</comment>


Atomico invests $4,200,000 in 6Wunderkinder - <AUTHOR> http://www.6wunderkinder.com/blog/2011/11/16/atomico-invests-4200000-in-6wunderkinder/

<comment><USER2> Congratulations guys! Great group of people :)

</comment><comment><USER3> Rock Solid Berlin Software-Art!

</comment><comment><USER4> awesome!</comment>


The UK's "Chief Digital Officer" job has been open for over a year - <AUTHOR> https://www.zdnet.com/article/its-the-biggest-job-in-tech-so-why-cant-they-find-anyone-to-do-it/ <comment><USER2> Because it won't have any power. The person will just run around between meetings preaching about the right way to do things, while everyone else in the room rolls their eyes and ignores it.

The _main_ problem is not that the govt lacks the _knowledge_ about what to do ... it is that they lack the _will_ to do it.

<comment><USER3> Entirely this. Don't demand a competent practitioner with the illusion of authority when you're hiring for a patsy to take the fall for failure to deliver due to politics.

<comment><USER4> Couldn't agree more with this statement.

Also, professionally, if you find yourself in this environment: GTFO yesterday. It's toxic, and will take it's emotional toll over time. Especially if you're technically talented there's always a market for your skill... keep bouncing until you find a place that respects you as a professional/person.

<comment><USER5> This comment really hits home with me. I took a job similar to the one outlined, albeit in a political party and not government. It is taking an emotional toll on me. Very difficult to get any work done and expectations to perform are sky high. Difficult to do that though if you aren't allowed to....

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> You know what? GOV.UK used to be an amazing team. I mean, seriously, some top talent and a really productive team. They did a remarkable job of understanding the art of the possible and writing clear guides that ordinary people could understand.

And then the rest of the civil service and the government saw its brand reputation as a resource to be used much the same way that slash and burn farmers view the Amazon. Most of the great teams left. Much of their material is still there, but it's not growing.

So yeah, that's why.

<comment><USER7> What I heard through the grapevine was that the end of the Coalition government and Cameron's resignation basically meant the GDS team lost their protection.

<comment><USER6> That tracks. It was absolutely bizarre to watch a successful, apolitical ongoing project like that get ruined.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have _some_ experience with government IT (state and municipal, not national). Anyone in this space knows that changing the bureaucracy essentially requires a legislative or executive mandate. My team once got intense push-back trying to change an extract file's date format from MMDDYY to MMDDYYYY.

I suspect the person in this role won't have the power or authority to do that. Clerks are notoriously protective of 'the process' and resist any changes to it.

This honestly sounds like a miserable job and anyone who's actually worked in this space would agree that this person has virtually no chance of succeeding.

<comment><USER9> If you're changing it anyway, why not push for YYYYMMDD?

<comment><USER8> That was my original request! But there are "readability" concerns with a "non-standard" date format. I died a little inside when I heard those words.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The job title should read. Person wanted as fall guy for Uk government when we mess up any it project.

<comment><USER11> Maybe this is why so many high level positions include a golden parachute.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Having been through a few of these public sector transformations as a consultant, there is no "there," from "here."

Strategically, the play for a few successive governments has been to stand up new arms length agencies outside the public service proper that have missions to develop new platforms, with the intent to migrate the public service to them when they arrive.

The successes have been where the stand-alone agencies manage to deliver and maintain their independence. The failures have been where they have become captured by "secondments," where mandarins or "retired" ones leverage their way into governance roles, subordinate them to the old system, and turn them into the same broken and staid institutions they were designed to replace.

The successes were expensive but their success amortizes that cost. The symptoms of the failed ones were visible early on, generally because of Party- connected consulting firms owning the HR contracts for them and using them as patronage factories and slush funds.

Change requires freedom, and that freedom requires independence. The accountability risk is real, and the challenge with oversight was that the overseers simply folded the agencies back into the morass.

If I were running this, I would take a radical approach, where the strategy would be a venture model that micro-funded projects to create useful products that solved for providing future services and applications, and not legacy ones.

Priority one is a set of useful and privacy preserving identity services with varying levels of assurance that meet the needs of regular people, not just public servants, as all public servants are citizens first, so are researchers, academics, police and everyone else. This must be exogenous and adopted willingly, and not forced down as a national identity scheme. Second would be an investment in FHE and other privacy technologies because they can preclude and even obviate the need to stand up new private infrastructure to support data exchange. Third, I would invest in federated and distributed techs (git/BC/OIDC, etc) because interoperability is the ONLY problem government is designed to solve well because fundamentally it is a coordination and interoperability layer for society in everything it does.

While I am not qualified for this job, with a long enough lever, I have no doubt I could move the whole thing.

<comment><USER13> > If I were running this, I would take a radical approach, where the strategy > would be a venture model that micro-funded projects to create useful > products that solved for providing future services and applications, and not > legacy ones.

The above is more similar to some ideas being floated about in various halls of government than you might think. That of course doesn't mean it will happen, given the quirks of government.

> While I am not qualified for this job, with a long enough lever, I have no > doubt I could move the whole thing.

I think your above insight and actually addressing some of the real issues and opportunities shows you are (technically-speaking) well-qualified for the job. Better than a lot of candidates, and better than anyone else that will take up the post.

The fiefdoms in central government are very real, but there's a value to the people who are able to navigate these, use rivalries to good effect, and achieve the desired outcome by pitching everyone off against each other correctly. Of course very different in a "CDO" role than as an outside consultant coming in with a scoped brief of what needs achieved and which eggs are able to be cracked in the process.

The sad part is that the whole system is such that you'll probably not want to apply for the role, due to the highly politicised nature of most senior appointments - you need to implement what an elected minister wants, even if it doesn't make technical sense. The civil servants who are happy to project- manage the blockchain-backed AI-enabled boondoggle (that lacks a ledger and any form of ML) are the ones that survive.

<comment><USER12> Indeed, and thank you. The reason I have taken the startup and consulting route is the intuition that these are upstream of the institutions, and this is where I suspect a technically inclined individual can effect the most change.

In the ~20y I've been around govt, arguably Linux, GitHub, Docker, Jira/Atlassian, PowerBI, VMWare, LinkedIn, SalesForce, and even Twitter have done more to transform government than any endogenous solution could. EVen in the last 5 years, AirBNB and Uber have altered the economics of municipalities faster than anything planned might have. These techs are all still in early stages there, (and the economics of devops break public service finance, but that's another story) but you can see the downstream effects they have.

So far regarding public services, my two favourite models have been In-Q-Tel and 18f.gov. The first is far upstream, and the second has been a way to navigate it. It's worth considering that a public sector CTO role is really a "steady hand on the tiller" role to navigate the things we're all building upstream. The CTO is a necessary role, but my experience is that heroes and visionaries will likely select out fast, and framing it as a navigator role might yield different results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The reality is that at £200k/y a suitably qualified person is taking a massive pay-cut compared to what they could make in the private sector and so would have to want to feel great deal of ideological or public service drive to take this role on.

Gov.uk saw a great turnover of talent under the Tories (starting with the Tory/Lib Dem coalition) as many people were simply disenfranchised/unaligned with Tory rule but also felt equally uninspired at the prospect of a Corbin government. Faced with no great outcome, people left.

Many qualified people in the private sector are going to pass, especially as you probably can't also invest or sit on the boards of other companies and all the other stuff tech execs do to further enhance their careers and wealth.

It is of no surprise to me they can't find suitably qualified folks to run this, the pool size of the intersections above (ideologically aligned with Tories, well qualified, open to pay cut) is minute.

And that's before you even consider the well made points in the other comments; that this is probably a bit of a shit job in the first place.

<comment><USER15> I don't know--Ignoring the political ideology requirements, I'd guess far more than half of HN have the technical chops to do the job, and far less than half of HN make more than £200k/y.

<comment><USER14> I've been in tech for 20 years from a software engineer through to founder, an executive and now a VC... I know the type of people who do this job and I don't think I'm suitably qualified.

My time at the BBC showed that public-service/civil-service tech leadership is part people management, part political maneuvering, part vision and a small dose of any actually tech experience. It's certainly more CIO not CTO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I second the sentiment of many comments here.

To use an analogy. Instead of trying to upgrade the engine in a model T to a modern block, start over. Get a new office, get a small team to redesign the workflow. Then test it live, handle the exact same workload as the existing office and fix problems until everything mostly works. Give first dibs on the permanent jobs to the folks from the old office. Hire for the rest and pray you met budget. If you did start over with the next office. If not, you'll be replaced shortly.

</comment><comment><USER17> Who will call app Britain?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ei9iM_zzzQk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ei9iM_zzzQk)

<comment><USER18> Perfect!

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Hmm.. maybe I will apply.. I think the thing a Chief Digital Officer would do would be to map out each organizations data needs and mandate that their product be provided via a SaaS interface to their customers and/or exportable into something like Snowflake or Palantir or maybe a UK provider. Interfaces are the first thing that Bezos mandated for AWS. The latter is probably more risky politically but maybe there's a path there. It's a "we are moving to the Cloud* approach". The APIs and the Snowflake style analysis will allow enterprising organizations to refactor if they want and maybe develop new applications without requiring data source team participation.

Frame it that way or another with the same goal, build out your own cloud team to manage the project and then maybe you'd find success.

<comment><USER20> Well said. I'm going to cut and paste this in my application.

<comment><USER19> Sure, go ahead, but I would advise you to rephrase it in your own words. Otherwise you run the risk of rejection due to a few Google searches!! But.. none of this is special sauce, this is the playbook for every "scalable" organization. I would avoid the word "interoperability" though. That's verbiage from the last major IT/govt push.

<comment><USER20> I was mostly joking though I'll consider applying for fun

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> >the UK is recruiting a Government Chief Digital Officer (GCDO), who will be working at the highest levels of the Cabinet Office to lead the digital transformation of public services in the country. All of this and more, for £200,000 a year.

Maybe the reason they can't find anyone to do this is that they are underpaying for the position. The responsibilities described sound at least at the level of a Senior VP, if not higher, at a large tech company. Those positions typically pay more than 10x that compensation. In addition, being in government comes with its own unique set of headaches and scrutiny that people in the private sector would not have.

<comment><USER22> That's a quarter million USD per year.

You are telling me that senior VPs make 2.5 million USD each year?

<comment><USER23> Absolutely. Director levels at many large tech companies certainly earn > $1M, even before stock appreciation.

<comment><USER24> Not in the UK though.

<comment><USER23> True, that's a good point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Well they should add it to the HN monthly "Who's hiring" thread. Are americans eligible for this position or is it just for british citizens?

</comment><comment><USER26> After being open for so long, it's not a position nor a job. It's just publicity. Might as well get a Chief Morale Officer.

</comment><comment><USER27> I remember seeing it advertised, being interested, following the link, reading it, and eventually wandering off suddenly having no interest whatsoever. Don't remember what it was about it exactly, but obviously they should take pains to fix or at least conceal whatever it is in their recruitment materials that is making the job seem like hell on earth.

</comment><comment><USER28> This is the equivalent of accepting minimum wage for being CEO of a S&P 500 company, blindfolded and without a steering wheel.

<comment><USER29> > minimum wage for being CEO of a S&P 500 company, blindfolded and without a > steering wheel

I'd personally take that job offer in a heartbeat (And would recommend anyone else to do so as well), because I'd have ~50/50 odds of failing upwards or downwards.

Heads, I win, and my next job would be the C-whatever of a S&P 500 company for real wages.

Tails, I lose, and my next job would be the C-whatever of a Fortune 5000 company, also for real wages.

<comment><USER28> You'd take it because you're not qualified to do it. And neither am I. Anyone that would meet their expectations of experience would already be working in the C suite at another company for significantly more.

<comment><USER29> Well, sure, that's the reason why the CDO position isn't being filled.

But the parent poster I was responding to was painting it as a terrible job. I was pointing out that for those of us that don't have the privilege of being in the C-level of the Fortune 500 club (Which is, to some approximation, some large number of nines of the userbase of HN), this sort of job would actually be pretty good, not because of what you do in it, but because of the doors it opens.

I've seen too many political animals fail upward from one disaster to another to imagine that there's nothing career-boosting that can be salvaged from that job posting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> spaced-out >"All of this and more, for £200,000 a year."

Question for the Brits here: how long would it take someone making this salary, and supporting a family, to afford the down payment to a reasonably sized house within 1/2 hour of where they would be working (which I assume is central London)?

<comment><USER30> £200k a year you'll be very comfortable, and could probably get a mortgage on a £1million house depending on your deposit (downpayment)

<comment><USER7> A £1m house sounds big, but in central London that's... not really big at all.

I guess it depends on expectations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> 200K is base. The taxes on this wage are hefty in UK. The monthly takehome is less than 10K.

</comment><comment><USER32> >>"All of this and more, for £200,000 a year."

Unless the British Government is giving out some windfall of equity this is the compensation package of a mid level software engineer at FAANG. For anyone remotely qualified for this kind of job it is an absurd pay cut. Given this budget I would suspect that the department will also be asked to hire staff at salaries that are well below market rates. In other words the position is set up to fail and a simple google search could have shown as much.

<comment><USER33> It's more than the PM's official salary. It's almost as much as he was paid for a ten hours a week journo sinecure. [https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/ex- foreign-secretary-boris-jo...](https://www.pressgazette.co.uk/ex-foreign- secretary-boris-johnson-paid-275000-annual-salary-for-ten-hours-a-month- writing-weekly-telegraph-column/)

<comment><USER34> > It's more than the PM's official salary

I remember going to a party in west London at the time of the MPs' expenses scandal ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_e...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_parliamentary_expenses_scandal) \- remember when this was our biggest news?) and listening to people saying things like "well it's no wonder they claim for all this stuff, you can't live in London on 60K" (roughly an MP's salary at the time).

I was just amazed by that - as a member of the shiny technological elite I thought of £60K as a pretty fat wedge. Still do really. I think here, and in Europe generally, software people are usually paid as ordinary office workers who happen to have some useful skill, not as transformative irreplaceable self-governing magicians.

Seeing that this job pays £200K actually makes me wonder for a moment if I shouldn't apply myself. I could do two or maybe three years at that salary and never have to work again.</comment></comment></comment>


YC Patent Pledge - <AUTHOR> http://paulgraham.com/patentpledge.html <comment><USER2> This is not a YC patent pledge.

This is a proposal from pg, written in 2011, for a patent pledge to be adopted by tech companies.

What would be interesting, though, is to find out how many (if any) YC alumni (or success story) companies took some variant of it.</comment>


The race to the Moon was so unpopular at one point, Eisenhower called JFK nuts - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcompany.com/90375432/the-race-to-the-moon-was-so-unpopular-at-one-point-president-eisenhower-called-jfk-nuts <comment><USER2> "It's difficult to make predictions, especially about the future" . (Unknown Dane [https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/10/20/no- predict/](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/10/20/no-predict/))

I worked my first real law job for a couple who idolized JFK, but never really knew why, they were right-center what I thought Republicans. With more maturity I've come to realize the immensity of the loss and the damage the country and the rest of the world particularly in SE Asia suffered in his passing. It took Johnson to pass JFK's ideas, true, Great Society, and take us to the moon, and now we're disassembling it and regressing. The shame of it all.</comment>


MacKenzie Bezos likely to be world's richest woman after divorce - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/mackenzie-bezos-amazon-lone-genius-myth/ <comment><USER2> I mean, as Matt Levine put it, wasn't she already the world's richest woman?

If she has a claim to 50% in divorce, then she also had that claim prior to divorce.

<comment><USER3> Well forget about the "household net worth" vs "individual net worth" question for now and consider that this article digs up plenty of evidence that she wasn't just some supportive spouse in the background and that she was an indispensable figure in the early success of Amazon and probably deserves to be recognized as cofounder with an equal claim to the equity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I bet Jeff did this on purpose. This could very well be another Pai situation.

<comment><USER5> Pai situation?

<comment><USER6> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Pai](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Pai)

Lou Pai was an Enron exec who divorced his wife and married a stripper. As a part of his divorce he sold off 250m of shares months before the value of them collapsed. He was (relatively) shielded from the insider training charges.</comment></comment></comment>


Amazon Uses ReactJS Despite Patents Clause - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@blairanderson/amazons-new-brand-stores-utilizing-react-framework-a22f56e9e206 <comment><USER2> Maybe Amazon has a separate cross-licensing agreement with Facebook.

Maybe Amazon isn't concerned if Facebook infringes on any of their patents. Have they ever enforced "one click ordering" or any of their other dubious "innovations"?

</comment><comment><USER3> > 1\. Install the react chrome extension

No need to even do that. Open up the console and look for the `React` or `ReactDOM` objects, they are on the window object...

<comment><AUTHOR> But with the chrome extension you can see so much deeper into the react components! pretty cool to see the responsive components swap in an out on different browser sizes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Does Facebook realistically have any incentive to remove the clause?

Is there a history of them enforcing it (and forcing a competitor to stop using React)?

<comment><USER5> The Apache Foundation does not permit it, so they'll probably have to debundle the patents: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14779881](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14779881)

<comment><USER4> I'm not particularly well-versed in how these things work -- does that mean Facebook would no longer be able to use BSD licensing for React since it's from Apache?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Amazon likely has a bigger army of lawyers than Facebook, and so isn't worried about having to rely on patents if they need to sue Facebook. Or they're willing to eat a few hundred hours of labor to change the frameworks being used for their web pages if they do need access to that patent portfolio.

Not that many smaller companies can say the same thing.

<comment><AUTHOR> You think someone at Amazon literally said "Ehhh we have a bigger army of lawyers, lets use it"...???

I don't believe it!

<comment><USER6> What's the alternative? They didn't run it past Legal and opened themselves up to liability?

I'm making the (perhaps charitable) assumption they did run it past Legal, and Legal decided they could deal with the fallout if it came to pass.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> 2 days ago [Apache publicly disallows React]([https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14779881](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14779881))! I thought it was pretty interesting to see a freaking massive tech company completely ignore and utilize

</comment><comment><USER7> Amazon Apparently Afraid of Neither Bogeymen Nor Dracula</comment>


The Oxford Comma and The Internet - <AUTHOR> http://blog.anguscroll.com/oxford-comma

<comment><USER2> "Through the window she saw George, a policeman and several onlookers" clearly refers to two people and some onlookers."

No, it doesn't. If anything, I think the use of the Oxford comma would make this more clear (although the most elegant solution is surely just to draft the sentence in a less ambiguous manner).

<comment><USER3> Using an em dash would make the sentence clear.

"Through the window she saw George—a policeman—and several onlookers."

Or one could simply specify who George is by inserting "who is" after George.

"Through the window she saw George, who is a policeman, and several onlookers."

If using the Oxford comma does not make the sentence clear then the sentence needs to be rewritten.

<comment><USER4> I agree completely, but the original sentence used _a policeman_ as a member of the list, not an appositive. As an ardent lover of the Oxford comma, the only solution for this sentence is to move some words around.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > The internet is brimming with exceptional writing, and yet, the good content > makes up a tiny fraction of the whole,

Sturgeon's law - 90% of everything is crap.

</comment><comment><USER6> The author confuses bikeshedding for the impending end of civility. At length.

</comment><comment><USER7> Why do feel like I'm reading an AI generated article? It's a mashup of some seemingly random paragraphs.

<comment><USER8> I thought he made a number of good points all tied together around the suggestion that people aren't taking enough time to read on the web.

Angus, have you read Neil Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death?" I have a feeling you would enjoy it, and would love to hear your comments on it. Keep up the good work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This author needs to learn another rule of writing: concision.

<comment><USER10> I actually want to acknowledge Angus for a nicely crafted article. He uses a focused hook (the Oxford Comma) as a way to enter a broader discussion, and then neatly rounds out the article by bringing it back in - albeit a little bluntly - at the end.

I acknowledge that you may be trolling here with a pithy critical comment on an article about how easy it is to write pithy critical comments.

<comment><USER9> No, I mean the article was too long and it could have been stated in fewer words. I am not trolling.

<comment><USER10> I thought that was what you were saying - the trolling thing was me recognising I may have misread you, so I'm glad I didn't. Thanks for clarifying though!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The title should read, "The Oxford Comma, and The Internet."

<comment><USER12> An Oxford comma is used in a list. Two items wouldn't have a comma between them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> "The internet is brimming with exceptional writing, and yet, the good content makes up a tiny fraction of the whole, and there is a compelling sense that it's a diminishing fraction."

It's hard to take the rest of the article seriously after reading a sentence like this. We're talking about an issue that almost certainly predates the written word, never mind the internet. Don't confuse your growing awareness of a problem with the growth of a problem.

<comment><USER14> The next several paragraphs discuss reasons why the internet is unique.

Also:

> Writing online is so nearly effortless that reading (not to mention > reflection, deliberation and thought) has become a chore in comparison. It's > easier to jot off a patronizing, indignant or self-aggrandizing missive than > it is to take the trouble to read the whole article or give fair > consideration to the author's perspective. Thus the vicious circle sets in…

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Lou Montulli gave us the solution years ago. Perl, Python<blink>,</blink> and Ruby.

</comment><comment><USER16> '... and there is a compelling sense that it's a diminishing fraction.'

There is a compelling sense? I had to reread that a few times to try and make sense of it. Awkward, at the least.

</comment><comment><USER17> I've always used the Oxford comma when confusion/misunderstandings of a list could occur. That may or may not be Oxford comma, but it is how AP guides it, IIRC

</comment><comment><USER18> anyway, i can't help thinking this forms such a powerful combo with another post very close in time... <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5247237>

</comment><comment><USER19> 1 - I use an Oxford comma 2 - WTF are we talking about Oxford commas?

<comment><USER19> W == Why, as in, "Why the fuck?".

<comment><USER20> The traditional meaning of WTF used in that sentence is perfectly fine internet grammar.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Vim or Emacs?

</comment><comment><USER22> "And while there are many Americans who care deeply about their beloved comma, in the UK (outside of the OUP) it's rarely used."

The British call drunk driving "drink driving", which is nonsensical. Based on this fact alone, the rest of the English-speaking world should disregard their writing patterns when determining correct usage.

<comment><USER23> "Drunk driving" is nonsensical; the people doing it aren't driving drunks, they're driving cars. It's almost as if "drink driving" and "drunk driving" aren't actually meant to be literal descriptions of an act but are a linguistic shorthand commonly used to refer to a situation.

<comment><USER22> While I don't want to take an unfunny joke I made in the Hacker News comments too far and am sorry for hurting any British people's feelings, "drunk driving" does make sense as a literal description of an act, unlike "drink driving". "Drunk" is an adjective which modifies "driving" (which is used as a noun in this case).</comment></comment></comment>


Darpa is working on a "one-way" biodegradable cardboard delivery drone - <AUTHOR> http://newatlas.com/cardboard-delivery-drone/47419/ <comment><USER2> Why biodegradable? I mean it's nice, but it's not supposed to go down in the woods and not to be found.

I guess making it cheap is the real reason for for paper. Though the expensive part is allways the motor and electronics anyways...</comment>


J.C.R. Licklider on the History of Personal Workstations (1986) [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SN--t9jXQc0 <comment><AUTHOR> This is the only talk online by the visionary who conceived and funded the Internet. It's quite amazing, though it needs a bit of patience at first; stick with it. Licklider was everybody's genius absent-minded uncle, and this is your chance to join the family.

He covers a myriad of ideas about interactive computing, many of which are still futuristic. He strongly defends 'open' software and talks about Moore's Law under a different name. You get glimpses into how his mind works. He mentions dozens of different researchers and now-forgotten strands of work. He tells great stories, such as how he was walking in the dark, fell into an open grave, had trouble getting out so sat down to think instead, and came up with the idea of the personal workstation. The bits about analog computers are fascinating. There are cameos by Butler Lampson and others.

Licklider was the sort of prophet whose vision usually remains unexecuted, but he turned out to be a social genius too, with an unmatched eye for talent. Some spacetime wormhole landed him at DARPA with a budget in 1962 and he played his cards brilliantly. It's an if-only story that actually worked out. We all owe this guy.

It's Saturday. Take some time and watch this—it's a rare window into the background of our world. Watch it all the way to the end and you'll get to hear Alan Perlis quip that the historical purpose of AT&T was Bell Labs.

Edit: Forgot to mention that I found it via [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10989390](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10989390). Thanks, whistlerbrk!

<comment><USER2> _tips hat_ my pleasure. I'll add that I've recently begun to read about the fascinating early history of computing myself through a series of HN threads which led me to read, "Tools for Thought" by Howard Rheingold. That book is highly cited in another book mentioned here in the comments about Licklider, "The Dream Machine".

I highly recommend Tools for Thought. It is very clear from reading these histories that the early pioneers of the field knew with a very high degree of accuracy how the future of computing would play out over the coming decades. That book is humbling to say the least.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> The owner of this Youtube channel works at VPRI with Alan Kay. I believe he mentioned he got a bunch of these tapes from Alan, which he has then been digitizing and uploading now and then.

A number of these ACM talks were recently made available on Youtube by the Computer History Museum [1], with talks/reflections by Butler Lampson, Chuck Tacker, Doug Engelbart, Larry Roberts, Gordon Bell, and many more.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerHistory/videos](https://www.youtube.com/user/ComputerHistory/videos)

<comment><USER4> The tape was from the collection of the Computer History Museum, inherited from the collection of their predecessor, the Computer History Museum in Boston. It had just never been digitized. There's a blog post on it here: [http://www.computerhistory.org/atchm/the-1986-acm- conference...](http://www.computerhistory.org/atchm/the-1986-acm-conference- on-the-history-of-personal-workstations/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I just finished reading "The Dream Machine" and recommend it highly to anyone in the industry. It's got Licklider a the forefront.

[http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Machine-Licklider-Revolution- Com...](http://www.amazon.com/Dream-Machine-Licklider-Revolution- Computing/dp/014200135X/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=)

<comment><USER6> This should be on every programmer's "Must Read" list of computer history books. I would put this up there with "Hackers" in terms of the volume of critical information about how basic questions of computer science were answered.

<comment><USER7> I'd add on "What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry". The three together and the three gives very nicely complementary angles and additional stories.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Where Wizards Stay Up Late"[0] is a fascinating account of the invention of the internet (Licklider a major player). I found it to be _much_ more interesting than I expected from the subject material. Highly recommended.

[0] [http://www.amazon.com/Where-Wizards-Stay-Up- Late/dp/06848326...](http://www.amazon.com/Where-Wizards-Stay-Up- Late/dp/0684832674)

<comment><USER9> Another good read is "Machines of Loving Grace" [1]. Much more focused on Artificial Intelligence (AI) vs. Intelligence Amplification (IA), but covers a lot of the work influenced by Engelbart and Licklider.

[1] [http://smile.amazon.com/Machines-Loving-Grace-Common- Between...](http://smile.amazon.com/Machines-Loving-Grace-Common-Between- ebook/dp/B00OP06CRG)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Oh, very neat. I've read most of the papers in the proceedings of this conference, the 1986 ACM Conference on the History of Personal Workstations [1], which is full of great information. But while 10 of the 13 speakers wrote up their talks as papers for the proceedings, three didn't, and this was one of the missing ones (the other two were the talks from Alan Kay and Charles H. House). So it's great to now have the talk available.

[1] Open access, click on the "table of contents" tab: [http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=12178&picked=prox](http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=12178&picked=prox)

</comment><comment><USER10> Weird timing! Just this afternoon I finished cleaning up a transcript of an Oral History interview with Licklider from 1988:

[http://wcarss.ca/refs/aspray-licklider- interview.html](http://wcarss.ca/refs/aspray-licklider-interview.html)

<comment><USER11> Hey, I'm reading that and there's an apparent typo of "oral" which should be "aural": "and I put together oral radar"

Edit: Also, some footnotes might be helpful.

There's a reference to problems with DC bias when all bits are the same; could be good to put that in contemporary context of 8b/10b codes etc.

The following words seem to be a reference to Christopher Strachey: "Licklider: Yes, probably the first person who wrote about it was a young Britisher. He mentioned the concept at a computer meeting in Paris, I think in 1960 -- sponsored by UNESCO, maybe."

See [http://www.bobbemer.com/TIMESHAR.HTM](http://www.bobbemer.com/TIMESHAR.HTM)

<comment><USER10> Ah thanks, I was wondering who that was! The interviewers just nod along when he says it.

Good idea on adding some footnotes like that. I'm trying to get a paper/interview/essay-reading group started (which is why I'm hosting the page) and some additional support material would likely be quite useful for folks in reading it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This guy funded Douglas Engelbart (mother of all demos). Doug mentions him in this interview: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1oNBImSX0M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1oNBImSX0M)

</comment><comment><USER13> The youtube poster's video collection is full of similar material. [https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima/videos](https://www.youtube.com/user/yoshikiohshima/videos)

</comment><comment><USER14> A few mins from the end of the video, he said he wished they had picked another name than "workstation". Then someone from the audience suggested a different name, which Licklider said would probably sell better. Can anyone make out that name?

<comment><USER15> P "something" stations, almost like "pleasurestation". Hard to make out.

<comment><AUTHOR> You might be right—it would explain why Licklider replies by joking that it would sell better.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Jeff Moser on Licklider:

[http://www.moserware.com/2008/05/who-is-this-licklider- guy.h...](http://www.moserware.com/2008/05/who-is-this-licklider-guy.html)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> If you want more like I did, this interview with Licklider's son contains quite a bit of information:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi4pVeyAhU0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi4pVeyAhU0)

And this is only a minute long but has some great clips of Licklider and Larry Roberts. Anybody know what broadcast it came from?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GfOTUoBpRw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GfOTUoBpRw)

<comment><USER17> I spotted something, but it doesn't seem to be related to the "one minute" vid you linked to. None the less, it's fun; "J.C.R. Licklider in One Minute"

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMpfmDEC5JQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMpfmDEC5JQ)

The 1963 "Intergalactic Computer Network" paper is also fun reading.

[http://worrydream.com/refs/Licklider- IntergalacticNetwork.pd...](http://worrydream.com/refs/Licklider- IntergalacticNetwork.pdf)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Starts at 4:30, direct link: [https://youtu.be/SN-- t9jXQc0?t=270](https://youtu.be/SN--t9jXQc0?t=270)

</comment><comment><USER19> This was really good listening for a lazy Saturday. He pretty much outlays the road to tablet PCs, massive LCD TVs, etc.

</comment><comment><USER20> He talked a lot about input and displays. I wonder what he would think of today's tablets and touchscreen laptops.

<comment><AUTHOR> I was surprised by how early the work on touchscreens he mentions was. Was it the 1950s, or am I misremembering?

The one I want most is the brain-computer interface he talks about. It's disappointing that we haven't gotten further on that in 30 years.

<comment><USER17> When the "touch screen" was invented depends on how you define the term. For "light pen" based system, early/mid 1950's. For capacitive systems, it's the mid/late 1960's.

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

>" _The first light pen was created around 1955 as part of the Whirlwind >project at MIT.[2][3]_"

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchscreen#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchscreen#History)

>" _E.A. Johnson described his work on capacitive touchscreens in a short article published in 1965[6] and then more fully with photographs and diagrams in an article published in 1967.[7]_ "</comment></comment></comment>


Getting started with Queue Classic - <AUTHOR> https://blog.rainforestqa.com/2014-04-17-getting-started-with-queue-classic/

<comment><USER2> We've been loving Queue Classic; we switched from Resque because of the awesomeness of only enqueuing jobs after a transaction is committed! If you're wondering about QC's origin, it was developed by Ryan Smith and used a lot at Heroku.</comment>


An Android web application to send and receive SMS from your web browser - <AUTHOR> https://messages.android.com/ <comment><USER2> It's really a nice application from Google. But can I use it to back up my text messages?

<comment><AUTHOR> I've not used it a lot yet. There's an "archive" button in the options but apparently it's purpose is to move the conversations away from the top list.</comment></comment>