Skype for Windows is broken - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@zg/skype-for-windows-is-fundamentally-broken-and-nobody-is-doing-anything-to-fix-it-bc064a50094e <comment><USER3> "Skype for Windows takes advantage of Internet Explorer and Flash to display advertisements in the client. This means that in order for advertisements to work correctly, Internet Explorer and Flash need to be working correctly."

As if Skype spying on you wasn't enough, requiring mshtml.dll and Flash this now makes Skype a malware vector from compromised ad networks.

This seems especially bad for IT environments where Internet Explorer is not the primary browser due to "security" and has Flash built-in (like Chrome used to) or disabled, so any outdated version of Flash attached to IE becomes an unpatched vulnerability possibly outside of IT package management scope.

There are other good videoconferencing/call solutions today. I see no reason to install Skype anymore. I personally have not used it in years. (FWIW, I also haven't used Windows as my primary operating system since the days of XP.)

<comment><USER4> Most medium sized professional environments aren't utilising Skype, they're utilising an entirely different product called, uhh, Skype (Lync), but it doesn't show ads and is a completely different product with Skype branding (even the executable is still Lync.exe).

<comment><USER3> Thanks for the correction; I didn't know this existed and that's somewhat comforting. I guess my point still stands for personal users of Skype, small businesses and startups.

<comment><USER4> Oh definitely. You're right on base, it is a massive concern.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> In the old days, people paid for cable TV so they could avoid ads. Now you pay for cable and get ads too.

I pay for Skype, but they think they can bombard me with annoying, irrelevant ads anyway. And now the ads actually break Skype itself. Unacceptable.

I'm now blocking Skype ads by editing the hosts file. More info here: [https://gist.github.com/eyecatchup/ba7dc7a50d90cbf6377d](https://gist.github.com/eyecatchup/ba7dc7a50d90cbf6377d)

<comment><USER6> > In the old days, people paid for cable TV so they could avoid ads. Now you > pay for cable and get ads too.

Cable TV was invented to distribute tv to areas where antenna reception was not possible. It was just regular channels rebroadcast with the same commercials. Superstaions emerged like TBS that were once local channels but now became regional and then national cable channels. Still with commercials. Premium channels like HBO and showtime were the only commercial free stations and you paid extra for them.

<comment><USER7> By paying a premium, we're indicating to advertisers that we have buying power. Which is exactly who they want to target. So in a way, paying tends to attract ads?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Skype is fundamentally broken. I use it on iPhone and my laptop (Mac) and neither are remotely trying to adapt to my use case, which seems to be the vast majority: I use it to talk to a handful of people (two, maybe three) I need to have a button to call each, and access the history of the conversation. Instead, I have unending lists of lists of contacts, annoying recruiters, people who failed an interview 5 years ago, spammers, and I cannot de-list any of them. And violently loud, impossible to remove, alerts for each of those thousands of people's birthdays, for no apparent reason. Best of the best: they somehow cannot filter Larsen loops (the annoying high-pitch wobble that comes & goes becomes louder: it's an acoustic loop between mike & head- phones), so I have to mute every 5 seconds for a second to take those out…

</comment><comment><USER9> I've been using Skype since around 2005 and, since the Microsoft purchase, every update has made the product slower and more resource hungry.

<comment><USER10> Running Skype for Linux here, and what are these "updates" you speak of? I'm still getting 240p quality video when my friends try to screen share, which means I can barely see what they're trying to show me. Also Skype sometimes randomly mutes my mic. I guess one good point is that they never updated it to run ads...

<comment><USER11> Oh, and watching two video feeds at once? That's "not supported".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Only good Skype version I know is for OS X. Issues seem to be rare. Even it is not as good as it used to be.

Skype on Windows 10 freezes and crashes pretty often. It doesn't seem to like RDP with multi-monitor setups.

Android version doesn't always seem to update latest messages. It's presence indicators are also not agreeing with desktop Skype and often just plain wrong. Annoying when you're talking to someone who is 'green' and should be present and turns out they were not.

Overall, Skype has gone downhill for at least the last five years. No positive changes.

What would be a good replacement? Must be zero configuration, grandma usable, with good voice quality, ability to chat, to share screen and send files.

<comment><USER13> Google Hangout? It works on all major platforms, and it can call landlines / cell phone number too.

<comment> yoz-y I think Google Hangouts would be much more used if it was not initially broken (or non existant) for Google Apps users for a long time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Is it worth noting that Flash should only show those errors if you have a debug version of the player installed? If you aren't developing Flash content; get rid of the debug player and those errors will go away.

[Although I 'm not sure if that will fix the problems w/ Skype]

<comment><USER15> Exactly, usually only a flash dev would install the debug version. But maybe he still needs it for development.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Skype is one of the very worst pieces of software I have ever used, the UI is so incredibly unintuitive it absolutely blows my mind.

<comment><USER17> Skype : Microsoft :: iTunes : Apple

<comment><USER18> I wonder why in general this kinds of things happen.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Running skype on Linux, I was hoping the Skype web client would become a good alternative, but nothing really happens there...

Edit: I wanted to use the Skype app on my modern Android devices but last time I tried it didn't even work.

</comment><comment><USER20> I have a really standard Win10 machine, nearly new, nothing fancy, and Skype just updated itself to whatever the newest version is. About a minute after the update the machine BSODed (or whatever the BSOD is now on win10) and rebooted, saying it had a problem with an app had had to restart. Kind of worried to start Skype again now. Those adverts drive me absolutely mad though. How much could they possibly make off those ads that they're even worth running in Skype?

<comment><USER21> BTW it's super unlikely Skype would cause a BSOD. BSOD is akin to a kernel panic. Most likely you have a hardware issue.

<comment><USER12> BSOD is indeed impossible without kernel or more likely driver bugs.

That said, Skype on Windows 10 does do weird things.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Windows 10 now has a built-in "Skype video" app which is much more bare-bones. Once I confirmed it worked for calling the few people I need to video chat with, I uninstalled the desktop app right away.

</comment><comment><USER23> Also a long-time Skype user. I pay for the $29/year plan that gives me an inbound number and outbound calls anywhere in the U.S. and Canada. I agree that the UI has been getting worse, but I don't see those ads, which I presume don't display for subscribers? I also obstinately continue to use the minimal interface format, so that might have something to do with it. I actually use Skype much, much less these days. Pretty much everything happens on hangouts or Slack.

</comment><comment><USER24> Author of the article doesn't seem to understand the word "fundamentally". This is most definitely an ancillary flaw, not a fundamental one

</comment><comment><USER25> Why is anyone still using skype?

<comment><USER26> I use Tox-im. What do you use?

<comment><USER25> Google vid google chat, aim chat, both from pidgin client.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Do the ads disappear if you have Skype credit? If they don't, that's abhorrent.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have Skype credit and the ads are still there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I don't see these ads. But I purchase a phone number through Skype - <USER2> they don't show if you're a subscriber?

</comment><comment><USER29> I tried using Skype on Windows 7 but found it simply impossible. It does work passably well on my Note 4.

</comment><comment><USER30> Someone who reads HN and hasn't blocked Skype ads yet? LOL</comment>


Microblogging – Taking control over your content - <AUTHOR> http://chrisbuchholz.me/writings/2014/09/22/microblogging-taking-control-over-your-content/

<comment><USER2> Have you considered using Bridgy, [http://indiewebcamp.com/Bridgy](http://indiewebcamp.com/Bridgy)?

<comment><AUTHOR> I have not, no. Never heard about before now.

Do you have experience with it?

<comment><USER2> I saw it on Dan Gillmor's site, [http://dangillmor.com/2014/09/16/a-return-to- hong-kong/](http://dangillmor.com/2014/09/16/a-return-to-hong-kong/)

Related effort for students: [http://www.wired.com/2014/09/known/](http://www.wired.com/2014/09/known/)</comment></comment></comment>


If you're a software engineer, where should you live to maximize your income? - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/view-from-the-valley/at-work/tech-careers/best-city-for-software-engineers <comment> tj-teej The "Opportunity index" is "determined by dividing the number of job openings listed on ZipRecruiter by the number of active job seekers in that area"

This leads to Baltimore being #1 and San Francisco 17th. I think this is overly simplistic and not representative of "opportunity", I used to live near Baltimore, I wouldn't say it has more opportunity for Software Engineers than SF.

<comment><USER2> "Finally, it combined the real adjusted salary data with the opportunity data, giving double weight to the opportunity data."

How do you decide how to combine "adjusted salary data" and "opportunity data"? They aren't even in the same unit. I find that this is often the problem with these city rankings (not only this one, but also "quality of life" or "most expensive city" rankings). There is no universal way to weigh these factors, and your result highly depends on the particular weightages you assign, often arbitrarily.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is bad. If your metric for best city for software engineers excludes from its top 10 not only SFBA but Seattle, New York, Austin, and Atlanta, your whole piece better be a prolonged and detailed explanation of how you concluded that metric was valid. I love Chicago and think we benefit in a lot of ways from running a tech company (mostly) from here, but there is no way Chicago is a better place to be a software engineer, careerwise, than SFBA.

<comment><USER4> They're looking at "median".

If you're a "median" engineer, I would not recommend SFBA.

<comment><USER5> That's a really interesting point.

I often fantasize about leaving "my" city of Frankfurt/Germany, but I always wonder if anywhere else is actually better for ME, wherever on the bell curve I might be.

Before I was 30 I became CTO of a great company here, i really wonder if I had made such a career anywhere else if I'd moved to somewhere with a more vibrant tech-scene where my specific skill combination isn't as relatively uncommon as it is here.

Same with my lifestyle situation of being the working Dad in a one-income household. Doesn't matter that i'd be making a killing in SFBA if living with a family simply costs so much more there.

<comment><USER4> If you're happy, stop fantasizing about leaving :) You already have a family.

For younger people without responsibilities, I do suggest they think about the Bay Area. If you have the right set of skills, you can skyrocket your career rapidly. If you don't like it, move back home and hopefully you gained some valuable life experience.

I've seen staff engineers at age 25 at Facebook and Google... Very rare, but having this amount of impact, responsibility, and trust from others is basically unheard of anywhere else (outside of other major Google offices worldwide).

<comment><USER6> Perhaps you can skyrocket your career rapidly, at least in terms of tax bracket, but is that what you want your life to be about?

My coworkers and I are doing all sorts of things that seem unlikely in the Bay Area. I have 11 kids. I once lived in San Jose, where that would not come cheap. The person in the office next to me has sheep on 11 acres, and he can shoot an AR-15 in his yard. He grew up in San Francisco, where that would be... difficult. Other people live in beach condos.

If you aren't careful, you can let the years pass by while hoping that just a bit more will get you financially secure enough to do something you really want to do in your life. One day you notice that the years are just gone.

<comment><USER7> > I have 11 kids.

I think its a pretty safe assumption that your paradigm of life differs significantly from most people on this forum. More concretely, having that many kids automatically make it a different calculus to decide an optimal place to live.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> m-i-l These are just cities in the USA. Suggest the title be adjusted accordingly to reflect that.

</comment><comment><USER8> The HN title and first sentence in the article are potentially misleading. It's not just about maximizing salary, it's also about cost of living and "opportunity", as described later in the article.

Perhaps the HN title should be updated to the title of the original article: "What's the Best City for Software Engineers?"

<comment><AUTHOR> I originally had the title as:

"What's the Best City for Software Engineers?" (Adjusted Salary & Opportunity)

But it was changed by a moderator for some reason...

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The "Median Salary" figures are surprising to me for a number of reasons. To isolate Denver specifically (where i live, work and hire routinely) i do not know a single developer who is making < 70/yr.

Perhaps this figure is brought down from the sheer quantity of code school (Galvanize, Turing, General Assembly) grads we have in the city, but even then i find it hard to believe 50% of the se's in Denver are making south of $67/yr.

Edit: I'm dumb. The median salaries are adjusted for cost of living of the city.

<comment><USER10> "adjusted that according to cost of living data"

<comment><USER9> Just noticed that. makes considerably more sense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The link doesn't even try to answer what it claims it tries to answer.

If you're trying to maximize your income as a software engineer, you move to SF. If you're trying to maximize your standard of living as a software engineer, you move to Seattle. Adjustments for "opportunity index" only obfuscates that.

<comment><USER12> Why Seattle?

When I think Seattle I instantly think Amazon, which isn't particularly well- regarded around here from a work-life balance perspective.

The sheer number of Amazon employees would lower the average, correct?

<comment><USER11> 1) I'm also including cities like Redmond and Kirkland with Seattle.

2) Amazon's not a bad place to work: it only is thought so because of comparisons with other big companies. And even its negative aspects are as much team dependent as they are company dependent.

3) In general, working at a big tech company in Seattle will give you a small haircut in income while offering a far lower cost of living than SF/SV.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Hmm, I'm not sure I want to move to Baltimore or Detroit even if they have tons of "help wanted" ads published. Especially after reading something like this: [https://www.baltimorebrew.com/2015/08/07/baltimore-surges- pa...](https://www.baltimorebrew.com/2015/08/07/baltimore-surges-past-detroit- in-number-of-homicides-in-2015/) Of course, it's from 2015, but has much changed in 3 years?

</comment><comment><USER14> Skeptical to see baltimore so highly ranked

<comment><USER15> Why? There are a TON of government jobs there.

<comment><USER16> I left Baltimore for Seattle, having left a position that included govt funded research, and with many friends in related positions. The ease of finding, stability, and pay of jobs all seem DRASTICALLY better in Seattle than Baltimore. This is a very subjective comparison, because I was a much more junior dev back then, but even when going for internships/starter jobs, I had far more opportunities in CA/WA/CO than on the east coast (excepting NY, of course). Now, don't take this to mean there isn't a tech job ecosystem, I was able to keep a gainful chain of good employers, but as said, they were by and large much smaller, less stable (not as a pejorative, but when compared to the BigCo's I've worked at since) and paid far less; while each time I switched jobs I felt like I had to _search_ to find the next, whereas in Seattle, I couldn't throw a stone without hitting a mid-to-large tech co. (I'd be lying if I said COL didn't hurt, but the amount one can put away with a good paycheck is _substantial_)

This ended up being a bit of a ramble, but it's one (perhaps relevant) transplant's perception.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> If you were only earning the median salary, why on earth would you pay the median amount for an apartment? A much better metric would be where is the best place to live, assuming you're making significantly more than the median salary and living in an apartment with below average monthly rent.

<comment><USER18> You might not be able to find something below median.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The adjustment they make on income is opaque. It's hard to judge what those values actually represent. I can't believe that the median salary in San Francisco before adjustment is anywhere near $55k.

</comment><comment><USER20> San Antonio is interesting. Have only visited. Enjoyed touristy bars on the Riverwalk. But its less than an hour from Austin. And I'm guessing even more affordable.

<comment><USER21> (I'm sure @mgirdley will show up here in a moment)

I used to live and work in San Antonio. Five years ago it was beginning to show signs of a tech scene. Geekdom had been around for a couple of years and acted as the hub of the community. TechStars had a program there (though no more).

I left four years ago for Boulder so I've been watching it grow at a distance. From what I see, deal flow has picked up and Houston Street in downtown has turned into the epicenter, anchored by Geekdom on one end and Codeup on the other.

It's a great place to live and I'm constantly tempted to move back, though I expect that I'd need to find remote work to maintain the pay I currently make up here in Colorado. Excellent food and low cost of living in a city that's rapidly growing up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> The best to maximize income? One of those places in middle America or Alaska that pay people to live and work there. Work remotely on something boring so that you can spend the rest of your time investing your savings. Live in a small part of your house and rent the rest out to people if you can find tenants.

I mean, if we're JUST talking about maximizing income here and not anything else, this is the way to go.

</comment><comment><USER23> It's interesting to see Phoenix so high up. Living there now, and there does seem to be a lot of Software Engineer jobs. But I'm not sure how it's handling the newer programmers. I spoke with 7 companies yesterday that asked if I would relocate to San Fransisco for entry level or internship opportunities.

(Obviously this data does not take that into account)

</comment><comment><USER24> I think many people would still rather make $55k in SF than $91k in detroit, even if these numbers weren't completely bogus

<comment><USER25> You're joking right? A quick googling shows the median price of a home in Detroit as $35k. I don't care how bad you are at budgeting, with $91k/y in Detroit you could buy two homes.

I don't have to google San Francisco to tell you that you'd be lucky to afford to rent with three roommates on $55k in San Francisco.

I get where you're coming from in terms of crime and such, but cost of living is a major part of choosing where to live and on that front there's no question.

<comment><USER26> You probably wouldn't want to live in a neighborhood where a house costs $35k. I used to live in Philadelphia, the median house price was around $100k, but it was skewed by neighborhoods with high crime rates.

<comment><USER25> I've lived in much worse growing up, I assure you.

The point is that the bay area housing market is on one extreme and Detroit's is on the other.

<comment><USER27> Would you raise kids in that same environment if given the option?

<comment><USER25> Between SF and Detroit? I'm not joking when I say that's a difficult choice.

Based on your question I think we have different core beliefs about what's important in raising a child.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> A lot of people would rather maximize their retained earnings rather than their income. No point in working like a dog so that your landlord can lie on the beach in Maui all year.

</comment><comment><USER29> Ha, that's an easy one! Just go to Berlin :)

</comment><comment><USER30> I am not sure a scraper job site is a good source of data those sort of sites don't tend to have very good inventory.

</comment><comment><USER31> Work remotely, live in Budapest like a King.

<comment><USER32> Kings don't have to work.

<comment><USER13> Good or at least decent kings have to work quite a lot. Or at least had to when being a king meant something. You still have to rule the kingdom, and watch you back so your lords and your relatives do not depose you. Of course, you can give up and just relax, but this can end up bad for you and the state...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Live in Eastern Europe, work for American or Western European customer.

</comment><comment><USER34> clickbait

</comment><comment><USER35> That doesn't seem to take in account cost of living.

</comment><comment><USER36> Anyone with industry knowledge can look at those median salary numbers and instantly tell that the data set is faulty.

<comment><USER37> Do cost of living calculators take into account the more static pricing of non-necessities?

For example, maybe an apartment in the Bay Area costs, say, 300% what it costs in a major mid-western city. Groceries are 150% more expensive and other necessities are equally as expensive. (All numbers made up for the sake of example)

After you pay for the things you need though, you move on to things you want. Investments in stocks and bonds still cost the same no matter where you live. Flights actually are often cheaper from major, HCOL cities. Mobile phones cost the same online no matter where you live.

So basically I don't know if the cost of living calculators properly scale with the incomes that SWE provides in certain markets (specifically the PNW).

Does this make sense? I'd be interested if anyone had more information about this.

<comment><USER6> They do account for that. Normally, they assume you are a person with average desires. The more complicated cost of living calculators will let you enter in your actual expenses to produce a personalized adjustment.

If you aren't weird, the cost of living calculators work fine.

I mentioned in another comment that I have a coworker who moved from San Francisco. He now has an 11-acre lot with sheep, goats, and chickens. He can shoot an AR-15 in his yard. OK, he's weird. Imagine the cost of living for him in San Francisco. Step 1 is to find 5 acres. Step 2 is to lobby the state legislature...? Even if we downgrade to a California-compliant gun, that 11 acres seems likely to cost roughly $366,666,666.

Wow. For him, it looks like San Francisco is nearly 1000 times more expensive. Thousands turn into millions.

He does commute a half hour. Perhaps there is a city a half hour away from San Francisco where he could get his kind of home for "only" a hundred million dollars.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask YC: Books/Links on giving better demonstrations. - <AUTHOR>

I fudged my through a demonstration this morning and really want to improve the way I do it. I'm not looking for info on presentations so-much but just books on how to give a better run through of software. Are there techniques I can use to do a better job next time a client comes in for a meeting and I'm left holding the ball. <comment><USER3> I think that this is not the kind of thing you learn by reading a book - <USER2> sitting in front of a computer. It's a people thing. People have a knack for seeing through other people, whether they believe what they are presenting, like what they do etc.

These are the things I would recommend if you want to do a great demonstration:

\- Love your product - nothing shines through like enthusiasm. Don't be afraid to show it either.

\- Talk to people, study their reactions, smile to the waitresses, hook up with girls (or guys if that's your preference), start conversations with strangers on the bus. Like in all other walks of life if you practice interacting with people you will become good at it.

\- Study great speakers when they do their thing - Start by looking at some of Steve Jobs keynotes. The guy is amazing. Bill Clinton and Barack Obama are great at it too.

\- Be prepared - Do your presentation until your girlfriend starts complaining that you talk in your sleep and she has heard more about you product while you sleep than she has heard about her other girlfriends sexlife. And that's a lot... Steve Jobs recites until everything is absolutely pixel perfect, and every eventuality is covered - and it shows. On their keynotes I heard that they have three independent AV systems. Just in case two of them break down.

\- Read Dale carnegies "how to win friends and influence people - it's much better than all the modern crap. It's from the 1930's if my memory serves me correctly.

Good luck :-)

</comment><comment><USER4> (A) Presentation Zen both the book (that came out recently) and the blog: <http://www.presentationzen.com/> and Beyond Bullet Points, <http://beyondbulletpoints.com/> the book and online seminars.

Yes, both of them are primarily focused on "static" presentations, however the focus on the telling a good story through your demonstration is the point. In presenting Krugle at DEMO06 (and winning a DEMOGod award, woohoo!), the biggest failing we saw in many of the other presentations was the fact that the "story" was a confusing, convoluted mess.

(B) Spend a lot more time building and practicing your presentations/demonstrations than you think. Video yourself is great if you can do it but just standing up and actually running through the entire presentation/demo repeatedly goes a long ways.

(C) For online/web demos, I always build a completely usable, static presentation (in Keynote/PowerPoint) using lots of e.g., diagrams and screenshots so that the presentation still works for the audience even if the network/server is down/slow.

(D) Have a personality -- and bend it towards your audience. I.e., a presentation needs to be engaging/interesting to the audience. I.e., think at least as much about entertaining (in the best possible way) as you do about being e.g., informative.

(E) Have fun!

Hope this helps, John

</comment><comment><USER5> I don't know exactly what your background/experience is, but experience in sales will give you good, everyday practice interacting with other people and demonstrating on the fly.

Like mixmax said, watch for Steve Jobs' presentations. He has a strange personality but his stage presence is outstanding.

How to win friend and influence people (Dale Carnegie) is also really good.

I would avoid most of the current "sales/presentation" self-help books out there. Most of them are not worth the paper they're printed on.

One last thought, try and find a mentor or a coach and/or join a speaking club. Toastmasters (<http://www.toastmasters.org/>) and the National Speakers Association (<http://www.nsaspeaker.org/>) are good, but they may be overkill if you don't do demonstrations regularly or to larger audiences.

</comment><comment><USER6> There are many things I can list. But I'll provide just one - get a tripod/camera and videotape yourself presenting.

"Speaking Secrets of the Masters: The Personal Techniques Used by 22 of the World's Top Professional Speakers" is the best book I have ever come across on speaking as an art/science because it has many different insights.

</comment><comment><USER7> 1\. <http://presentationzen.blogs.com/>

2\. Practice, practice, practice.

</comment><comment><USER8> Run, don't walk to:

<http://www.toastmasters.org/>

Listen to mixmax - all the books/info in the world are absolutely no substitute for practice. Find the smallest toastmasters chapter close to you (so you get more chances to present), join, and go every week, no matter what. In 6 months you'll wonder why you ever had to post this here.

I always used my Toastmasters group to practice my sales presentations. It forced me to be ready by a deadline, and the people there provided excellent feedback. It gave me a chance to try new things, and best of all, it never cost me a sale.

(Oops, just noticed that dkokelley suggested the same thing. See?)</comment>


How UNH spun blowing a frugal librarian's donation on a football scoreboard - <AUTHOR> https://boingboing.net/2017/10/11/late-stage-sportsball.html <comment><USER2> Here's the link to the original Deadspin article: [https://deadspin.com/how- unh-turned-a-quiet-benefactor-into-...](https://deadspin.com/how-unh-turned-a- quiet-benefactor-into-a-football-marke-1819064622)

A colleague who attends UNH had told me about the University's purchase of a scoreboard (she wasn't very happy with the purchase, lamenting about her understaffed and underfunded lab). The university, according to her, has had a history of frivolous spending, but she hadn't told me the insane backstory of Mr. Morin's (IMO) squandered gift.

The trustees and administration should be ashamed.</comment>


Google's billion dollar acquisition of Waze faces FTC antitrust probe - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/06/22/googles-acquisition-of-waze-faces-antitrust-probe-from-ftc/ <comment><USER2> Err, so I couldn't find a readable and authoritive description but apparently these Waze guys seem have two services:

(1) Aggregation and geocoding of traffic metrics

(2) Aggregation and geocoding of pump price metrics

While this data is already available in some parts of the world (largely from traffic sensors deployed by governments for road network monitoring, which are extremely widely deployed internationally!), live geocoded datasets outside of these areas (typically city centers) are not really out there yet. To get there, sourcing additional data from individuals is a logical step... if you can rely on the sources.

IMHO the biggest issue with this whole area is that it is linked to the notion of driving culture which is in my worldview essentially past its apex and on the way out. I mean, I could see Tesla buying something similar to back electric vehicle networks, but not Google. With so many cities already covered by existing and reliable, government-issued, road sensor based live datasets, I am a little puzzled as to why anyone would care about this area.

Congrats to the newly wealthy as a result of this deal though; please consider contributing to more forward looking, socially engaged projects in future!</comment>


Prime Minister Abe Shinzo Intends to Step Down - <AUTHOR> https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20200828_28/ <comment><AUTHOR> More information:

[1] Japan Times, "How Possible Successors Stack up if Abe Resigns" ([https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/08/24/national/politi...](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/08/24/national/politics- diplomacy/shinzo-abe-successors/))

[2] Japan Times, "Abe to Resign due to Health Concerns, NHK Reports" ([https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/08/28/national/politi...](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/08/28/national/politics- diplomacy/shinzo-abe-resign/))

</comment><comment><USER2> I have my disagreements with Abe, but it's hard not to admire someone who walks in with bold ideas and tries for as long as he did to push society in a different direction.

The morass would have done many in much sooner. Wishing Mr. Abe a swift recovery.

<comment><USER3> There's a pro Abe narrative in the west I do not understand.

It's a one party system, and as all one party systems it's incredibly corrupt. Under his tenure poor people became poorer, his friends became richer, and press freedoms got crushed into the earth. What on earth did he do or attempt to do that was admirable?

<comment><USER4> He's done quite a bit of work on getting women into the workforce and into leadership positions with not terrible results for such a difficult problem.

<comment><USER5> This narrative is touted in the western press, but has little basis in reality. In real terms, women were only allowed into low wage, low rank, and part time or contract work to juke labor force participation stats. Gender parity is worse than it was 14 years ago:

>This year, the World Economic Forum ranked Japan 121st out of 153 countries on gender parity, down 11 places from the year before and 41 places from 2006. Its gender pay gap of 23.5 percent is the highest among G-7 countries and the second highest in the OECD, behind only South Korea. And while the share of women in the labor force has grown to more than 70 percent, higher than in the United States or the European Union, most female workers in Japan have part- time or contract jobs, which are more vulnerable during economic crises. Of the 970,000 irregular jobs that were lost in April due to the coronavirus pandemic, 710,000 were held by women.

[https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/trend-lines/28972/for- ja...](https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/trend-lines/28972/for-japan-s-abe- womenomics-is-not-enough-to-achieve-gender-equality)

<comment><USER4> It's hard to say without more data. Are more women who have never been in the workforce, or out of it for a very long time, now coming back in at lower positions and thus bringing the stat down, but there's a net benefit as those women are now there, climbing the ladder slowly but surely?

Or it can be as you say, and that they are getting glass ceiling.

We will see what the results are but - [https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Business-trends/Japanese- co...](https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Business-trends/Japanese-companies- set-goal-of-30-female-executives-by-2030) is a goal at least, publicly stated. The US hasn't had such a goal by any administration.

<comment><USER5> I'm not sure if you read the article I linked, but the 30% of executives is not a new goal but a revision by ten years of a failed target set by Abe when he first took office. It's not a serious measure, but something used to distract from the widening inequality and growing poverty measures in Japan.

Japanese households needing two wage earners to survive is increasingly becoming a reality, but is a violation of what the LDP has promised would be delivered through its conservativism. Abe's pivot to "womenomics" was a little more than a PR maneuver to distract from the worsening material conditions that the LDP's corrupt, failed leadership have wrought, while preserving the underlying, extreme sexism of the country.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Rare politician;

If I can't discharge my responsibility to the people of this country with confidence, then I judge I should not continue as prime minister [https://archive.vn/KaCoE](https://archive.vn/KaCoE)

</comment><comment><USER7> He is the longest serving Prime Minister in the history of Japan just shy of 8 years. Before COVID-19 he was under constant attack for a school funding scandal, manipulating a cherry blossom party guest list hosted by the government, and his mishandling of COVID-19. He never got to revise the Japanese Constitution to reinstate a standing military force and all his economic gains were cancelled by COVID-19. I don't know how history will judge Abe but he did better than most.

<comment><USER5> I wish I understood the origin of all the pro-Abe PR narratives in the US. In Japan, he's immensely unpopular and emblematic of the country's corrupt, one- party democracy.

His supposed "revitalization" of the Japanese economy has done little more than further impoverish average people, so he can hand out tax benefits to the wealthy and his cronies. He's dismantled press freedom in a way that other politicians on the far right only dream of, having fired or demoted several prominent journalists who voiced (by Western standards) mild criticism of him.

<comment><USER8> The origin seems pretty obvious to me — Abe is part of the old guard, a plutocrat and moral conservative, like his propagandist supporters in the US media. Doesn't take any squinting to see their interests align

<comment><USER5> Yes, it was inaccurate for me to question the origin. I should've said its surprising to me that otherwise educated people still fall for these narratives.

<comment><USER9> Blind idolization of Japan runs deeper than you might expect, especially in communities like the one we're typing on.

When I lived there, I could never find anyone who liked him... but then again as a society it's not quite like the west where political engagement is high.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> He seemed to have had this issue back in 2007, when he resigned from the Prime Ministership for the first time. At soon-to-be 66 he's not older than Trump, I wonder if he will make a third comeback.

If he doesn't, I wonder how future generations will look upon Abenomics. Reuters is already claiming it failed to deliver [1], but it takes ages to understand the full impact of economic changes.

1: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-economy- abenomics-a...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-economy-abenomics- analysis-idUSKBN25O0TT)

<comment><USER11> Was it his decision to open Japan up? I've seen some graphs and they've had more tourists in the past 10 years than they've had in many decades, combined, before.

<comment><USER12> In previous decades, there weren't as many tourists from China.

Japan is rather far away from most of the rest of the developed world, so its international tourism industry relies heavily on a handful of neighboring countries. China, Korea, and Taiwan make up 2/3 of all foreign tourists who visit Japan, and almost 3/4 if you count Hong Kong as well [1][2]. The increase in the total number of tourists in the 2010s is more a reflection of how well Japan's neighbors have been doing as it is of Japan's objective attractiveness as a destination.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Japan#Statistics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Japan#Statistics)

[2] China's share was probably even larger in 2019, as diplomatic disputes with South Korea resulted in a ~60% drop in the number of Korean tourists to Japan in the second half of 2019. This year, of course, the pandemic screwed up everything.

<comment><USER13> >In previous decades, there weren't as many tourists from China.

This. Billion+ people country with a growing middle class that's almost within day-trip distance is gonna result in a hell of a lot more tourists.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> He will be missed.

</comment><comment><USER15> Now who will open the Olympic Games?

</comment><comment><USER16> isn't his name Shinzo Abe?

<comment><USER17> Most languages of East Asia have a Surname First Name order (even with limits to how many syllables the family name can have). So Mr. Shinzo's first name is Abe, written as Shinzo Abe. Same with Korean's Kim, whose first names are Jong Un or let's say Vietnamese's Ho Chi Min, whose surname was Ho. Sun Yat-sen (last name Sun), Taiwan's Tsai Ing-wen (surname Tsai), Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew (Lee family) etc etc. You get the idea.

<comment><USER18> Nitpick: the name is Ho Chi Minh, not Min.

<comment><USER19> That's the kind of thing I just assume a mobile keyboard autocorrected. It's a forum, not a publication. Armchair editors need not apply.

<comment><USER20> Your assumption is fair, and feedback is generally welcomed, but this kind of opinion is not helpful or solicited. Some people may not know the correct spelling.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Not sure what to think of that. Of course it's annoying to have your disease recur, but it does feel like he's just up and leaving when things aren't looking good.

<comment><USER7> You just can't falsify a medical diagnosis and would you rather have a Prime Minister leading the country despite deteriorating health? Japan's COVID-19 situation is still way better than most countries. Whether it will hold is anyone's guess but he's not fit enough to make big decisions and at some point Japan might need another lock down.

I will say that I don't trust the LDP to rise above their internal bickering and backroom politics to choose someone capable of handling this pandemic but that is neither here nor there. We will find out soon.

There really isn't any stand out for LDP leadership post Abe and that's something that deeply concerns me.

<comment><USER22> I think Japan shows that political leadership, of all factors, has minimal impact on COVID-19 outcome. The Japanese government did almost nothing and got away with it.

<comment><USER23> They didn't have to, because much of their population already follows "COVID- safe" practices. A large fraction wears facemasks in public and especially on public transport. They bow instead of shaking hands. They don't kiss acquaintances on the face, unlike say the custom in parts of the middle east. They're very hygienic, even taking their shoes off when entering a home. Food workers wear masks and gloves. So do taxi and bus drivers. Etc, etc...

A full lockdown on top of this would have unnecessarily harmed their economy with little medical benefit.

<comment><USER24> so many mis-conceptions.

Japanese don't all wear masks. They all had experience wearing them but it wasn't common to see more than 5% of people wearing them at any one time until Covid

Japan is not remotely hygienic. Most hospitals and doctor's offices would be shut down by the health inspectors in the USA. I've seen all kinds of disgustingly dirty beds, cabinets, shelves, tables, and equipment in my 14 years here. Most restaurants as well. It was only covid that finally got them to cover food items at bakeries and buffets. It's easy to lose your appetite when you see kids sneezing on all the food.

And for the last 2/2.5 months the country has seemed mostly not caring about Covid. People are partying at bars, restaurants, and coffee shops and their masks are off. Clubs are even open.

Something else must explain why Covid hasn't been bigger here but it is not hygiene

<comment><USER25> Yeah, this post sounds fake and wrong and should be rejected. Japan is most likely the most hygienic country on earth (okay, Singapore may beat them). Sure you can find some backwater somewhere in Japan with worse hygiene than the USA, but the overwhelming majority of that nation has levels of hygiene which make even the cleanest parts of America look like a pig pen.

<comment><USER24> Are you serious about Singapore being hygienic? Ever been to hawker stands in Singapore? Ever visit Little India on a Sunday? Ever walk though the food section of Mustafas? Especially the eggs isle? And yes I know they are inspected.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Not surprising. Haven't seen much if anything of him in the media since he announced Japan's complete victory over Covid 19 right before things started reopening.

<comment><USER27> Just to clarify, that its' definitely not been a complete victory.

More like a nice display of "selective testing" so the numbers always look acceptable.

<comment><USER28> [https://toyokeizai.net/sp/visual/tko/covid19/en.html](https://toyokeizai.net/sp/visual/tko/covid19/en.html) Publicly available test results show active cases slowly surge higher than the point when they started shutting down. The numbers hardly look acceptable.

If Japan didn't have the pandemic under control, would there not be a surge of deaths, particularly in the vulnerable age groups? [https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/05/12/national/tokyo-...](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/05/12/national/tokyo- overall-mortality-data-shows-no-surge-deaths-pandemic/)

<comment><USER22> The death rate has a lot to do with who gets infected, elderly in Japan tend to be far healthier and in better care.

Another possibility is that those deaths are simply not counted. Japan did notoriously little testing in the beginning. If a couple of 90 year olds die a bit sooner, few would suspect foul play.

<comment><USER27> I don't believe this statement is accurate, there are a lot of elderly who aren't in great shape in good care also.

I think what is accurate is that there is a lot of shame in Japanese society and there are many accounts of even healthcare workers being ostracized and bullied for catching it.

What I believe is more accurate is that it's swept under the rug in Japan more than other countries.

If someone elderly in a family dies from Covid19, it's easier to not bother requesting a test so you don't have to deal with the shame of having it in your family if it comes back positive.

I'm not that against the lenient testing strategy, just don't think it's an accurate depiction of what's going on in Japan.I do think it's having a negative impact economically because people never truly feel safe as they don't understand the risks well enough to enjoy themselves.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: HeyFromTheFuture – Advice people wish they had at your age - <AUTHOR> https://heyfromthefuture.com/age/ <comment><USER2> I like the idea, some thoughts..

Every year seems a little much? Maybe at young age, but 21/22/23 doesn't really make that much of a difference, or even 40/45

The advice should be written for the perspective of the reader not the writer:

"Hey 13 year old, don't stop learning how to play piano"

How would that help a 13 year old? Something like "Hey 13 year old, I stopped playing the piano at your age and now I'm regretting it very much. I often dream how well I could play if I didn't stop and I also could teach my kids"

Obviously you do not control the text. A short description with tips would maybe help.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey thanks for the feedback - really appreciate it.

I struggled with the idea of creating a page for every age. I eventually settled on the idea that people could take the platform anywhere they wanted to, whether it was passing generic advice along, or sending themselves a very specific message at a specific time in their life. That being said, it's kind of cool to see the ages that mean the most to people.

I like your idea with the short description - do you mind if I quote your example?

<comment><USER3> I really like having a different page for each individual age. This separation distinguishes your site from the countless blog posts that pass on advice "to those in their 20s and 30s" or "to those who are still young". In my eyes, these pieces are often far too general. By this, I mean the following:

Thinking back on my life so far, the years 19, 20, and 22 were quite unique with respect to my then-current circumstances/knowledge/abilities (even though I was in the same undergrad program and had roughly the same job during these years).

If I had the opportunity, I would give 19-year-old me very different advice than 20-year-old me! 19-year-old me really needed it! And don't even get me started on the advice 22-year-old me needed.

Adding some pages that aggregate the advice submitted to similar ages (20s, teens, 18-35, choose your favorite grouping) wouldn't be bad for those who are interested, but I think taking the focus away from individual ages would minimize something quite neat that you've done here.

<comment><USER4> But what if someone develops a little faster? By the time they're 19, it might be too late!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nice idea, but who is to say the future advice is any good? The TNG episode [http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Tapestry_(episode)](http://memory- alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Tapestry_\(episode\)) is a poignant counterpoint to the idea that your hindsight perspective is always best.

</comment><comment><USER6> It is shocking how much of this advice assumes that the world will be a similar place even a few years from now.

There is a constant set of themes, for each of the years I scanned but especially my age which is 23, to travel, invest for the future, and start businesses and I am increasingly skeptical of each.

I am just starting out, and I am here because I used to think that my future involved travel and startups, but recent news has made it clear to me that travel is one of the human obsessions that is destroying this world and that the future will not happen: [http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/07/climate- change-earth-...](http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/07/climate-change-earth- too-hot-for-humans.html?gtm=bottom)

My advice, for all age groups, is to enjoy what you have now and don't have kids- the world even 10-20 years from now isn't one worth living in.

<comment><USER7> I realize this post may come off as abrasive, but here it goes.

> but recent news has made it clear to me that travel is one of the human > obsessions that is destroying this world and that the future will not > happen:

If you think that impending climate change (/climate catastrophe) is significantly impacted by the "human obsession" of travel, you are drinking someone else's kool-aid and pulling wool over your eyes as to the real causes (industry greenhouse gas emissions, industry and non-industry energy generation, and agriculture).

>My advice, for all age groups, is to enjoy what you have now and don't have kids-

My advice for all age groups is to take with a massive grain of salt what a 23-year old suggests to you, perhaps going as far as to completely discount any "life advice" given by this demographic. And I'd also suggest to make a decision about having or not having children based on your life circumstances rather than some absurd claim (coming below) that the world sucks.

> the world even 10-20 years from now isn't one worth living in.

We get it; you're a pessimist. People have espoused this same sentiment for decades (actually, centuries or longer).

<comment><USER6> Fair enough, but tourism is estimated to account for a tenth of global carbon emissions which is not insignificant: [https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/tourism-climate- ch...](https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/tourism-climate-change- carbon-emissions-global-warming-flying-cars-transport-a8338946.html)

People have been espousing that we are doomed for decades, but many of them were actually right: we have not meaningfully deviated from the predictions made by the 1972 report The Limits of Growth ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Limits_to_Growth](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Limits_to_Growth)) for example. Reality has continued tracking along with our climate models, which were used to predict doom decades ago. Some doomsday scenarios have a preponderance of evidence that they are happening, and I feel that understanding that is not pessimism but realism.

<comment><USER8> The thing about pessimism is that it's a very attractive mindset for people who don't like to think all that much, but want to have answers.

It's also the mindset for people who stagnate and adopt a defeatist attitude.

It's also an extremist mindset, that closes itself away from other options and is fueled constantly by more pessimistic thoughts.

It's also a mindset that can quickly lead to depression, due to the constantly negative and skewed perspective of life.

It's also an easy mindset to disguise as "realism". There is no realism in what you've advised, in fact the advice for people to stop reproducing due to a doomsday scenario is perhaps the least realistic thought when it comes to reactions to global warming. The absurdity of such an advice is only explained by the naivety of someone who only now started life (which is accurate).

<comment><USER9> On the other hand the human life & culture we've developed might not give us a "realistic" means for dealing with the environment and climate change. Reread what you've written and look at it from the perspective of someone concerned about climate change, whose read the reports that we're likely to see effects of it within our lifetimes, and who lives in a world where the response to a progressively worsening disaster is ranges from "not my problem", "don't be so negative", to "what can we do?".

Young people today are born into a world with a considerable amount of inertia leading it to a not so happy place. The evidence points to this not being just pessimism, but a reality they will have to face and deal with in their lifetimes. Rising sea levels, political instability as once habitable and arable land become inhabitable and barren, increasingly sever weather, etc. Pessimism and optimism in this case refers to how severe these problems will be and whether we can either put them off or mitigate the consequences, not whether or not they are happening.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Interesting concept in this regard - Croatian artist Dalibor Martinis interviewed his future self, asking questions in 1978 and answering in 2010 on national TV.

Has english subtitles.

[https://youtu.be/3SCQiKDxmhk](https://youtu.be/3SCQiKDxmhk)

<comment><USER11> It's interesting the older one doesn't speak in English.

<comment><USER10> :) The video from 30+ years ago was recorded in Vancouver, in front of a class of English speaking students. His answers on Croatian national TV were broadcasted to a Croatian audience.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This reminds me very much of the video How To Age Gracefully [1].

One thing I think is missing is a "From: a x year old" for each bit of advice. I think the advice to someone in their 20's would be quite different coming from someone in their 30's vs 70's, and that in itself could be very interesting.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sycgL3Qg_Ak](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sycgL3Qg_Ak) 4m40s

<comment><USER13> Interesting video. Some advice seems person-specific over age-specific, as in, I wouldn't be surprised to hear them give the same advice five years prior or hence.

One area where I think future advice can be most helpful is in preventing hard-to-reverse mistakes. 18F's data release for college completion rates, employment rates, etc in 2012 may have helped people avoid bad decisions[0]. Another example could be increased wariness of using a drug after hearing personal stories of people trying to quit. Using the recently shared visualization of related subreddits[1] and looking at the "/r/askdrugs" graph, one can see Kratom and quittingkratom, phenibut and quitting phenibut, benzodiazapines and quittingbenzos, opiates and quittingopiates.

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

[1] [https://anvaka.github.io/sayit/?query=askdrugs](https://anvaka.github.io/sayit/?query=askdrugs)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> How about upvoting by age group. For example take advice from a 40 yo to a 20 yo, the 20 yos may not upvote but many other 40 yos may upvote the advice.

Would love to see the distribution of up votes. Do 60 yos agree with the advice the 40 yo is giving the 20 yo?

<comment><USER15> Great idea, this should be organized by decade. Nice idea OP.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> > Hey 32 year old, Even if it's not in your budget, buy yourself a nice (>$20) > bottle of wine and toast to your good health :)

Uhmmm, rrrright.

</comment><comment><USER17> Amazing. I started this 10+ years ago, called WishIKnew. It was a project to learn Rails. I learned Rails, but never launched it.

Glad to see it's real - with curation, I think it could be hugely valuable. I'm 42 and wonder what people who were 50 or 60 would tell me they wished they knew at 42 as I don't have a lot of folks those ages in my life.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I wanted to name it something similar but all the good domains were taken, so instead I settled for a veiled The Office reference.

Trying to get contributions from older generations is tough, but would likely provide the best advice. I need to find a few media sources to submit to that target this age group.

<comment><USER17> Where do old people hangout online? If my mom is any indication, Facebook and email.

I think getting advice is the hook to get people to the site. Once you get some valuable advice, the theory is that some of those people will be inclined to participate.

I'd think about this approach:

1\. Seeding this with advice from people you trust. Don't even get them to register - just get the advice and input it yourself

2\. Aggregate advice into posts e.g. "Top 10 lessons for peopel in their 40s from the future"

3\. Share / pay to promote those posts on Facebook

4\. Profit (?)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Things are newer than you perceive. What I mean is, look around at technology. You'll find it looks "already done" but it's not—it should require a second and third look by you to see what you can add. Be strong.

Secondly and related, I'd do a quick study of every single bit of general tech around you as for how long it's been in use. This will open your eyes to what has been and ready for what is coming. Mentally track how long this and that has been in play—you'll be surprised and more importantly, you'll see opportunities. Go!

-Edit- Misread that title and added mine here. ^_^

</comment><comment><USER19> I clicked on a few ages and saw advice from someone that was the exact age. To me, those are pointless in this context. Maybe restrict posting to posters that are >= 10 years older than the age?

<comment><USER20> 10 years is too much. I'm 26 and am busting my ass to get a good GRE score, because I didn't care about GPA in college because I thought I'd never want to go to grad school. Left a comment for 18 years old to take college seriously.

<comment><USER21> Hey 26 year old, save yourself the $50,000+ and skip grad school. The work experience you can get instead is far more valuable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I think age groups would be better than individual years. Is there any advice that applies at 13 but not 14?

I do love the idea of collecting wisdom. The hard part is getting the 14 year olds to believe it!

<comment><USER23> _> Is there any advice that applies at 13 but not 14?_

I can think of some advice that is specific to an age. If you're going to apply for an overseas working holiday visa, you want that last chance reminder at age 28 or 29... because once you hit 30 you're no longer eligible.

But I agree in general about age ranges. I like the idea of the user choosing their exact age, but it'd be better if the person giving the advice could choose the range of ages their advice applies to.

I think it might also need some filtering / curation. The current advice at age 64 to "start saving for retirement" is, uhm, probably a bit too late at that point. I think they made a typo in the age fields somewhere.

<comment><USER24> Wow, that's rather regressive.

[http://global-goose.com/travel-tips/working-holiday-visas- fo...](http://global-goose.com/travel-tips/working-holiday-visas-for- canadians/)

<comment><USER23> Huh, I learned something new today:

 _" Canada and Australia have signed a mutual agreement that allows young Canadians between the ages of 18 and 35 to travel and work in Australia for up to 12 months. (The age limit used to be 30, but it was increased to 35 in 2018)."_

Canadians appear to be a special exception though. If you're Australian, most countries still limit you to age 30 (and Cyprus & South Korea limit you to 25 or younger, apparently):

[https://global-goose.com/working-holiday-visas-for- australia...](https://global-goose.com/working-holiday-visas-for-australians/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> IMO the most valuable sections are always going to be < 19 years old.

Unfortunately, the hard thing is that when you're < 19 years old you don't want to listen to anyone because either you know everything already or they wouldn't understand.

It's a paradox.

<comment><USER26> I'm 18 lol, super confused and trying to gain something from older people. However, they always seem to say the same thing, and it's mostly just common sense, along the lines of stay in school and work harder. I guess I could say the same about my high school years, but I feel like I've heard the advice on this site a thousand times over.

<comment><USER27> I could give a lot of concrete advice to my 18 year old self. But, I don't think a lot of the advice I'd give my 18 year old self would apply to much of anyone else. (Get a side part haircut, you'll look better. Your mom wasn't right about a lot but that haircut you got as a five year old worked. Stop wearing baggy hoodies - you look stupid. Wear better fitting jeans and shirts, it'll take some effort to find ones that fit. Fix your acne, go to a dermatologist 3 years ago. etc... It's not all looks related but I needed a lot of help.)

I think that's why you hear so much of "work hard and stay in school." People are trying to be as broad as humanly possible to appeal to as wide of a net as they can.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> "Hey 37 year old, Remember it's never easier on the other side of the fence no matter how green it is."

Welp, thanks for the inspiration :D

<comment><USER29> Hey 37 year old, did you remember your age, or did you have to do the maths to work it out?

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> "sleep around in high-school, the opportunity cost will never be lower so you better get it out of your system while you're young."

Well that certainly flies in the face of everything everyone is told as a kid.

</comment><comment><USER17> Some feedback:

1\. Registration form is too long. Lower the barrier to entry. Maybe only ask for email and username? Or just email with a default username?

2\. Try lazy registration so the flow is:

\- click advice

\- enter advice

\- hit submit

\- get asked to login/register

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey thanks for the feedback. The registration form is a pain, I implemented SSO/oAuth with Google a few days ago in the hopes that more people would register.

Email and username is a good call, thanks. I had never thought about that kind of flow before, but that's interesting, encourage people to submit advice, then ask for registration. Think I might do that. Thanks!

<comment><USER24> Be careful. Soliciting user input and then holding it hostage is a use-hostile dark pattern that angers people.

Better to warn users that they must log in to contribute (why?), and to provide the sign-up and contribution in the same page.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Great site! Was fun reading through. Out of curiosity I skipped to age 81 and saw

> Hey 81 year old, You've got one good year left... maybe

Ouch! That one sucks

<comment><USER24> It's a poignant reminder that time runs out for all of us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Hoping there's a "Hey 15 year old, everything you've learned and are likely to learn in the next several years through TV and popular culture about life and relationships will turn out to be wrong or misleading, but it sure made lots of money!".

</comment><comment><USER11> "Sorry, It looks like nobody has submitted advice for age 80 yet. Try being the first"

"Try" sounds funny in the context of me being an 80 year old (just testing for the octogenarians who are desperate for advice :) I'm not quite 80)

<comment><AUTHOR> Haha good point. I'll rewrite this. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Conceptually, this is really appealing, though I agree with sibling comments that offering some grouping would ease browsing.

What I'm finding interesting is the metacommentary on what your userbase (which I'm presuming is mostly HN at the moment) looks like. The advice for teens and twenty somethings is wide-ranging and pretty good. Almost everything for folks in their thirties is pithy and reads like it was written by someone younger. (My own bias: haven't checked past age 40). So, presumably, there's not as many people commenting retrospectively on their 30's.

Would be neat to track the delta between a subitter's actual age and how old they're willing to advise.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey this is a great idea. When I get a free chance I'll see if I can publish a report on it. Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> This is some of the worst advice I've ever seen..

</comment><comment><USER35> For Singularity University I conceived of a similar idea. I called it TimeTraveller.

I am not on my computer but a couple of ideas I had:

1\. Match people with similar personalities (measured by the big 5). This idea hypothesizes that similar personalities can help each other.

2\. Match people per topic. This idea hypothesizes that experts can help non- experts.

Matching older people with younger people and allowing them to chat regarding their lives can give a time traveller type of effect. Here is someone who's done what you want to do and walked a similar path beforehand already.

</comment><comment><USER36> Meta-lesson from this site:

Hey X year-old: 90% of advice, like everything else, is bad.

</comment><comment><USER34> This is all such a bunch of gormless vapid chicken-soup-for-the-soul bullshit. One gets the sense that none of the people giving advice have ever faced real hardship. when the moment comes that you have to make a real choice, the best advice I can think of is to not listen to all these self satisfied blowhards who have never walked in your shoes and think for yourself.

<comment> reading-at-work I don't know, I thought "Hey 24 year old, you need systems not goals!" was actually an interesting take.

Of course, none of this is actionable until you apply it to your own life, but I don't think this is meant to be taken as gospel. It's a neat idea, no more no less.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Badly needs quality control.

</comment><comment><USER38> This has great potential! Every now and then I learn something new that I wish somebody would have taught me when I was younger. Simple tricks that make life easier.

Not going to go into things that I think could be improved right now but just leave this as encouragement to develop this further as it can really be useful to the world! Well done on getting the idea shipped!

</comment><comment><USER39> For many popular advises I know quite sure that my response would have been "meh". Yeah it would have been nice to be able to play the guitar now, but 13 y/o me will tell 36 y/o me: "Screw you, I have more fun things to do, learn it yourself you lazy old man. By the way, what is stopping you from doing that anyway??"

</comment><comment><USER40> Nice idea. But I feel like most things people wish they knew at a younger age aren't the sort of thing you can learn by reading a line of text. Most are behavioural things that you really have to experience.

Like you can't just say "be more confident" to someone. Or "do more exercise". Or "don't go into debt". No shit.

</comment><comment><USER41> The only pieces of advice available for 60 and 64 are unhelpful - they both talk about starting to save for retirement.

I'm sure that the idea is that these things will fall off the bottom if the site gets more popular, but pretty much by definition, there will be less advice at the older end, so there will be less to push off the rubbish.

</comment><comment><USER42> Isn't one of the problems though that people in the younger age brackets don't tend to listen to older people? I remember in University I was a mentor, and my mentees would usually be blaise about most things. Only when they were seniors would they panic about job prospects.

</comment><comment><USER43> The voting system is interesting.

How can anyone judge whether the information is good for an age group higher than their own, or even for their own age? I would have expected that you can only vote on advice for ages younger than yourself, much the same as giving the advice

</comment><comment><USER44> > Hey 35 year old, be aware of spent your half life

Don't need my coffee, found my morning anxiety!

<comment><USER45> I beg to differ with that statement.

I'd say life doesn't really begin until you're on your own, so around 18 for me, but I'd really say that life picked up around the late 20s, early 30s. So, at 37, if I look at everything that I've done in the last 10 years, and now knowing what I want to do, I've still got three lives to live.

<comment><USER46> Life begins as soon as you can make conscious choices in what to think about. Things that look like adulthood to us used to start at about 10-12.

Maturity, focus, concentration, self confidence all ebb and flow with time and aren't guaranteed to be monotonic. Civilization allows us to do great things, but it also enables the individual to be a weaker total person while being particularly skilled in one area.

<comment><USER44> > Civilization allows us to do great things, but it also enables the > individual to be a weaker total person while being particularly skilled in > one area.

Is that actually the case? I feel like a hunter/gatherer society isn't particularly well rounded - it's just a couple of skills that one lives or dies on. I wouldn't say that a caveman was well rounded, instead they were just ignorant of everything outside of "find something to eat and kill, then mate with something else".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Oh man, too accurate. Why were these words exactly what I needed to hear?

Good site, thanks for the help.

</comment><comment><USER48> "Do not become bald" is the only English-language advice at 34 years old. Helpful.

</comment><comment><USER49> The spelling and grammar of some of the "hey x year old!" copy is not that great.

</comment><comment><USER50> "Hey 34 year old, do not become bald. Let's face it, bald people aren't happy."

Well that was sure worth my time spent on the website. I'm not sure how I will best incorporate this advice into my life.

<comment><USER44> > I'm not sure how I will best incorporate this advice into my life.

Don't go bald.

<comment><USER32> Realise that the advice is nonsense and baldness has no meaningful impact on your life. Go bald and be happy.

<comment><USER51> So the advice is don't listen people who post on HeyFromTheFuture? It doesn't surprise me but it's self defeating.

<comment><USER32> Genuine advice is often coloured by a person's own bias and experience, and if another takes it without taking that into consideration, they will be misled by the same faults.

In this case, the advice about baldness is a joke based on a negative stereotype for baldness, and not genuine advice at all. The default response in this post appears to be along the lines of preventing or reversing hair loss, showing support for the stereotype, and that people are taking the content at least a little bit seriously. I'm just here to say this particular piece of 'advice' is misleading at best and harmful at worst. Baldness will only affect your happiness if you let it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> People who wish they lived their life differently when they were younger, are the same people who when they are older will realize their younger now self should have given different advice.

</comment><comment><USER53> It would be interesting if the upvotes have age statistics, e.g. of the upvotes for this advice to 30 year old, 15 are from 35 year old, 20 from 43 years old, etc

</comment><comment><USER54> Cool idea!

Looking through it, I'm not sure I like the ability to post to your current age though. It doesn't read like worthy advice to me.

</comment><comment><USER55> Honestly one of the coolest site ideas I've seen in a long time. I'll be checking back.

</comment><comment><USER56> It's a fun and interesting idea. Would definitely like to see how it'll evolve further.

</comment><comment><USER57> Wow, the HN filter ignored my advice completely, refusing to post my comment. It was a shorter version of engaging more in the recreational form of reproductive activity, while your body is in its prime.

<comment><USER57> And don't waste decades thinking you're not that smart.

Some people have prodigious technical skills. They'll use absolutely all of their abilities to try to lift the truck off the baby, and the wall of equations they produce while failing will make you feel like you don't belong.

Don't confuse this with intelligence. It's not. The best answers are simple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> I love the idea, I guess the form will change when there will be more content.

</comment><comment><USER59> The idea here is very cool, but was disappointed by the execution. A lot of the advice given is really simplistic. I'd like to see (1) more deep, meaningful advice (2) from smart, successful people (ex: Warren Buffet).

<comment><USER60> * Warren Buffett's List of 14 Must-Read Books || [https://www.warrenbuffett.com/warren-buffetts-list-of-14-mus...](https://www.warrenbuffett.com/warren-buffetts-list-of-14-must-read-books/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> I like it, but I would add moderation on the comments.

</comment><comment><USER62> 34 is a rough year.

<comment><USER44> Hahah, I looked at it and went "uhhh, I'll try not to, I guess?"

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> Hey Nineteen That's 'Retha Franklin

</comment><comment><USER64> This one is unkowningly funny:

Hey 26 year old, these are your prime earning years, make sure you're saving as much as you can

<comment><USER65> Why do you think so?

<comment><USER64> Its the opposite lens of most the other advice. The others look at the mid 20s as a time to have fun, quit jobs you don't like, etc. This advice is purely fiscal - you earn in a prime position to earn money, so maximize that value while you can. All the advice agrees the mid 20s is a prime, but 80% is prime for fun/living while this one is prime for money.

Still good advice, just a funny juxtaposition.

<comment><USER66> Also that's only true for a narrow subset of people working in "rockstar" industries where the career decline is sharp after 30. Footballers, pop stars, models, _some_ programmers. Everyone else expects to make more as they get older. Some industries (e.g. acturaries, medical) have really long qualification processes so you will only reach full pay after 30.

It might be "peak savings opportunity because you don't have a family", but that's not at all the same thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> Hoo boy that's a lot of over-privileged suggestions right there. "hi, millennial who is working full time to make rent, now is the time to start your business!", "Why not take your family around the world?"

It's a nice idea and the site works pretty well on mobile, but it sort of grinds my gears.

<comment><USER68> Actually all of these things are more achievable than you think. I have a relative who has a family of 5 (as in two adults and three young kids) and they've managed to travel the world the past several years on a high school teacher's salary.

It's all about your priorities/tradeoffs and how much work you're willing to put into it. They lead a very no-frills budget-restricted life, keep very minimal possessions, put effort into finding overseas teaching jobs in low cost-of-living areas, finding dirt-cheap travel deals, and honestly I think the kids getting all this early travel and cultural exposure is probably a big net win (vs e.g. prioritizing things like buying them the latest video game consoles and fashionable clothing, etc).

You could say the same for starting most small businesses. There are loans available to get up and running if you have a solid business plan and don't have awful/ruined credit, and many viable businesses can be "pay my bills" profitable fairly quickly. You won't make as much excess cash as getting on the corporate treadmill and doing well, at least not earlier on, but you do reap the rewards of being your own boss and learning a suite of skills that's much rarer, and over time even the small business world can eventually become quite lucrative if you want it to be.

<comment><USER44> >It's all about your priorities/tradeoffs and how much work you're willing to put into it. They lead a very no-frills budget-restricted life, keep very minimal possessions, put effort into finding overseas teaching jobs in low cost-of-living areas, finding dirt-cheap travel deals...

So how is their retirement plans coming along?

>...and honestly I think the kids getting all this early travel and cultural exposure is probably a big net win (vs e.g. prioritizing things like buying them the latest video game consoles and fashionable clothing, etc).

That seems to be a loaded assumption. I've known people who spent their entire childhood traveling, and rather than culturally rich they just couldn't fit into any culture - they were inappropriate and had difficulty functioning in a North American lifestyle due to having a mish mash of wordly exposure which has proven to be pretty career limiting. They can tell neat stories about their time in South America, but can't figure out why people don't want to hear outright that their ideas are dumb. There's this assumption that the more you travel the more well rounded you'll be, but you've just been you in more places, doesn't mean you'll be a better person.

<comment><USER69> One does not have to retire to a first world country. Seriously, why would you even want to retire to USA? Health care, which old people tend to use, is stupid expensive.

<comment><USER44> I'm Canadian, so I have no desire to retire to a place with awful health care. How does health care in second/third world countries work? Are you instantly granted all rights to health care if you retire to another nation?

<comment><USER70> >> are you instantly granted all rights to health care if you retire to another nation?

Yes, those rights being the sole right to purchase health care. Which can be very good if you have money and doesn't exist if you do not.

<comment><USER44> > Yes, those rights being the sole right to purchase health care.

But do all nations actually have that?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> Invest much more aggressively in stocks.

</comment><comment><USER57> Have more sex?</comment>


Ajax Accessibility - <AUTHOR> http://ejohn.org/blog/ajax-accessibility/ <comment><USER2> I just googled and found that jQuery UI is going to be made ARIA compatible after the 1.5 release too, which is awesome! The AxsJAX project mentioned in the post looks really cool too. Has anyone tried the jARIA jQuery plugin yet?

Accessibility is a post-launch feature we're strongly considering for our app. Are other startups considering accessibility in their apps? If so, what did you do?</comment>