Ask HN: How can you tell if you are insane? - <AUTHOR> My family is quite worried about me. Two days ago I believe someone hacked in to my cellphone and computer. It was behaving oddly as was my cellphone. Coupled with several harassing emails one of which told me that "here is something over your head" and contained a link to someone using Metasploit in a YouTube video demonstrating a root kit attack against a mobile device, I became concerned.
However, I also truly believed that they had my cellphone and were intercepting outgoing calls to my wireless provider. I tried to use the home phone which, immediately began to call out when I tried to use it, even though I never completed dialing. I called my wireless provider to check data usage and it felt like the person was "off" taking long periods of time to answer and give normal pieces of info back to me like other phone numbers on the account and basic stuff. My passwords were all on my phone so I honestly believed someone was looking up the information and they were stalling for time. Battery was draining while phone was off and didn't seem to hold a charge well.
I also felt very ill about 2 days later and had stayed up resetting and wiping all my devices and router. I went to the 24 hour walk in clinic with symptoms of being very weak dizzy and other general things.
My family thinks I am crazy. At first I was angry but I realize there is no way for me to really objectively consider this. I really believe my system was compromised and I am starting to doubt my own sanity I guess. Is there a way to figure out if I am crazy? It could be brought on by lack of sleep and stress, I doubt/hope it isn't anything permanent. I am 26 male, don't think it is something as serious as Schiz. And I take adrall (40mg) daily, slightly more recently, but other than that do not take drugs or drink.
How can I evaluate my mental condition objectively? <comment><USER2> Your story reminds me of a similar one that appeared on reddit a little while ago. [https://www.reddit.com/r/bestof/comments/34novp/user_thinks_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/bestof/comments/34novp/user_thinks_a_stalker_is_leaving_random_postit/)

[https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/34l7vo/ma_posti...](https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/34l7vo/ma_postit_notes_left_in_apartment/cqvrdz6?context=3)

Do you have a carbon monoxide detector?

Dizziness can be one of the symptoms. [http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Carbon- monoxide-poisoning/Pages...](http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Carbon-monoxide- poisoning/Pages/Symptoms.aspx)

<comment><USER3> There is a _much_ more similar case from a few weeks back: [https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/3iycro/fl_i_am...](https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/3iycro/fl_i_am_being_harassed_by_an_leo_agency_please/)

The poster thought they were being spied on by law enforcement, and that a drone was entering their house and moving around the iPad they had set up to monitor the premises (!). They posted some of the clips to YouTube but none of the commenters saw anything suspicious.

It turned out to be a paranoid delusion caused by a combination of stress, sleep deprivation and Adderall, which is the _exact_ situation in this thread. I would highly encourage the OP to read both the original post and the followup.

<comment><AUTHOR> hahaha I don't think I am insane, I think it was just a temporary episode and am resolving to try and be less stressed, sleep more, and take less adderall and caffeine. That being said, as someone who is/was insane, I was able to checkle a bit when I clicked on the video and it said "this video does not exist".

The CO one scared me, especially because a few fir alarms went off in my house a few days ago, but my father and I looked around and confirmed there was no fire despite them going off for ~1 hour. Myabe lighting the stove for the first time? Anyway, I think I just need to get more sleep and my parents have been cool about it. I think they are a bit worried, but seem to be resolved to just monitor me, which is good.

<comment><USER4> In the US, at least, you can call the gas company if you suspect a carbon monoxide leak. If you have reason to suspect a real emergency, you might also consider calling the fire department or emergency services.

Most fire departments also have a non-emergency line that you can just call for advice, they may even send somebody by non-emergent to check your house out and you as well. Some EMS providers (in the US most fire departments have EMS on staff also) have the ability to check for carbon monoxide in your blood.

During my time as an EMT, I saw plenty of people go crazy for various reasons from schizophrenia to completely unrelated physical issues such as diabetes, migraines, epilepsy and rhabdomyolysis. I AM NOT A DOCTOR, but you should consider consulting one. It may not be that you are not "crazy", but you may have some other medical condition affecting your mental status.

Best of luck.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hi qwertyFish thank you so much for reaching out.

I have a close family member, and close friend who both suffer from Schizophrenia. Although I'd hate to make any type of diagnosis over a medium like this, I feel you've been descriptive enough for me to make an educated guess.

Schizophrenia is a fairly complex disorder with varying levels of severity. What you described sounds very close to what a lot of people describe as their first 'episode', which commonly comes between the ages of 18-30. It includes what you've described, a long period of being awake, with intense thoughts, paranoia, and a inescapable need to 'do something' (such as wipe your devices).

One of the greatest challenges of dealing with this is finding treatment fast enough before the disease progresses. Often once it progresses, the person no longer is able to realize something is wrong. As you've described it, you still have that sinking feeling that something isn't right. Often at this stage general practitioners will not understand the disease enough to make a diagnosis, so it's important you see a trained psychiatrist as soon as possible.

For your question about evaluating your condition objectively, this is part of the core treatment of Schizophrenia and it's related disorders, so it would be best a doctor helps you with this. Adderral is a known to aggravate Schizophrenia as it interferes with Dopamine, I'd advise to cut down or stop taking it until you can speak to a doctor. There is also a very small chance you are experiencing a reaction to long term Adderall use it's self, experiencing a Amphetamine psychosis which has very symptoms to Schizophrenia but is temporary. Do not risk it though, for a lot of people if Schizophrenia advances, they are unable, or refuse to seek treatment.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for that answer. My "hopeful" theory is that I did get hacked and maybe overreacted too much. However, if I am being honest, regardless I think it is likely amphetamine psychosis. I have been taking it for 3months but as month 4 started I began to take a bit more at times, possibly leading to these symptoms.

I think being somewhat paranoid is positive, but I need to have a better way to assess the underlying concerns rationally and not from a paranoid/worst case view.

Thanks.

<comment><USER6> > adrall (40mg)

This is a lot of Adderall. Consider lowering or stopping your dosages. See a primary care physician ASAP, or go to a hospital if you feel in danger, and talk to him/her about stopping your dosage and alternatives to Adderall.

<comment><USER7> Over the course of a day, if you've been taking it for years, it doesn't seem like much. I have heard of doctors prescribing 30mg (20 morning, 10 at noon) for people brand new to it.

<comment><AUTHOR> my doctor prescribed me 40mgs, first time. I have been on it ~4 months. I take 20 in the morning and 20 in the afternoon. I don't think it is a totally massive amount, but I am posting in my own thread about whether or not I am insane. I am going to try and cut my dosage in half though, because that seems like quite a bit.

<comment><USER8> ' I take aderall (40mg) daily, slightly more recently' paranoia is a frequent side effect from amphetamines, which is what adderall is. It's very easy to slip on it and you state yourself that you are taking more than your prescribed dose. I'd recommend getting off this junk as soon as possible, I've watched the side effects first hand. You're not crazy (most likely, based on the evidence so far). If you must take a stimulant, have you talked to your doc about modafinil instead? Please, be aware of the impact a psychostimulant has on your reasoning - it's easy to convince yourself it's not the problem. I wish you well and also please make sure to sleep properly and don't take any late in the day, sleep deprivation leads to paranoia as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Actually, Adderall could very, very easily be causing this. In the same vein of the guy who had CO poisoning, there was a man who was paranoid about drones doing surveillance on him.

[https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/3iycro/fl_i_am_...](https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/3iycro/fl_i_am_being_harassed_by_an_leo_agency_please/cuwciib)

It seems like it could be in parallel to your situation. I highly recommend having someone evaluating your dosage, as well as whether it's an adverse effect of the Adderall itself.

<comment><AUTHOR> yep, just read that thread. Resolving to cut my consumption _way_ down.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> 40mg of adderall daily is the maximum allowed daily amount. That makes me wonder in and of itself..I am going to go out on a limb here and say you are abusing it. Probably a lack of sleep leading to paranoia. Someone hacking your phone? It could happen. More likely is you are either having your first break from reality with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, etc. or you are having paranoia and a mental breakdown secondary to drug abuse and lack of sleep.

Why are you taking 40mg adderall daily?

<comment><USER11> It's 60mg day that's the maximum daily amount. No idea where you got that from. The pills themselves go up to 30mg per pill as well. In fact, in some cases, they allow up to 90mg a day, that's like the max-max they can legally give, but it's in more specific circumstances like if someone's already been taking it for years and also has a larger body mass as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> You might want to arrange a "Rainy Day Action Plan" with a family member or close friend that you trust.

This would involve you writing a list of stuff that you do and don't want to happen if people ever feel the need to provide treatment. It can include signs to look out for - that mean things aren't going well and that people should take action.

I'm not going to do any kind of diagnostic stuff but _early intervention is important_.

EDIT: obviously, you should see a doctor rather than relying on Internet advice.

EDIT: here's a sample plan

[http://www.2gether.nhs.uk/advanced-care- planning](http://www.2gether.nhs.uk/advanced-care-planning)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks. I don't think I need to do that yet and not really sure what I would include. I guess on balance, I think I am somewhat abnormal in terms of goals and stuff, and have never achieved a high level of success but don't think I am overtly crazy to the point that I need this yet.

I recently had to move back to the rural area I am from and although I am quite social, have had limited interaction with people outside my family. There is a single store in my town, no stoplights etc rural as fuck. No one in my demo. I think I need to start getting out more but will keep this link in case.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> The correct answer is go to a health professional and have them evaluate your mental and physical health objectively.

<comment><USER14> Yes, based on the question, this is the only advice in this thread that should even be considered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Based on your username it seems possible to me you're a fan of the TV show MR Robot as the main character has a fish called QWERTY. The main character Elliot suffers from anxiety, depression, insomnia and mania.

I would consider that unless like Elliot you're trying to reset society's debt to zero it's unlikely you're being targeted. What makes you worth targeting over anyone else?

I think you should speak to a medical professional (get multiple opinions if you don't trust them) and move on from there.

There's a lot we can learn from Mr Robot, for me the biggest lesson is you can't always trust what you see and feel. Find somebody who can help you with that.

For instance, I'm partially convinced this is just someone trolling hacker news whilst bored on a Sunday...

<comment><AUTHOR> I responded to this already, but the hacker must have intercepted it. Just kidding, I think I hit post limit because this account is new.

Regardless, that was the reference and I am definitely not that spun out, for sure. I will say this though, when he goes to meet wh1teR0se he says maybe they're the best because "they are more paranoid than the rest of us".

So, did I take too much adderall, flip out and whipe my whole system? Yep. Have I been leading a financial revolution under the exper tutelage of my dead father with a curious affinity for back to the future II? Not yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Hey qwertyFish, thanks for reaching out. It's brave and commendable to ask this question from your position.

I don't know if this is your case, you should to talk a psychotherapist and/or a psychiatrist, but some of the details of your story (like picking up on details like the pace of talking from a wireless company representative) remind me of my mother. She thought there was a worldwide conspiracy against her, with the CIA involved, and so on. One example: she was active in a Blogger community, and someone connected to her network wrote this mundane blog post about visiting the zoo with his family, written in a witty style and with pictures of animals. My mother thought this was a concealed attack to her well being. ("I am obviously the giraffe in this story", etc). There was no way to make her see how absurd that was, that was her perception of reality, and she wouldn't budge from it.

Unfortunately, even after having seen doctors and having spent time in a mental hospital, she continues to deny that she is unwell. She is too proud and too stubborn to be open to the idea that her perception is mistaken, or that she has an illness, or that she is not at the center of the world. Her illness along with her pride and stubbornness has caused our family a lot of pain. Imagine your mother or your sister or your wife, not just becoming mentally unwell (that is tough but fixable), but denying at all costs that she is unwell, and so letting that illness define her character going forward.

So for me, whether or not you have a health issue, you taking into consideration what your family is worried about, is commendable. Please stay open to what the people who are close to you and who care about you have to say.

I wish you the best of luck friend.

</comment><comment><USER17> EDIT: I've reviewed the Reddit thread linked in another comment! (The Co2 guy)[1] Given that the original Reddit report was written as cogently as you've been writing I would suggest taking similar and related steps. I don't have anything more specific to add. Get things back to normal. Also you report physical illness, so this would go hand-in-hand with some similar reason. (For example, Co2 guy had severe headaches, that he didn't mention but which were a symptom.)

I've deleted the earlier version of this comment (in which I asked you to speculate on a motive for the email) as I think that it is more important to address the things that could cause these thoughts. It would be different if you didn't feel sick or weren't taking a high drug level.

I see a lot of similarities, especially because you mention physical illness (although the OP there didn't mention his headaches until prompted.) Try to solve them, as they're quite serious. Bear in mind that your judgment may be impaired at the moment, and that your family are concerned. Try to solve the external source of the issues if at all possible.

[1] Here is the thread I mean: [https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/34l7vo/ma_posti...](https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/34l7vo/ma_postit_notes_left_in_apartment/)

</comment><comment><USER18> > How can I evaluate my mental condition objectively?

You can't. You need a third party (such as a psychologist) to definitively tell you what's what. It's super easy to fool and mislead ones self.

I once thought my girlfriend hacked into my computer and corrupted it somehow; I lost everything. In hindsight, that was a crazy thing to think, but at the time it made sense given who she was and what was technically capable and all that.

What one must do, is separate what is possible (being hacked) from what is likely (computer crash) from what is absurd (girlfriend did it). This is not always easy, and not always straightforward, and not always something you can and should do by yourself.

Also... stress is a biggie. aderall likely won't help things either. People have lapses, behave irrationally or quite insanely as result of temporary outside factors. So, Its not something to worry about in that sense, but its certainly something to identify the cause of and take action against and monitor.

best of luck!

</comment><comment><USER19> Insane is probably not a useful word in this context. Is it possible that you are suffering from an illness? Of course it is. The internet is not the place to seek a diagnosis. Make an appointment with your primary care provider or a qualified mental health professional. There are a number of illnesses that can manifest themselves in ways archaically referred to as mental. Just keep in mind that everything that happens in your brain is chemical and electrical. If you are having a psychotic break, and believe me I do not mean that as a pejorative but simply as a medical term then you need qualified medical care. When asked, a schizophrenic patient will say when they began to hear voices they were as real to them as their friend talking from the next room. I wish you the best of luck. Get help. If you need treatment, get healthy. These are tough issues. Hang in there.

</comment><comment><USER20> Go talk to a doctor. Strangers on the internet with anecdotes are not qualified for this.

Never be embarrassed if you think you might be having a temporary psychotic break or experiencing heretofore unknown symptoms of schizoaffective disorder or bipolar disorder. It will do no good sitting around and wondering.

Getting help is the only thing that will help you regain confidence in yourself. And maybe it's nothing and you were right all along.

<comment><USER21> Doctors are not always helpful for stuff like this. I wouldn't go to a doctor unless I am bleeding or immobile from pain or for scheduled checkups. They see far worse that a little paranoia every day, and will probably just prescribe some random pills. Doctors don't care about un-treatable problems and "i'm afraid of my phone" isn't a treatable problem. Yes, they can refer a mental health specialist. That specialist will just confirm, yes you do have whatever problem you think you might or something else that's more benign and should start regularly paying them.

<comment><USER20> This is absurd. Qualified psychiatrists are the only way to diagnose and deal with an actual mental illness, and the only way to be sure you're not having a break or don't have a problem if you don't. Always helpful? Sure, nothing's always helpful. Doing nothing when OP thinks he's "going crazy" is a terrible strategy.

<comment><USER21> No, what you said is absurd. You're feeble straw man argument is pathetic. Nowhere did I state the person should do nothing. Mental illness of the kind that is described here can be dealt with in other ways such as living with a trusted family member, focus on sleep hours, or stop taking Adderall if it isn't prescribed.

<comment><USER20> Dude, his trusted family members are telling him to see a doctor. It's not a straw man, it's the only way he's actually going to resolve his question. I agree it's likely he should stop taking the adderall, especially if it's not prescribed, although doing that suddenly can also have serious consequences. A doctor is the best way to answer these questions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Please direct these questions to a psychiatrist. I doubt many of us here replying are qualified to provide guidance on what you are experiencing and why. And ignore the name dropping of various mental illnesses and speculations by others; getting in contact with qualified people and calmly explaining your situation and providing evidence of what you saw / feel is the best option.

</comment><comment><USER23> It's probably very difficult to evaluate oneself 'objectively' but that said, if it's affecting your life negatively, you may want to get a medical diagnosis. Your sudden paranoid-like behavior could be caused by any one of many different physiological, neurological, or psychological things.

Also 40mg of adderall seems like a lot, if you're on adderall xr.

</comment><comment><USER24> I think the best thing is to see a doctor. However, your behavior is too paranoid and may indicate a certain mental condition. To be sure though, just see a physician.

</comment><comment><USER25> Is no one going to address the objective evidence? If there are emails flaunting exploits... You're not crazy. If the emails don't exist, there's probably a bigger issue. If the emails did exist and then got deleted... That's tough.

<comment><USER3> The problem is that paranoia causes you to assign meanings and interpretations that aren't reasonable. We haven't seen any emails, only the OP's brief, vague description of them. And even if they do exist, there is a huge difference between sending a threatening email and tapping a phone.

In the Reddit thread I linked elsewhere, someone thought they had "objective evidence" of intruders and drones in their house, because they were seizing on tiny details -- a tape dispenser not where they remembered it, an airplane flying overhead, bumps and clicks on an audio recording -- and assigning them the worst possible interpretation.

Likewise, the fact that the OP is seeing events like "the phone company's tech support was slow to respond to my questions" as part of the conspiracy is a _huge_ red flag.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> You could always visit a doctor who specializes in these things to get evaluated objectively. Also cut the aderall.

</comment><comment><USER27> Hi, I used to take adderal for ADD when I was in my early 20s.

40 mg/day is a LOT... who put you on that dose? I was taking 10-20 mg/day and it usually left me feeling totally zonked. (I'm about 200 lbs) Taking 40 mg was a sure-fire way to spend the day grinding my teeth and babbling frantically.

I definitely experienced paranoia, and tended to fixate on things outside my sphere of influence, which lead to feelings of helplessness and despair. At the time I thought I was seeing things more clearly.

After a while I realized that while adderal was effective at improving performance in rote tasks, it messed pretty severely with abstract reasoning. I ditched it cold turkey one day and never went back. Surprisingly there were no withdrawal effects. After stopping its use, my grades in university level math and computer science improved dramatically.

I now believe that psychiatrists are wrong about prescribing adderal for ADD, and that adderal is not a safe or effective long-term treatment. Frankly, I think the whole field is either in denial, or corrupted by financial incentives.

Some people will tell you that you need someone to objectively evaluate your mental state, but I don't believe such an analysis is truly possible. Best- case, you'll get an educated guess and some good advice. Worst-case, someone will try to prescribe you even more drugs. So before you do that, quit taking speed, and exercise regularly. You might be surprised by how much better you feel.

</comment><comment><USER28> _How can I evaluate my mental condition objectively?_

You can never be entirely objective about your mental condition. But you can try to find objective verification about what was going on, whether that validates or refutes your ideas about the events.

Hemingway thought the government was tapping his phones, etc. Everyone thought he was crazy. It came out after his death that he was right.

Just because it seems improbable to other people does not mean you are imagining it. But, also, the fact that you fell ill means you could have been misinterpreting things due to fever or other temporary mental impairment.

Whether you were coming up with unfounded ideas or were right, the best answer is to seek some kind of objective evidence concerning what actually happened. If you get objective evidence that refutes your interpretation, then you can feel okay about the possibility that it was machinations of a fevered mind. If you get evidence that something wonky was going on, you can deal with it.

Since you were sick, please consider the possibility that it is a little of column A and a little of column B. Perhaps someone did something, but you blew it out of proportion. The truth may lay somewhere between the extremes of "I was 100% right" and "I was 100% crazy and imagining things."

Best of luck.

</comment><comment><USER29> See a professional, and if they recommend medication, try it for at least a few days and see if your view of the situation changes.

Story: I knew a lady in her 40s who started experiencing some psychosis. She started thinking that people were spying on her and reporting her activities on radio and TV, that huge gatherings were being held in football stadiums to watch videos of her which had been secretly filmed, that songs on the radio (in languages she didn't know) were talking about her, etc.

She thought that all her friends knew about this but didn't mention anything so as not to alarm her. After a couple months went by, and still none of her friends mentioned anything, she thought it was strange and decided to have herself checked instead.

After taking the recommended medication, within a day or so, the strange music she used to hear in the distance disappeared, all the people on the radio and TV stopped talking about her, etc.

Moral: Don't get stuck on the stigma of the "crazy" label. Just like anyone can get sick physically, people who are otherwise normal can start having mental problems. That doesn't mean you're "crazy". It does mean that you should have yourself checked by someone who is knowledgeable about such ailments.

</comment><comment><USER30> Almost this exact thing happened to me during this summer (2015). It ended up that I was experiencing a stress related break.

I was so incredibly convinced at the time that someone was intercepting my calls and playing back snippets to me. It was terrible. My mom drove from another country to take care of me. My brother came in. I made an embarrassment of myself on my social media. I freaked the fuck out of my roommates and all the friends I had at university.

I was on vyvanse and aderoll like drug at the time for adhd. It seems these things may have been related.

All I can say now is. Put the phone away. Post everywhere that you're sick and going to be out for a few. Take a nap. If you can't nap try and burn the energy off somehow. Then sleep.

And remember that while it really hurts the ego, everyone around you just wants to see you feeling like yourself. Hack or not.

If its a hack you can trace it after you're feeling more like yourself. If not then ohwell. You got weird for a bit. It happens. Life's weird.

I wish you the best! Good luck.

If its a hack

</comment><comment><USER31> Isn't the first step to see how you feel if you get plenty of sleep and stop taking Adderall for a week? Horses, not zebras?

</comment><comment><USER32> Yo man. Sorry to hear about your situation. I have been previously prescribed a high dose of Adderall. For the first 3 -4 months it was incredible.

Slowly, but surely, however, it started having negative side effects, namely anxiety and paranoia. My symptoms and resulting behaviors weren't as extreme as yours, but I could definitely feel the crazies coming on sometimes. That being said, don't listen to the people on here telling you that you are schizophrenic.

After getting a 2nd and 3rd opinion from other doctors, and reading some stuff on Pubmed, I realized that my dose was very high. I resolved to just ditch the Adderall and never return to my psychiatrist.

I'd be happy to talk more about this with you if you want. I am a 23-year-old male software engineer and have spent a lot of time trying to find healthy/ier alternatives to adderall. Drop me a line at [redacted].

</comment><comment><USER5> I also want to point out that the feeling of being sick/tired after your 'episode' is also very common. As I've been told by a doctor, this is due to your brain going in overdrive for a few days, and then crashing. Typically it results in a a deep depression.

It always starts out small like this though, and it's extremely common for a person after their first few episodes to still not believe they have Schizophrenia, so please don't trust yourself.

I should also be clear, we could be talking about Schizoaffective Disorder. Schizophrenia is sort of umbrella term. I find it's often used incorrectly. Lots of people who suffer still have prolonged periods of being completely normal and lucid, some even go into year long remissions. It's a complicated disease, and you've displayed the tell-tale first sign almost to a T.

<comment><USER33> OP, I would advise you to get help in person from professionals, not from friends, family, and the internet.

Ziles88, while you are sincerely trying to be helpful, the DSM-5 criteria for Schizoaffective Disorder requires 2 continuous weeks of psychotic symptoms without mood symptoms, not 2 days accompanied by mood. The criteria were changed precisely because it was being diagnosed incorrectly.

but even better is to stick with actual symptoms and stay away from labels; the labels cover broad ranges of symptoms in a way that is useful to trained professionals who understand the nuances and limitations, but individuals don't show such ranges.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Not sure if anyone is still in here but this is OP. Here is a pastebin link from a few of the emails that weren't from auto-generated indian programmers. I downloaded one of the attached files and followed one of the links to a personal site with my phone.

[http://pastebin.com/rTMrSETK](http://pastebin.com/rTMrSETK)

I am sure I overreacted but they did make me concerned when my machine was running slow. I had upgraded to El Capitan on like the 2nd. SOme behavior preceded that but not having fans run and machine getting hot is fairly normal on mac.

IDK maybe I am just paranoid. Trying to find the TCP DUmps. From before I formatted the system. I am posting them because a few people said that there was no real evidence. I am sure I overreacted and maybe should look into it more, but the emails happened.

<comment><USER34> Stop taking Adderall for a day. Do you have a link to where your post/ad is?

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> The stimulant usage, of which aderall qualifies as it is an amphetamine, can lead to Stimulant Psychosis:

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

</comment><comment><USER36> I've never dealt with something like this before, but I have personally had to tackle recurrent depression. It wasn't until my late-20s did I finally notice what was going on and got the help that I needed. In the meantime, I nearly lost it all -- my family, job and life.

If you have the slightest inclination that something isn't right, I suggest seeing a doctor who cares. I waited way too long even after realizing that perhaps there is a problem (trying to avoid the stigma) and learned that mental health is no joke.

</comment><comment><USER37> Definitely cut down on the stimulants. This is the first step to evaluating your paranoia.

You're healthy enough to get help, friend, you can't be any crazier than the rest of us.

</comment><comment><USER38> Go watch the movie "A Scanner Darkly". It contains a couple of characters suffering from amphetamine psychosis. Phillip K. Dick knew these kinds of people well. If you find your behavior to be similar to the characters in the movie, you should really lay off the Adderall.

<comment><AUTHOR> i've seen it. Great movie and sort of the begginning RDJ's comeback. This seems in line with my experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> "It is much more comfortable to be mad and know it, than to be sane and have ones doubts."

</comment><comment><USER40> Stimulants make you paranoid, dude. Cut down on the Adderall, and you'll be fine.

</comment><comment><USER41> Can't remember where I read it, but I remember learning that it is very rare for schizophrenic people to question their sanity. So the fact that you are considering it should give you relief that you probably are not.

</comment><comment><USER42> There's functional and nonfunctional. The rest is philosophy, consensus, convention.

</comment><comment><USER43> The same thing that is happening to you happened to me. Contact me at firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER44> May be you are really was hacked? :) If it's possible, I would suggest to find someone who got skills to explore your devices, analyze your emails and find out, whether that was harassment from some strange person or real hack.

I would be definitely very nervous if someone hacked my devices.

</comment><comment><USER45> 1) Based on the info you have provided, it sure sounds like someone is messing with you to an unusual extent over the internet. Hard to tell exactly why, or what exactly they are doing, but there are plenty of plausible reasons why it is not crazy to think that it is happening and to act accordingly.

2) Taking drugs is a very dubious practice at best. Prescription drugs are drugs. They mess with your normal functioning in ways that sometimes mask certain problems, almost always at the cost of causing worse ones. The list of known side-effects at normal dosages is usually bad enough, and those are just the ones that are known. The people who make them are only motivated to find a product that produces a certain effect. They are not motivated to learn what the drugs actually do. The people who push them do so for reasons that rarely have to do with promoting your real health, mental or otherwise. The people that think they are helping are the worst. For every problem that drugs might help you with (temporarily and at too high a cost), there is almost certainly a better way.

2a) What goes for drugs goes for any person in the mental health field, whether they push drugs or not. It also goes for anyone recommending professional help from someone in the mental health field, especially when they are very nice and emotionally supportive and want to help and are sure they have (or will find) the answer for you. Many people enter the mental health field because they have questions about their own mental health that they want to answer. They do not find answers. They find a system where they can gain status and make a living by making sure that other people do not find answers either. This is a harsh and sweeping statement that cannot be properly justified without going into issues that are beyond the scope of this post, but suffice it to say that the entire mental health field is based on assumptions which are completely wrong and do not allow it to even get a whiff of what the real problems and the real solutions are. If you value your sanity, stay as far away as possible. Take it as one person's opinion if you like, but that's what I have to say about the mental health field.

2b) I have an aunt who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, went on drugs, and has spent most of her life in institutions. She had serious problems (possibly before and certainly after entering care), but I agree with the poster who said that mental health issues are often family politics issues in disguise. I told my parents things that they did not want to hear, and they did not think there was anything wrong with going to a mental health professional and asking if they could do something (read: possibly get me committed) without even trying to talk to me first. These are parents that I thought I had a good relationship with, but I discovered (the hard way) that there were just certain that they do NOT want to hear. Obviously I do not recommend doing or saying anything even remotely threatening to anyone, and particularly not to parents or family members. I do not even recommend saying things that family members do not want to hear (even if they are true), if you can possibly avoid it. I recommend staying as close to your family as you reasonably can. However, you have to realize that they do not necessarily have your best interest in mind when they give you advice, and that your natural inclination (if you are like most people) is going to be to trust them even if you shouldn't. If they attempt to manipulate you or try to get you to think that you are crazy just because you think something unusual is happening, when it is pretty clear that something unusual is indeed happening, then be very careful and do not let them become the ones who determine what is real and what is not real for you, or pressure you into mental health channels, or anything that would commit you to something that is not actually going to help you.

3) The better way (than drugs) might involve investing less of yourself in technology and the internet. That's a decision that you have to make for yourself, but the tech industry, and the internet part of it especially, is already borderline insane. Some of the people who participate in it the most intensively (though probably not the most visibly) are criminally insane. Even "normal" behaviors within internet culture ingrain ADD type thinking and behavior. Rather than take drugs to mask a behavior, ask yourself what is causing it. It is certainly possible to have some involvement with the internet and not suffer any apparent ill effects. I still have some involvement with it. But I used to live on it. That is becoming normal behavior for more and more people, but in fact it is insane-making.

4) Exercising is a waste of time. It might provide an alternative to drugs that is somewhat healthier, and it might help you get off the internet, but it does not address any of the real issues. For many people it is just another obsession. Most people would do much more for their health just by paying more attention (and putting more effort in)to not eating more than they actually _need_ to eat.

5) Having gone though a similar experience to the one that you relate (perhaps a bit more extreme, hece the length of this post), the best step I can recommend, based on my own experience, is to get a job as an employee (preferably low level, preferably with minimal prospects for advancement) at some job that pays the bills, and spend the greater part of your day doing what someone else tells you to do. A job that does not require you to interact with very many other people is fine, and less stressful, but a customer/service job is OK too if you can do it. Some of these kinds of jobs are hectic, but ideally you want the most boring such job that you can get. Don't be a trucker, or another job where you're not dealing with a boss for long periods of time. The idea is that you are doing what your boss tells you to do and/or what the customers are asking you to do as much as possible, that you are not what you want to do, and that you continue doing this as long as possible. It might sound counter-intuitive to tell you to listen to your boss and to random customers and do what they want after I've just finished telling you not to listen to your parents or mental health professionals or do what they want, but the difference is that with a job (especially a boring job) it's just a job. There are no family politics. You are not attempting to create something out of nothing. You are not trying to become rich or famous. You are there because you choose to be there and because there is a job to do. The customer wants a simple thing from you, and your boss wants a simple thing from you, and none of them gain much from trying to mess with your head. It's just a job. You are also not falling into the habit of becoming a leecher in a system that is designed to support a leecher lifestyle, which is what happens to people who fall into institutions hoping that someone else will solve their problems.

Getting a job like that and sticking with it long enough might be too big of a step for many (most?) people, but it's what I did and it has worked very well for me. There are also very good reasons why it can be expected to work in general, but these are beyond the scope of this post. If you do it, and reflect on it, you will start to understand it yourself anyway. And that is the real reason to do it, because the question of what is sane and what is not, what is normal and what is not, is a non-trivial question--very non- trivial. Unfortunately you cannot trust the answers that you get from most people, including the ones who ought to know. But you cannot simply trust yourself and leave it at that either. It is worth spending a great deal of time and effort to get it right.

</comment><comment><USER46> I would recommend adding a non-public way of talking about this. People might be more willing to give genuine advice about this in a non-public forum.

There is a certain amount of legitimate paranoia which comes on anyone who is technically competent and starts thinking about security and the systems most people trust without question. This sounds like the place you are now. Once you start thinking about it, it won't go away, and you will learn to manage it.

Don't use the word "they" when you think about who can intercept your calls or hack you. That ways lies unhealthy paranoia, where anyone can start to seem "off" or "acting weird". Even without that bias, bringing up anything that might imply your cell provider not securing their network will confuse a call center employee at best, or put them on "careful what I say" mode because that way lies legal liability for them. Not sure if that's what happened, but it's one explanation.

There definitely exist people and groups in this world that can hack you in a variety of ways: legally (FBI using a warrant), probably legally (NSA without judicial approval), or illegally (criminal hackers). Most likely the first two don't care to attack you, and the latter have no reason to risk performing an attack on you unless you recently made some shady enemies. If you care to do so, you can minimize the number of such groups by using end-to-end encrypted technologies like FaceTime. Google is allegedly working on end-to-end encrypted calls, as well, and has included WebRTC into Chrome. Signal by Open Whisper Systems and Firefox Hello by Mozilla also provide e2e crypto, if you prefer open source things.

Realize that the challenge you're facing is both technical and psychological. Start thinking systematically about security. If you think your phone is hacked, ask "how did it get hacked, and how do I prevent this with my next phone?". Did the OS get rooted, or is it just one of the apps that could be acting weird? Cell phone makers spend a lot of resources securing their manufacturing, hardware, software, and platforms, and it's really expensive and risky to perform an attack on someone who follows best practices.

That said, don't imagine that you can be secure all of your systems against everyone all the time. Angela Merkel can't, and she has way more resources than you do. Security is all about increasing the cost and risk of an attack and decreasing its value, something worth integrating into your lifestyle regardless of whether you're a target now.

Finally, about schizophrenia: there's definitely stigma there. Don't worry about it. Read the DSM [2] to understand what symptoms drug manufacturers target in their drug trials. The point of the categorization is for medical treatment, not judgement, and it's none of anyone's business except the people who you choose to tell. If your security concerns get so bad that they interfere with your daily life more than you want (i.e. you can't work or have close relationships), get diagnosed and meds to help you get back on track. Based on your writing, it doesn't seem like you're suffering from anything that will require you to be on meds for a long time, even if you choose to use them. A doctor or therapist can be a good advisor in this regard, as can friends or relatives if you can find someone qualified.

Stimulants like Adderall are in some ways the opposite of anti-psychotics, so that definitely won't help you.

Good luck!

1\. [http://www2.nami.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Intranet/Homefro...](http://www2.nami.org/Content/NavigationMenu/Intranet/Homefront/Criteria_Schizophrenia.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER47> "I take a bunch of speed every day and I think people are spying on me, am I insane?"

YES. But its probably just the drugs. Quit taking speed.

</comment><comment><USER48> How is your "nature usage" going? What I mean is how often are you outside? I mean in the woods, not the city. At the beach, you know, nature.

The stimulation our brains get by beeing in nature is very important for us.

When you are outside and all the little, tiny millions of natural information tidbits that are coming from everywhere, they are important for our mental health in general. Outside, look at the waves, at the leafs of trees in the wind, bugs humming around and everything. Those pattern are important.

In the confines of our cities, which give us solace on other levels, and the simplistic abstractions of our GUIs, which we love, these natural stimulations are lacking.

May I suggest to you to go outside, hiking, kayaking, paragliding, stuff like that, regularly and often?

Take a walk to the nearest park every day, look at the trees for a while.

Do something physical - start a martial arts or so.

On a personal note: I hate it too. Working out is so dump, your brain is empty while doing so and that sucks. I know. I am not a "jock" by any means. I am bored by it, I understand.

But. From my point of view tere is a clear spiral down that beins with not having enough natural stimulation going on. For decades now, I suppose?

I also want to second the other poster: it is good that you reached out.

<comment><USER49> Why is this comment getting downvoted? I'd say of all the recommendations in this thread, getting out into nature is by far the most sensible.

I second this advice.

<comment><USER12> Q:"I have found a small hard lump in my arm pit. What should I do?"

A:"Go for a walk in the woods."

Q:"I've come up in a rash. What should I do?"

A:"Go for a walk in the woods."

Q:"I need to pee all the time. I'm very thirsty. And I sleep a lot."

A:"Go for a walk in the woods".

It's an inappropriate response to the situation. The question was not "What things can I do which will protect my mental health?" but "I think I have a mental health problem, what should I do?" ("See a professional" should be the answer)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Why are you taking Adderall? I just read the symptoms of ADHD and that is not something worth medicating for especially with amphetamines. You're a human. We're all different and some of us have more energy than others. It's ok to be hyperactive and not be able to concentrate if that's who you are. Try cutting sugar from your diet and meditating instead of cramming yourself full of Adderall. Anyone would go crazy pumping that shit in everyday. If that doesn't help after a week or two find a professional psychiatrist.

<comment><USER51> Better don't tell people on medication to stop taking them for a week or two, and if it doesn't work go to a professional.

<comment><USER52> Well, it depends on _why_ they're taking the medication. You're correct if it's prescribed, but if they're taking it off their own back, it makes sense to suggest they ease off it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> If you are independent enough to live by yourself, I suggest doing so, and temporarily getting rid of your mobile devices and staying away from your family for a while so that they do not interpret your thoughts the wrong way and get you committed against your will and put on drugs which can ruin your life.

When I was 20, I abruptly left my parents and moved into an apartment. We were having personal conflicts, and had I stayed, there's a possibility, however remote, that I would have been told by family members to see shrinks and take drugs (they didn't have enough money to have me committed). It was the best decision I made. Within two years I was working in the technology sector and I've never looked back.

Mental illnesses are often just political problems in the family, and if you can break free and gain independence, you can avoid a vicious cycle which leads to family members running to psychiatric drugs to explain away and suppress political issues.

Anxiety, depression and lucid dreams or paranoid thoughts are often the result of being in the wrong environment. I've had symptoms which, if I disclosed them, might be considered paranoid or mentally ill; but when I've changed jobs or moved to better environments, all of the symptoms have disappeared. I believe it's the body's way of telling you something is wrong out there.

Reading books can be a good way to take your mind off of difficult issues.

I would also eliminate caffeine and sugary foods from your diet.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think this make sense sense. I am sure others find this dangerous but the lack of balance in my life can also I would imagine, cause problems mentally. I haven't had much contact with people outside my family, spend all my time programming or on the Internet, and there is no one in my age demo in my town. I never exercise

I suspect I should cut my adderall and caffeine intake, eat healthier, get a more regimented schedule and excercise. Call friends more and try to get out and about with the few people I know around here</comment></comment>


Almost everyone is doing the API economy wrong - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2016/03/21/almost-everyone-is-doing-the-api-economy-wrong/ <comment><USER2> I've seen a lot of APIs on ReadMe.io, and one thing I've noticed is that many APIs tend to be built as though replicating the main site is the only usecase. Before launching an API, you should come up with 5-10 compelling usecases that someone couldn't use your website for.

You should publicly post these usecases somewhere, too, as a type of "Request for Projects". It gives people ideas... after all, you spend more time thinking about your API than anyone else ever will.

<comment><USER3> > "Before launching an API, you should come up with 5-10 compelling usecases > that someone couldn't use your website for."

Not necessarily. Sometimes what you want is to combine data from multiple sources in interesting ways. A single API doesn't need to be versatile, it just needs to make useful information available.

<comment><USER2> Sure, this counts as a compelling usecase. Maybe your API just lets users list Items chronologically since that makes sense for your site, but someone else wants to get Items by location.

Many times, the only way to do what you want with data is to use the API to get _everything_ , then transform it locally. This is obviously really inefficient (and sometimes impossible).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> "If you build it, they will come." Except they won't.

It seems to me that, unless your product is a platform, you probably shouldn't publish a public API until someone requests it as a feature. And you should charge for it, especially if your hosting the API endpoint. Turn it into direct revenue to support the development and maintence of those API features.

</comment><comment><USER5> If we're talking here only about web APIs where there is an economy (meaning that money changes hands), then I don't think that it's fair to say that most are doing it wrong. This is relatively new territory and it is taking time to flesh out the business models. Look, newspapers are still trying to figure out the business models.

Information consumed by eyeballs has different business models. You can paywall or you can have it ad-supported (or both). API clients don't have eyeballs, so ad-supported isn't an option. Microsoft has the Azure Data Marketplace, which is the only monetized API market that I'm aware of. My company provides APIs for cloud ETL that companies pay an annual subscription to use. You could say that Amazon Lambda is a metered API. My own opinion is that there will be lots of different business models. This is just getting started.

</comment><comment><USER6> You guys know you really mean "Web API" and not "API", right?

This kind of phraseology is a clear sign that someone's programming experience is extremely narrow in scope.

<comment><USER7> It also depends on the context. Typing Web API everytime is stupid. We say Linux, not GNU/Linux or Chrome instead of Google Chrome.

<comment><USER8> What's the context here though?

I had to skim like 5 paragraphs to even know wtf the title meant.

<comment><USER9> In case you are asking genuinely, the "API economy" buzzword was coined a few years ago to describe business models based or largely reliant on web APIs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> To how many products does this article apply? Only super huge platform products, like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Dropbox and Uber, right? Perhaps 2 or 3 high-business services. Google services have super limited APIs, Airbnb has none, WhatsApp has none. All other APIs are unmonetizable.

<comment><USER11> I work on a product that uses several third party, paid APIs.

\- postcode lookups

\- sending email

\- sending SMS

\- multi-hop route planning

\- engineer appointment scheduling

<comment><USER10> This is not the kind of API the article is about. These are paid services that happen to be accessible through APIs, not API ecosystems.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I want to do it right, so I want to ask you:

Question 1: Is there a de facto API/service description language standard out there?

Optional question 2: Which would be the best choice for a decentralised internet of services?

<comment><USER2> Answer 1: Swagger is the de facto. It seems to have low actual usage, but high midshare. As time goes on, I expect there to be a much higher usage of Swagger, since pretty much all API services accept it.

(Other options include RAML, Blueprint and IO Docs, but Swagger has the momentum)

<comment><USER12> Thanks! I figured the same. OpenAPI seems to be it.

WSDL on the other hand seems to be dead and/or unusable. Even one of its creators described it as a "train wreck" :)

<comment><USER13> Oh gods yah. WSDL should die painfully in a fire with all the people in its standards committee

<comment><USER11> The basic WSDL stuff is OK. It's the WS-n extensions that are truly the Zed of this world.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It seems like a lot of APIs are created to support websites, and then developers/PMs think oh well might as well open this up to the public, not really taking into account the ramifications.</comment>


Hacker News for Hackers - <AUTHOR> http://ontology2.com/essays/HackerNewsForHackers/ <comment><USER2> Impressive. The aspect I find of particular interest is dog piling. When I first heard about Prismatic[0] (RIP), I thought that would be a great way of discovering articles on topics I was in interested from sources I didn't already know. I ended up being overwhelmed by articles dog piling without a useful way to filter them for either (a) the original source of the news or (b) articles written on the topic from sources who added valuable context or insight into the topic. I'm glad to see someone tackling this particular issue.

One aspect the author touched on is "I'd like to be suprised by relevant things that I don't know about." It's not immediately clear how to discover serendipitously items that are outside of the things you're already interested in, and therefore would already be in your feed. This is an area I'd like to know more about.

I'm also really keen on someone taking the time to automate curation of their own feed. One can still fall prey to the more negative aspects of Daily Me[1], but at least you're better aware of what's going into producing the feed you're reading and have the tools to update it if you find it's not serving your best interests.

[0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prismatic_(app)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prismatic_\(app\))

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

<comment><USER3> Perhaps off-topic but I was quite fond of Prismatic. Is there a good replacement out there you've found?

<comment><USER2> No, unfortunately. I haven't really searched much. My patience for trying out new tools isn't all that high. The only two I've really used have been NetNewsWire (which I stopped using I think back around the time NewsGator acquired it) and Prismatic, which I never really found useful. The closest thing I use now is HN. I think likely the next tool I'll use in this space is roll-my-own as the author has or some app that provides the building blocks or plugin architecture for customization along those lines.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Are you not setting this up as a website? I was really hoping that this would turn out as an announcement to be an aggregator of an aggregator. Personally I dont understand either why Apple news and 'Why is X down' links dont get banned, these are the most obvious offenders. I was just about to make a list of posts on the top page that I personally wouldnt allow on a serious hackernews site and I stopped because it would include almost every single link and at that point I feel like I'm just grandstanding. The number one rule that I would have for news that I dont want to read is that if this is some political decision, I dont want to hear it. Politics change all the time, it's messy, it's opinionated and frankly populated by stupid people with stupid commentators. Absolutely no value gets generated by reading some post about how solar power is now 20% more affordable in Florida or how France just banned Monsanto crop nr. 4 or how country X wants independence. These daily occurences will happen over the course of thousands of years, I dont care. You would have to keep reading and following that particular industry/country in a research-like capacity to be up to date at all. Other rules are of course any kind of 'do this to be a better programmer' post. Look I heard it all, I dont need to hear it for the next 30 years too, this is all too similar to politics and they are always blatantly opinion pieces instead of objective looks at the landscape.

<comment><USER5> You might like [http://www.hackernewsletter.com/](http://www.hackernewsletter.com/) \- a guy whittles down the stories but on a weekly basis.

<comment><USER6> [http://n-gate.com/](http://n-gate.com/) is better

<comment><USER5> Well.. I'd agree with _funnier_ :-D

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Pop-ins : here is what I do

1) I found here, on Hacker News, a nice "kill sticky" javascript function to put in my shortcuts

2) In Firefox, I gave it a shortcut keyword

3) In my AutoHotKey script, I assigned a key to "type the shortcut keyword in the address bar" to run it quickly

4) when a pop-in occurs, I reflexively press my kill key

The script is

      javascript:(function()%7B(function%20()%20%7Bvar%20i%2C%20elements%20%3D%20document.querySelectorAll('body%20*')%3Bfor%20(i%20%3D%200%3B%20i%20%3C%20elements.length%3B%20i%2B%2B)%20%7Bif%20(getComputedStyle(elements%5Bi%5D).position%20%3D%3D%3D%20'fixed')%20%7Belements%5Bi%5D.parentNode.removeChild(elements%5Bi%5D)%3B%7D%7D%7D)()%7D)()

Enjoy!

<comment><USER8> For those curious, this is what that script is doing:

        var i, elements = document.querySelectorAll('body *');
        for (i = 0; i < elements.length; i++) {
        	if (getComputedStyle(elements[i]).position === 'fixed') {
        		elements[i].parentNode.removeChild(elements[i]);
        	}
        }

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Videos, Podcasts, etc.: If I am rating 100+ articles a day I just can't > spend the time it takes to look at time-based media.

It makes me sad when I see an interesting looking post, and it turns out that it is only a video or podcast, with no proper writeup. I just don't have time to watch an hour-long video, for content that I could read at my own pace in ten/fifteen minutes.

<comment><USER10> Usually those submissions are affixed with a _[video]_ or _[audio]_ tag.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is certainly a _different_ take on Hacker News data.

One of the thing I honestly dislike about comments on Hacker News is the advocation of the No True Scotsman-esque definition of "Hacker," where the _only_ thing that matters is code and how it's used. In 2017, there's more to being a "Hacker" than just what low-level language is being used.

<comment><USER11> > In 2017, there's more to being a "Hacker" than just what low-level language > is being used.

Always has been:

[https://stallman.org/articles/on- hacking.html](https://stallman.org/articles/on-hacking.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm a bit more interested in business (although a programmer first); so my article choices would have been somewhat broader. One of the things I value about Hacker News is that it helps introduce people who might be coders right now to business, market and management info; which will prepare them for the future, but also help ensure their coding decisions fit the business that hired them. I know that's not the primary mission of Hacker News, but I do think it's a valuable contribution.

There's an historical pendulum with a cycle of many decades re monopoly/market power regulation which seems to be reversing itself right now. IMHO, this will likely be the most important shaping factor shaping the tech industry over the next decade, especially re small startups. So I don't turn up my nose at "Big Tech Companies Behaving Badly" articles, although I know there's a fair bit of repetition. I do want to know where that pendulum is, and whether it's really swinging back. Yes, it's law that will be the instrument of that change, but it's public perception that will necessitate changes in the law (say re patent misuse) and its implementation.

</comment><comment><USER13> That's an interesting project. I've been exploring this from a different angle, in the form of generated email newsletters ([https://www.findlectures.com/form?type=alert](https://www.findlectures.com/form?type=alert)). This uses the contents of the articles as well - I'm crawling links on programming subreddits.

If you start from keywords you can use NLP (Word2vec) to measure how close articles are to your interests, so for instance "python, machine learning" gives you stuff on tensorflow, scikit learn, etc whereas "java, machine learning" gives you articles on spark, Deeplearning4j.

You can also measure how similar articles are to each other - getting the most dis-similar articles avoids the "piling on" problem mentions.

<comment><USER14> Many years ago, back when Bayesian spam filtering was the hot new thing, I wrote up a little program that would classify articles in RSS feeds based on whether I found similar articles to be interesting or not interesting in the past.

The ultimate goal was to save me time and effort in manually classifying them, as I and everyone else do when we scan through what we come across on a daily basis. Instead of manually doing that, the hope was the program could do it for me, and I could just focus on reading the interesting articles and not even have to deal with the uninteresting ones.

From that experiment I learned a few things:

\- First, that I'd have to manually scan through all the articles anyway, just in case the classifier made a mistake and maybe dumped an article I found intensely interesting in the uninteresting pile.

\- Second, that having to consciously think about which article was interesting or uninteresting in order to do the training, about whether the classifier was working or not and which articles needed to be reclassified, about having to re-train it when it messed up, and so on was a hell of a lot more work than just scanning through my RSS feed manually and deciding on which articles I found interesting or not myself.

\- Third, my interests were not static things that the algorithm could learn and classify on correctly from then on out. My interests were constantly changing. Sure, maybe there were a handful of things I always found interesting or uninteresting -- but overall what I found interesting or not changed from day to day. It was also kind of unpredictable, even to myself.

The third point kind of argues towards the approach of the HN front page, which is un-classified and un-tagged. I've read all sorts of great articles on HN that if I'd been going by some pre-written list of interests that I had, I would have never have read. I do still often wish for tagging on HN anyway, just because there are certain types of articles that I really never ever want to read, and I'd love to be able to exclude them. But the vast majority of HN articles aren't of that kind (or I wouldn't be here).

That experiment with bayesian classification turned out to be rather short- lived, as I found the whole thing way too much of a bother to maintain and to retrain when it misclassified articles. I'm still reading RSS feeds the old fasioned way today, and am a little suspicious about any AI/machine-learning- like approaches to article classification.

<comment><USER15> > First, that I'd have to manually scan through all the articles anyway, just > in case the classifier made a mistake and maybe dumped an article I found > intensely interesting in the uninteresting pile.

But I'm sure there are interesting articles that didn't get classified at all. It doesn't seem like the end of the world if you lose a little wheat with the chaff.

> overall what I found interesting or not changed from day to day

This seems like the problem. If you rated an article highly yesterday, it doesn't mean you want to read the same article again today. "Interesting" largely means "novel" and it is hard to find that by looking at similarities to what was new in the past.

<comment><USER14> _" It doesn't seem like the end of the world if you lose a little wheat with the chaff."_

But is it losing a little or a lot? No way to tell without looking.

Even if it misses just a little, that little bit might have been crucial. If it misclassifies "NYC NUKED!!!" as uninteresting that's a single mistake that could make me oblivious to a hugely consequential event.

Of course, as a human classifier, I'll doubtlessly making my own mistakes, and maybe the AI classifier could help me out by pre-classifying articles for me, but it could also be misleading and will cost me in terms of spending time on training and maintenance. I'm not really sure what the right solution is here.

<comment><AUTHOR> If NYC got nuked, I'd probably hear about it some other way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Can't find link to source code. Is there source available on this?

</comment><comment><USER17> Just a keyword filter works great for reducing the noise. I wrote one for hckrnews.com:

[https://gist.github.com/ivmirx/66a0015884d44297ea05a8c54d935...](https://gist.github.com/ivmirx/66a0015884d44297ea05a8c54d93566d)

</comment><comment><USER18> > Off-Topic: ... If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.

That would be nice but unfortunately in practice all the big news make their way to the top of HN, despite the fact that we've already read and heard about them from countless other sources. For example some of the top posts at the moment are:

\- Catalan parliament declares independence from Spain

\- New Zealand to ban foreigners from buying existing houses

\- How to Read the JFK Assassination Files

<comment><USER19> "All the big news"? That's quite a stretch. If it were true, it would mean the most of the other 27 stories on the HN front page could conceivably be found on a newspaper front page, which is clearly untrue. I don't think it's unreasonable that some news is so big — such as the potential creation of a new European country — that HN users want to discuss it.

<comment><USER20> Indeed. For years now I've been using HN as a proxy news filter, based on the assumption that if something _actually important_ happens - like a war or a deadly earthquake - it'll get on HN, and all the rest of the news can be safely discarded. It generally works pretty well for me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Interesting project, and nice to see some data on it. I've been mulling something like this as well.

One issue I have with pure keyword filters when I apply them to e.g. RSS feeds is that they can't capture details well - e.g. I'd like seeing a detailed article about how V8 works and wouldn't to exclude an otherwise interesting thing just because it is in JS, then you spend quite a lot of finetuning the filters.

<comment><AUTHOR> OP here: definitely the keywords-in-title have limitations as a feature set. Once I get more training examples (enough to characterize what "interesting") I will definitely look at the full text, HTML metadata, etc.

As you say, there is interesting deep stuff going on in the JS space, but there is too much average stuff for me to look at right now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I don't have time to read the whole thing, so maybe it's already there, but, ....

I'd like to be able to credit comments that got me to re-think or even change my position on a topic. Upvotes basically say, 'that's a good point', or 'I agree with you'. But I'd like to see a way to gauge 'influence', in terms of affecting what people think in a positive way.

Can that be worked in?

<comment><USER19> What about stating this in a reply?

<comment><USER23> I've often prefaced such replies with "Because sometimes a upvote isn't enough...", and those get downvoted about 40% of the time. Not that I care, I bathe daily in karma points, it's just a tiny bit disheartening.

I would also argue that an upvote is not "I agree with you", but "this contributes to the conversation in a positive manner". I frequently upvote posts with which I disagree. Conversely, a downvote in my book says, "hey, you're kind of being a dick and dragging the conversation down" rather than "I disagree". I mean, I'll downvote something that is just demonstrably wrong, but more often than not it's "quit being a dick".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I've been using newsbeuter with filters for the undesirable domains and I probably don't spend more than 1 minute a day skipping over stuff I don't want. The biggest win is using RSS just so I don't have to rescan things I've already skipped.</comment>


Shown HN: Instant customized news radio streams - <AUTHOR> http://www.hearinformation.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> My new startup: You can hear any type of news you want, 24/7, updated in real- time as news happens in the world.

If you only want to hear news on Sports, Top Stories or Economics (for example), you can simply click the categories you want to hear, and instantly you'll hear a continuously updated stream of news, commercial free, and ONLY about the things you care to know about. Adding RSS streams for additional sites soon (BBC, Slashdot,etc) that you can listen to if you want.</comment>


The Pirate Bay: PIPA/SOPA Won't Stop Us - <AUTHOR> http://torrentfreak.com/the-pirate-bay-pipasopa-wont-stop-us120117/

<comment><USER2> It would be interesting to see what technical measures are being taken to counter the legal measures. Everytime the industries that use copyright try to stop big name pirate sites/apps, there is a new revolution that gets around it.

<comment><USER3> The latest are things like metadata exchange and PEX, where you can get everything you need including the torrent file and a list of peers directly from the BitTorrent DHT given only the SHA1 of the torrent file. This is the direction TPB has chosen, where they're only going to have those hashes and not host the torrent files at all. The entire TPB index will fit on a USB drive.

</comment></comment><comment> Tim-Boss Honestly after all I've seen, I'm convinced that even global thermonuclear war wouldn't stop The Pirate Bay...

If there were only 1000 electrons left in the world, someone would be using them to download the latest Justin Bieber abomination from TPB!

</comment><comment><USER4> This legislation isn't about fairness, it is about a Congress that wants the option to erase data on the internet (leaked slimy deals/emails/corruption from congress, Wikileaks, CIA docs, spy id's, propaganda, theft and human rights violations).

Remember when Congress levied financial warfare against Wikileaks?(seizing credit card, bank and paypal transactions). SOPA is a future foreign country Wikileaks silencer). The "stealing", "fairness" and digital rights management talking points are red herrings. SOPA and the future bills like it are about control, specifically Congress losing it bacause they bankrupted this country and alienated everyone in it with a 11% and dropping approval rating.

<comment><USER5> Very good point, it's about Silencing Online Publishers.

If only it was about Stopping Online Piracy, which it isn't and which it can't (and arguably shouldn't anyhow.)

<comment><USER6> Silencing Online Publishers in America.

<comment><USER5> Online or rather Objectionable</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Products I Can't Live Without - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/01/04/2009-products-i-cant-live-without/ <comment><USER2> Hacker News is in the list. I can't imagine Michael Arrington actually reads Hacker News. Please reply to this comment if you are Michael Arrington and let us what is your username. This will help many hackers here who need your advices on their startups.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=techcrunch> <\- You?

<comment><USER3> Arrington has written about Hacker News before, and Hacker News _isn't_ in the list.

<comment><USER2> It is in the list but in somewhere else. He didn't mention it specifically. But, look at the digg section of the article. He mentioned that he reads Hacker News everyday.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Only one, for me:

[http://www.compuplus.com/i-Sony-NW-S703F-Noise-Canceling- Wal...](http://www.compuplus.com/i-Sony-NW-S703F-Noise-Canceling-Walkman- MP3-Player-PINK-1010322~.html?sid=9whbie06459naw4)

It's a near-perfect piece of hardware, and it's an easy way to banish all the horrors of the world from your head.

<comment><USER3> It does seem like a superior MP3 product.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm a little surprised slideshare didn't make the list, but I think it'll be there by next year.

</comment><comment><USER6> Animoto? Really?

<comment><USER3> I really don't get this one either. Anyone else get the impression that what people are really in love with is the Cinderella Story: that you can run a business on one feature executed well?</comment></comment>


Bernienomics 101: Why student loans carry higher interest than mortgages - <AUTHOR> http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-12-28/bernienomics-101 <comment><USER2> I'd accept the claim that rates are higher due to risk, given that's normally how loans work, except that student loan debt is virtually impossible to get out of, unlike any other form of debt.

As a result, its a bit disingenuous to claim "that's not how loans work outside of Sunday school" when they're already a very unique class of debt.

<comment><USER3> In the event of death of the borrower, a mortgage is still secured by the property. A student loan would be discharged.

<comment><USER4> That isn't always true[1]. The student loan is only discharged if it's a federal loan[2].

Also, neither federal nor private loans can be discharged in the event of bankruptcy, which means that student loans are effectively secured by a person's career (since loan payments can be garnished from someone's wages).

1\. [http://abcnews.go.com/Business/student-loans- die/story?id=19...](http://abcnews.go.com/Business/student-loans- die/story?id=19460467)

2\. [http://trends.collegeboard.org/student-aid/figures- tables/to...](http://trends.collegeboard.org/student-aid/figures-tables/total- federal-and-nonfederal-loans-over-time)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Of course, a society where tuition fee is not totally free market is automatically socialist. Like Germany.

</comment><comment><USER6> Bernie knows this. He's a politican, not stupid. Just more evidence that he's pandering and not really running.

In honesty I'd say the same from Trump. The only candidate who is really running is Clinton.

<comment><USER7> He's pushing to lower the cost of tuition[1] rather than challenging the financial model.

___

[1] [https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-114s1373is/pdf/BILLS-114...](https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-114s1373is/pdf/BILLS-114s1373is.pdf)</comment></comment>


Study: Three Short Walks Reverse Harmful Effects of 3 Hours of Prolonged Sitting - <AUTHOR> http://www.neomatica.com/2014/09/09/three-short-walks-reverse-harmful-effects-3-hours-prolonged-sitting/

<comment><AUTHOR> So walking desks may be unnecessary and overly extreme.

Does my morning jog counter sitting on my butt the rest of the day?</comment>


Half Of World's Bandwidth Consumed By Only 1% of Users - <AUTHOR> http://singularityhub.com/2012/01/31/all-your-bandwidth-are-belong-to-us-half-of-worlds-bandwidth-consumed-by-only-1-of-users/ <comment><USER2> The carriers (and in this case, the advertising firm, I didn't see who commissioned the study though) keep complaining about people using too much data, and use that to increase prices and throttle people for using the data they paid for.

Let me say that again: using the plans the carriers sold them. They can't stock phones and advertise their mobile web (AT&T is the fastest in the country!) services and Netflix and 4G and all these apps then complain about people _using_ it. If the carriers are so concerned, why do they allow Windows Phones that have unlimited music being streamed to the phone, why do they allow phones that have Netflix or Youtube, why do they allow Android to serve videos from their Market? Advertising a service as fast and available anywhere then shutting it down when you start to use it is bait and switch, pure and simple.

I know towers have limited capacity and adding new towers is expensive. But how much profit did AT&T rake in last year? And how much of that is going to providing better 3G and 4G service to avoid data caps? I was on Alltel unlimited data and used to use the shit out of my 3G plan. Alltel got bought by AT&T and now I'm on 2GB per month. I'll admit I never use 3G anymore, so it's effective.

</comment><comment><USER3> Bad title, on their part and here, as its 'mobile bandwidth usage' that is being discussed, not all bandwidth usage.

</comment><comment><USER4> These are simply the early adopters of the future, right?</comment>


Hedge Fund Chief Credits Colts Cornerback with Saving Son's Life - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-18/hedge-fund-chief-credits-colts-cornerback-with-saving-son-s-life <comment><AUTHOR> Every once in a while, I need to read a generic "hero/do good/recovery" story.</comment>


Google Makes $900 Million Stalking-Horse Bid For Nortel Patents - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/04/google-makes-900-million-stalking-horse-bid-for-nortel-patents/ <comment><USER2> I wonder whether Google's support for Patent Reform will follow a similar course as their support for Net Neutrality.

That is: will it get dropped the moment they secure a deal that puts them on the other side of the fence.

I mean, that's what this really is: Google attempting to sweeten their patent portfolio so they can land cross-licensing agreements with the other tech giants. If successful, their self-interest would be to maintain the patent system.

And I can't say I'm optimistic they'll stick to their currently-stated principles once those run counter to their self-interest.

</comment><comment><USER3> I posted a little while ago that Google has very few patents of it's own - only about 600 that I can find. Apple has about 3700, Microsoft about 17000. HTC has next to none.

Now Google wants to spend a billion dollars to buy 6000 Nortel patents. I guess Google learned that you don't bring smart employees, a sane corporate culture, genuine innovation, and a good reputation among your customers to a patent fight.

Another interesting angle to this whole patent auction going on here in canuckistan is going to be Google vs. Huawei. Both of these companies are in the telecom sector, both of them have a metric ton of money (although maybe Huawei has the advantage here - theirs is pretty much guaranteed by the Chinese treasury, in spite of whatever ridiculous claims of independence they've made), both of them are competing with established players with huge patent portfolios, but neither of them have many patents themselves. Huawei has already made it known that they want those patents too. We'll see how this turns out.

</comment><comment><USER4> It is coming: [http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/07/the-coming- software...](http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/07/the-coming-software- patent-apocalypse.html)</comment>


Did Facebook Agents Deceive To Get Domain Name For Cheap? - what-to-do http://www.conceptualist.com/2010/11/19/did-facebook-agents-deceive-to-get-domain-name-for-cheap-domain-seller-says-yes/

<comment><AUTHOR> How about another word: valuation. And another: capitalism. One more? Ok! How about: accountability.

No one needs to manage your business for you. If you are unaware of the value of the property which you hold and someone makes you an offer which you gladly accept. Guess what?!?! YOU are the only person accountable. Don't go whining because you were taken advantage of. Be a smarter entrepreneur. _rabble_</comment>


Ask HN: How can rational thinking increase in individuals and societies? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Education and experiences.

Education: We should educate for core thinking process as in the old days like logic and rhetoric topics. E.g. Logic can be taught and is undervalued as a trait these days. I'd prefer to work with someone that had great logic than rote learnt job requirements.

Experience: By balancing society and encouraging broad experience and social mixing you will get a more rational society. In my experience 90% of society is trying to be good citizens, but often they have a blinked view on the world. Mixing widly for greater experiences will reduce the tribal tendency people have e.g wealthy people to assume unemployed are lazy or the poor to think the wealthy have it all roses. This would cross to other areas like religion, guns, race if people can see the perspective where people are coming from. And those with opposing views more likely dont feel they have to push to the extreme to be understood. And simply seeing things in action opens your eyes. Like people that claim single payer healthcare will never work. Go spend some time in Canada, UK and Australia and you will see it works fairly well. Likewise you'll see bad things that reinforce what you need to protect.

<comment><USER3> It's worth noting that many (private) schools are picking up EQ as a primary focus in addition to regular subjects, which has the result of churning out kids more likely to evaluate themselves in their decision making (leading to more rational paths).

<comment><USER4> What does EQ stand for?

<comment><USER2> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotional_intelligence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotional_intelligence)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Why would we want to increase rational thinking? Do you believe this is beneficial for society?

What metric do we use to measure the happiness of a society? Do we want everyone to be as educated as possible? I once read some study that correlated intelligence with unhappiness (ignorance is bliss) so wouldnt it maybe be smarter to try to keep as much people as uneducated as possible?

The "ideal" society is such a philosophical question. On a related tangent it saddens me that although we have such technologic progress we still all work 40+ hours a week ... why?!

</comment><comment><USER6> The usual context for a question like this is actually finding out that someone has different beliefs from you.

First thing is for people to realize the prevalence of belief systems and how they are not derived or supported rationally.

Next thing is for people to realize that everyone has a belief system, no matter how non-religious or empirical they think their worldview is.

<comment><USER7> Corollary: Realize that _you_ have a belief system, too, and therefore that, when the other person has different beliefs, they aren't necessarily the one who's wrong.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Subsidiarity.

Subdsidiarity is the principle that decisions should be made locally as much as possible. In government it's what we call "federalism": most decisions are made by individuals; those that cannot are made by local government answerable to the people; those that cannot be made locally may be made by the county or state; only those very few decisions that cannot be made by states are the purview of the federal government. The US was supposed to operate this way. It hasn't since before World War I.

Why is subsidiarity connected to rational decision making? Simply, because the world is too complex for any one person or group to understand, model, predict, and control it. Most decisions can be made best by the individuals concerned, who have the relevant knowledge. This also reduces the cognitive burden on everyone else. Since higher authorities have few powers, their impacts are minimal. Citizens who do not have the time or information to follow those high level decisions may _rationally_ ignore and trust the system, because it has little impact on them. Those who do have the inclination to pay attention to politics can make a fair evaluation of their leaders because the leaders are only involved in a few things.

One of the reasons you see people acting in such an emotional and heuristic way, nowadays, is that the central governments and even transnational organizations are at the same time manifestly incompetent and incredibly impactful. All citizens _must_ be concerned with who wins the federal offices, because the federal government seizes half of every dollar they earn, and imposes itself into every intimate choice they make. So no one can afford to ignore it. At the same time, government is so complex and makes so many decisions that no citizen has the time or information to study it thoroughly. So what can a rational person do? They must seek shortcuts, such as finding trusted personalities to follow, or making judgments based on rules of thumb, slogans, and so forth.

In sum, because rational choice is only possible when we have the time and the information needed to make choices, neither the citizen nor the central authority can make rational choices in a centralized superstate. Decentralizing decision making spreads the work out to more minds, and places less burden on each individual.

</comment><comment><USER9> By competition and selection. Evolution is the main algorithm that can scale up and improve a complex system. How that is practically accomplished is a separate topic but the theoretical answer is clear. I think one day the same will become true in computation once a certain complexity threshold is reached.

There is little point in educating and refining individuals (although they may benefit) unless the whole network of society can be improved net.

P.J O'Rourke points out that a great many ignorant people exist in America, especially in certain zip codes.

He says the average Russian is far more well read and educated, not just in theory but in spirit too, and a great many of them have superior intelligence that makes their population natural adepts in science and literature.

Despite all of this; Russia is poorer and considerably worse off than the USA today.

It is good that you ask the question in the context of individuals _and_ groups. There is something of a microeconomics/macroeconomics divide here! The aid of one does not help the other. It is a most strange and counter intuitive paradox.

I say a good heuristic for our 'algorithm' for improving society and individuals is a diversity of options. Then we allow society and individuals to make the value judgments of what to choose independently. That is the classic position of a Westerner such as myself.

The caveat then is to what extent does informing a judgment control that outcome. That is a wicked problem. As computer scientists say, Garbage in, Garbage out. I suspect if you solve for that then you have your answer.

Most of the time I believe we act instinctively. This implies there is also a cost to rationality. I also believe rationality is a distant cousin to education and raw intelligence. There are too many examples of educated quick witted people who believe things that cannot be true.

To make a stab at a practical endeavour which would answer your question, I would guess that directing attention productively could increase rationality. I think in some way having a pencil and a piece of paper increases your powers of reason, or at least the possible scope. Putting somebody into a room with a cool temperature, good lighting, some paper and writing materials, no distractions and perhaps preliminary meditation is very likely to increase your powers of reason.

</comment><comment><USER10> An increase in honesty (both to themselves and others) causes people to search for the reasons why they do what they do. Greater political and legal scrutiny.

<comment><USER11> Agreed. It's also helpful for us to find the reasons that _others_ do what they do. It's more insightful than treating them with condescension.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Education, experience and _better health._ Poor health negatively impacts cognitive function.

[http://www.newsweek.com/diseases- mind-133263?rx=us](http://www.newsweek.com/diseases-mind-133263?rx=us)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> How do we bypass cognitive limits?

Can we offload rationality to our subconscious without allowing ourselves to succumb to heuristics? What are some strategies we can use for relying less on heuristics and more on logic?

How can we avoid perceptual errors which influence our judgement?

etc.

<comment><USER10> We don't know our cognitive limits.

Think about how hard you mentally push yourself on a day to day. It isn't a stretch to think that cognition can be trained stronger.

Do you ever wonder what an Eagle's vision would be like if they lived inside of a 10x15 room their whole life?

> At birth, the number of synapses per neuron is 2,500, but by age two or > three, it's about 15,000 per neuron. The brain eliminates connections that > are seldom or never used, which is a normal part of brain development. [0]

How much do you think the average kid, or their adult counterpart, would need to use their brain for sitting in front of the tv or working a menial job / boring school?

I believe we set our own cognitive limits and I hope that we can learn to reset them.

[0]: [https://extension.umaine.edu/publications/4356e/](https://extension.umaine.edu/publications/4356e/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Buy a large island, found a city, and reject anyone who doesn't pass a rationality test. Then include rationality in educational programs for kids.

</comment><comment><USER14> I believe the main usage of thoughts is to justify oneself, not to reason. Therefore we should aim at decreasing the need for self justification?

</comment><comment><USER15> When people see that being rational is selfish they will do it of their own accord.

</comment><comment><USER16> More spirituality.

</comment><comment><USER17> selective breeding

<comment><USER2> I suspect you're confusing intelligence with rationality.</comment></comment>


A co-founder's guide to Biz Dev - <AUTHOR> http://soundboy.tumblr.com/post/35768510187/a-co-founders-guide-to-biz-dev

<comment><USER2> Very sound advice by someone who's accomplished A LOT in this field.

#6 strikes me as particularly important:

> 6\. Make sure you're talking to the ultimate decision maker. > It's often > not the person you'll be directed to. It's frequently the PM.

I'd also add that 'it's not necessarily the person with the fancy title.' You'll lose a lot of time by focussing on the wrong person(s), even if their title suggest that they're very important. We lost a deal in which we spent several weeks conferencing flirtatiously with BD and Corp Dev (both EVPs) only to have the proposal rejected by a 'regular' PM, who ultimately owned the product and wasn't very pleased to be brought into the process at a later stage. Instead, we should have asked early on who is going to be involved in the decision process 'given we find a great strategic fit'. Getting a soft Yes, that'd be him/her/me on this also helps the general sales process.

<comment><USER3> I agree with that. I think from a titles point of view it's also worth noting that BD roles at start-ups is 99% about selling, whereas BD at big companies is often more about being a filter for things that a PM might want to 'buy', and shielding them from what they don't. That's part of the reason that the most badass start-up BD people don't come from big company biz dev teams.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Strongly agreed with lots of these. Getting to the right person is key. Also the "Bigger companies" comment applies whenever the company you want to partner with perceives themselves as big or important.

The two I would add:

1) Listen. Obvious but critical to making the right arguments and providing the right information to help the project get sold internally within the partner.

2) You don't just have to fit in with the overall strategy but local departmental strategies and politics with the partner company. Convince the person deciding that you will help them achieve what matters to them (hit targets/get bonus/get noticed...).

</comment><comment> yo-mf Most important point was actually before the points listed: do business development yourself and figure out the sales process/value proposition before hiring for sales/BD folks. You will never get a handle on what customers want, how they buy, and why they buy if you do not roll up your sleeves and sell your thing yourself.

<comment><USER3> Yeah, I totally agree with that. Just not for too long, otherwise you become too integral to the process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Most important, from my experience doing biz dev at zillow a few years ago, is focus on the relationship (which is why BD is hard to scale - you can't just "hand" over a relationship to someone else) and figure out how to help the other party every step of the way. Promote the hell out of your closed deals.

</comment><comment><USER6> Great advice. Especially documentation: that is your marketing at scale.</comment>


Ask HN: What are some sustainable and eco-friendly products/services you use? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> I'm probably not the most eco-conscious person out there but I have taken some small steps to reduce my carbon footprint. These are not exactly products or services but just some lifestyle changes I've adopted:

1) Re-usable bags and more reusable bags! I have almost eliminated use of single-use plastic bags. I always carry my backpack around and keep a tote bag in it in case I pop into the convenience store for groceries. The same logic applies when I go to the supermarket for weekly shopping.

2) The same goes for plastic bottles (no more buying plastic water bottles). I always take my thermus everywhere now.

3) I don't have a car but I'm still mindful of taking taxis over public transport. Of course this doesn't mean I'll never take a taxi but if I can take the metro or a bus, I try to use that option more.

4) I haven't done this yet but I'm planning to experiment with solar panels. I live in a hot climate (we get the sun 300+ days here) so using solar panels to store energy to power small items like lamps might be a good way to save energy.

Would be interesting to see what other little hacks the community is using.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you have any specific brands/products that you can link to?

<comment><USER3> It is perhaps better when thinking about sustainability to not think it terms of "what brands can I consume" but instead "what thing can I avoid consuming altogether"</comment></comment></comment>