Ask HN: When should you quit? - <AUTHOR> this is a pretty dark post but I'm pretty much burnt out. Not one of those 'take a break' and come back but I just don't think I can deal with working in tech anymore. I started out as a software dev for a couple of years, moved on to selling my own software and just too tired to go on. Like I don't think I can compete or have the willpower.
I tried to think of new software ideas to work on but I really can't muster any energy to do it. I know there's ton of exciting new tech stuff going on but after 16 years I think I've had enough.
It's been a really interesting 6 years working on my own thing. But it was far too isolating. Too much mental health issue causing. And it's a zero sum game I'm realizing, one that is won by whoever can raise the most amount of money in the shortest time period.
I don't know maybe my head was too high in the clouds. But I'm turning 30, and I think it's time I quit and look for other things. I don't know anything else besides making software, and I feel so old to be trying something completely new. If I keep going I think it's going to drive me nuts. Even reading HN and Techcrunch these days I'm not even feeling excited or let alone interested.
I haven't had any success and all I've done was get taken advantaged of by crappy customers, worked for free for years, and yeah.
I know I'm not owed or entitled to anything. It was my decision after all to work on something alone for such a long time. And it was all for shit.
I even got a hold of investors but I just think it's too late. I should've taken money 6 years earlier, not now. I'm burnt out and can't do anything in front of the computer anymore. Like I just want to get away from computers permanently almost. I try to imagine what life was like before internet and computers and I don't fucking know and it scares me.
tl;dr: want to quit making software & tech but don't know where to turn. <comment><USER3> > "I feel so old to be trying something completely new."

Dude. You're 30. I'm not going to post the cliche list of people who've done amazing, impactful things after age 30, but please understand that that list easily runs to the hundreds of millions. You have a lot of time to do whatever you want. Take a break. If you still want to get out of tech, then jump into another field. If not, just take a normal tech job and be one of us drones for a bit. It won't kill you, and it might reenergize your desire to make your own thing.

You're been working on your own thing for six years, which means you started it before you had even reached the age where you could rent a car. You have never experienced a normal life. Give it a shot. It's not as terrible as it's sometimes made out to be. I'm not making a billion dollars, but I get paid well and I go home to a nice place; I live with a beautiful girlfriend and I exercise at a nice gym and take fun vacations and eat at nice restaurants and drink fancy scotches. It's not jetting to Malta on the weekends, but it's better than what the vast majority of people on this earth who are around our age can hope for.

And doing that doesn't mean you've given up and sold out or whatever. You can work on side projects when they make you happy. The cult of the entrepreneur hasn't done right by you. Try another path, and see if it works better. It might fit you better, or it might reenergize you to get back into the startup space, or it might make you realize you need to live in a hippie commune. (If that's the case, I know a place.)

</comment><comment><USER4> My husband had the same problem when I met him. He was 27 and just decided to never ever make a living from programming again because he felt sick of it.

So, he decided he would organize bicycle rides in Transylvania. And he looked really cool doing that so I fell in love with him, but he wasn't making any money while working his ass off. I didn't care ( -I had a job), but after a while, he did. I'm used to not afford basic stuff, but he got sick of scarcity then.

We only started doing little websites for friends in the afternoon. But they asked for more, so what could we do, right?

And here we are after 7 years, having a small software company... in Transylvania. Many times it does feel like "eating glass and staring into the abyss...". Maybe it's a grownup thing to feel that way and stand up to it. It's the overcoming of all the winning is what gives you dignity, in the end, I think.

I don't think you should quit.

<comment><USER5> Do you still organize bike rides?

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> First, taking a break is probably the most important. If you're burned out, don't underestimate the need for healing by just relaxing. If you can't afford to take a long break (no savings, etc), find a really easy job where you don't need to think much.

Honestly, the most relaxing job of my life was when I was lifting and restacking wood in a shipping warehouse. The lumber would come in on these big trucks, but they'd be stacked in a way where they couldn't fit optimally into shipping containers. So we were responsible for literally manually restacking the wood into stacks that would fit. I got to joke around with my co-workers, and the work was great exercise too. Heck, I even poohed better due to all the heavy lifting in that job. Every day, I'd go home exhausted, but happy, and have a really great night's sleep. I felt like I did an honest day's hard work and there was no debate about whether or not I was succeeding at my job too.

Don't think that you're going to get away from tech forever yet. You might find later that you really actually still like it, but you just aren't in a good place right now, so it's hard to distinguish what your emotions really mean. Or maybe you are completely done with tech. Take some time to heal and rest first for a few months, and then ask the question again.

I like jacquesm's blog posts on this subject, in the first one listed, he actually personally experiences and deals with similar questions: [http://jacquesmattheij.com/categories/health](http://jacquesmattheij.com/categories/health)

edit: Thought. If you can afford it, something like Habitat for Humanity is a great way to get that type of physical exercise, and also give back and feel like you're contributing to a worthy cause. I think it gives us warm fuzzy feelings when we're doing something for the greater good, and that helps. Heck, you might become good at it and discover that you'd rather be in construction, who knows? Again, if you can't afford it, I recommend finding a simple job where you can turn your brain off and just do stuff, preferably with a physical component.

</comment><comment><USER7> If you're going to make an irrational decision, do it out of love, not hate.

When was the last time you fell in love? Maybe it was a girlfriend, perhaps it was a language? Perhaps it was with an apple product?

I realize your questioning why I'm asking this. But here's the thing. If you're going to make an irrational decision, do it out of love, not out of hate.

My love is photography, I fell in love with it while taking a camera to a juggling convention, and shooting a friend on stage. Nowadays, I can take a camera in my hand, and what ever is bothering me starts to disappear when the camera clicks. The how or why doesn't matter to me -- what matters is that I feel better after.

So, what makes you feel better?

<comment><USER8> "If you're going to make an irrational decision, do it out of love, not hate." :) This is awesome advice, specially for seemingly crucial decision points.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm 53 and have been working as a programmer since I was 17. I still _love_ what I do but I've been where you are at several times. I'll tell you something you probably already know - it's impossible to make a good decision where you are at right now. For what it's worth I'd suggest taking a break and then deciding what to do once you have some distance and have shaken some of this off.

</comment><comment><USER10> Quit. But quit with a caveat:

> I haven't had any success and all I've done was get taken advantaged of by > crappy customers, worked for free for years, and yeah. [...] > And it was > all for shit.

This part is bullshit.

You can't see it, but all of those petty, trivial, and fragile moments have influenced who you are now.

It might take months, maybe years, for that investment to come back with dividends. The seeds of what you have learned are just now taking root for tomorrow.

Contrary to all of the late-era Capitalist rhetoric, life is not a narrative. You aren't something destined. You aren't an arc.

You are a human fucking being living an accident of delicate and frail circumstances.

Let life lead you. In due time, the act of quitting may well be the turning point that led down a tremendous path you would never have previously seen...

</comment><comment><USER11> You are a hero, and what I consider to be the definition of a real man. You did the hardest thing on earth for 6 years - you tried to build something new and useful to this planet.

I guarantee you learned a great deal about business, about technical topics, it was probably like getting an MBA and a PhD all rolled up in one.

It was a lonely path, and it still will be if you continue. It is the nature of the task. Perhaps it is time to go out among the "just started this path" types for just a little bit. After talking with you for 5 minutes, they will probably think you are a God for surviving this long, and because they sense your 6 years of vast experience.

Take a week or two off in some small town without high speed internet. You probably need a good solid vacation.

</comment><comment><USER12> We live in a very strange world...

It takes these odd postings (like this one) to bring out scores of people who say "I've been there too, I got burnt out and I started to give zero fucks"

While many HN users enjoy the articulate nature of programming and have a great enthusiasm for it as a hobby, the truth is that we are all different, in very strong ways.

To the OP, before you quit, try to find another gig, perhaps not in software, but any gig to get you by. Remember that most of the world works in jobs they are not passionate about and money is a means to sustenance. Once you have a decent income stream, even if it means working as a coffee-barrista, start to find your life outside of work.

To everyone else suffering from HN, programmer-speak, x-libraries, x-languages, x-ideas, x-dreams, x-future, x-80-hour-workweeks:

 _Take a step back from your job and find yourself. See your job as nothing but a job. No amount of perks, free lunches, free gym-membership is going to change the fact that you are just a cog in the chain. Keep your job to keep your sustenance, but start living outside your work. Love your wife, love your children, or try to find a wife and have children. Hold on to your dear ones and build relationships beyond your tech circles. Explore ~ global travel is expensive, but chilling in a forest or sitting by a lake only costs you a little driving time and nothing else. Live outside your career, because your code will not matter and will not be remembered when you die. You, as a person, will be remembered; only by those you 've built relationships with (and not your employer who gave you free lunches in 2016)_

Above all else, value your time. If you never get to HN/reddit frontpage with 1246 upvotes to your legendary docker-esque github repo, breath in, look outside the window and repeat: who gives a fuck (and then move on with your life)

</comment><comment><USER13> I worked too hard on developing software and got stressed out and developed a mental illness and became disabled.

I went back to college to take a business management degree and earned one. Thinking that I might do better as a manager. But since I have no experience as a manager, no luck in getting a job.

It is very hard to work on your own, and earn money. You need a team of people, you need investors, you need social and people skills. You need to market your product and SEO your website to get clients and customers.

I've worked on software projects that went nowhere because I couldn't get anyone interested in them.

I'm 47 now and figure my career is basically over. I could try Freelance after updating my skills to modern languages, build new projects and a portfolio, but I don't see the point when everyone else is doing that and there is a lot of competition.

<comment><USER14> Being 47 (I'm older!) gives you a perspective that younger folks simply don't have. How many SV startups are targeting people a few decades beyond their teens?

<comment><USER13> I do have a perspective on how things work better. How to better debug programs. How to make ADO recordsets work faster. How to make Crystal Reports generate reports faster. How to cache an ASP website using a text file and using the system time to update it every day at midnight to update the data and load the HTML from a text file.

I'm sure these things can work in modern languages as well in theory. I might be able to mentor other programmers as well and manage them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I am 28 and feel exactly like you: one difference, I have never gone on my own, I have always been an employee at a huge corporation.

Right now, I look up to you a lot, you had the balls to go on your own.

I don't have a solution to this, I can only let you know that you are not alone and I relate 100%. I would get a 9to5 job, save some money, and quit and travel for a while, find your passion. This is what I hope to do, hopefully soon

<comment><USER16> This is good advice - I did this when I turned 30 - spent my 30th on a beach in Chile having the time of my life - then spent the next 7 months backpacking around south america - and it was the best time of my life. After I came back I worked for a few months to save some $ then moved to the other side of the world - that gave me enough interesting stuff to keep doing something I wasnt so interested in anymore - but I found unusual work opportunities that never would have happened if id stayed in the same place

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Programming for a career does appear to affect the soul. I mean soul in the sense of self and relation to the world around self and general sense of happiness. I thought it was just me but I'm noticing it in others. Don't get me wrong... the excitement of solving problems and making things is addictive. It's a really nice high. But it definitely take a toll as certainly as laying bricks or driving semis day after day does. I don't have any actionable advice. I try to take time to do other things.. projects in the physical world. It helps some. Maybe you should get a job and change environments. Maybe you should do something else for a while. IDK... but I do feel for you.

</comment><comment><USER18> I may be reading between the lines, but it sounds like it's the business side of things that is becoming miserable. If you still enjoy writing software, it might be worth worth exploring opportunities outside of self-employment. Working for a manager comes with its own set of problems, but it can be a whole lot less stressful financially and emotionally.

</comment><comment><USER19> This is a long shot because I don't know where you live, and only have HN as my source of widespread info on tech careers. But if you're in SV or somewhere like that, maybe you'd be happier in a more provincial setting. You might be able to find an employer with a more laid back environment, and a slower paced lifestyle, more access to the great outdoors, etc.

I did something similar, a couple decades ago: Pulled up stakes and moved to a town that was listed as a "best place to live," with a similar climate to where I grew up, etc. Best decision I ever made.

</comment><comment><USER20> I am in a very similar place right now.

Similarly horrified that my only valuable skillset makes me effectively chained to the computer screen, forever.

Been self-employed so long that full-time employers see the experience as a disqualifier from hiring. Let a string of bad business deals put me in so much debt I have no hope of putting together the financial cushion or runway towards taking an extended break or re-skilling into another industry. Been taken advantage of so many times by tech industry titans that I trust no one. Turns out the root cause was partly a mental illness working against me my entire career that I only recently was diagnosed for, well into adulthood.

Completely deflated in confidence or ability. Burned out to the point where I can no longer even effectively fake enthusiasm for selling my abilities. Jaded hostility I can no longer control towards clients, peers. Hide away from socializing with anyone else with ties to the tech business because of social anxiety fears they'll judge me for my failure, or worse, I'll get drunk and lash out.

Therapists suggest a major career change but I have no skills in anything else that could pay my bills. All the attempts at shifting away to management, associated non-code skills tend to backfire.

When my checkbook is drained, it only refills with a half-hearted sales pitch to an old client, a grudging all-night session with a text editor.

Obligations to wife, sick elderly parents that keep me bound to where I live. Got somehow stuck in an absurdly expensive soul-crushing city with absurdly hight rents for absurdly tiny living spaces, that also happens to be critical for my wife's career. She's at the top of her game here. Leaving means she gives up her career.

I've been dreaming of living in the woods making furniture or something, being a tugboat captain, construction worker, a sanitation worker even. Welding, cutting bushes, mopping floors. It took 15 years to really truly drive home how badly I misjudged my ability to succeed in this business, what the consequences were for a career of being self-employed in something that didn't really motivate me to begin with. I need a paradigm shift in how I see my life, but it just won't seem to come.

Such a bleak comment. Ugh. Sorry. Anyhow, yea you're not alone.

</comment><comment><USER21> Don't worry man, lots of us (me too! I'm 33!) started companies while young. Shutting them down is liberating, not every effort comes to monumental financial success. Some say that the true measure of a person is how they respond to challenges. Knowing that there is no set direction in life, it's really healthy to embrace moments of reconsideration. Don't worry about deviating from some social obligation of fervently chasing dollars. Changing physical and social environments can be very powerful. If you have some money in the bank then I would highly recommend going to travel on the cheap to some different countries. Learn about where you go, explore. Try to limit the time while you are away spent with people from your own culture. It will help you relax, and stimulate you in new directions. You might even try something new that pops up on the way, and find new directions you might like to consider: Diving. Studying. Teaching. Writing. Art. Picking up a new language. Running a hospitality business. Maybe even someone who gives you a shared direction in life?

Personally I shut my first company in 2009 after getting some recognition from VCs and support from angels, found success working for others for awhile, did a few years of remote, and now - some 7 years later - I'm starting businesses for myself again. It took that long to re-energise. We don't even have our website complete yet, but yesterday just signed our first client for enough money to buy a nice shiny new mountain bike. I plan to let it grow slowly and organically, not stress and to ride that mountain bike at least as much time as I spent in the office coding. Wiser these days.

</comment><comment><USER22> You probably can't really tell whether you want to leave tech forever, or just leave being extremely poorly paid and appreciated for your work in tech forever.

To tell the difference, you might have to take a Normal Tech Job, when you're ready for it.

</comment><comment><USER23> Take a six month break from computers and the Internet. If you absolutely must, you can check your e-mail once a week, but no further tech than that. During those six months you can vacation (if you saved up some money during your years of coding), or, if you need money to get by, you could work some menial job. After six months, if you feel up to it, you could decide to return to the field of software development. However, I hope you'll resolve to never again work as a software developer for peanuts. It's mentally taxing work that ought to provide you with plenty of money.

</comment><comment><USER24> Spend a year or two getting as strong as you can physically. It is just as important as exercising your mind.

</comment><comment><USER25> I am 28 and two years ago had similar feelings. I burned out after 6 years working in IT corporate environment in shift mode.

Moving to different area helped me a lot. But same mind-set reoccurred after 3 years and i burnt out again, another moving to different area.

Now I have kids, house with my own workshop where I have environment for creative hobby - woodworking. I can see real result of my job. Beside this I work in IT corporate and have company with on-demand programming services.

I feel it's stable period, with work-relax balance, at least for now.

</comment><comment><USER26> _Don 't quit yet_, because your judgment is clouded. You sure to regret quitting based on emotion.

      Here is what helping me:

1\. Take a break off in the different country. At least for 1 month. I recommend backpacking.

Why?

Everyday task will shock your brain out. Making it hard to think negative thoughts.

And never underappreciate the power of like minded people. They are escaping cubicle nation, too.

2\. Try new things, extreme things while you are on holiday.

Why?

You are still shooting for shocking your brain. That's will help.

And here is the other takeaway: your burnout based on missing out on things. Do it now, everything that your old self wanted to try out.

3\. Go back to work with different condition in mind.

But, this the big BUT. Write down when you will be quitting before starting again. Think SMART goals here. And I emphasize on writing it down. Clue: Seth Godin: The Dip

4\. Are you still in bad mood?

The primary culprit will be one of the following:

\- Flexible schedule

\- sleep

\- your own imagination

\- diet

\- exercise.

Work to achieve the missing one(s). At this point the diet, exercise and sleep is good because you have been on a holiday. So you might need flexible schedule for the last part.

5\. Tweak this. Read books. Meet people, listen to them. Have notes.

6\. Repeat.

Your own imagination will take care of itself in no time. Try not to think and go on holiday.

Also, one year from now I would like to read your takeaway, here on HN.

Take care.

</comment><comment><USER27> I feel the same, but I am trying to dedicate my hard-earned skills and experience to healthcare so that I can focus my week days on doing something which will someday help saving lives. Otherwise, I think most Tech is a gamble with VC's money (they do have a lot) and at the end we will end up corrupting human generations with information/consumption overload and decent skills to talk to people and enjoy life as it comes. At some point when I was working for a advertising startup, I burnt myself out and it was a good first step at realizing how not to work and inculcated lot of good habits (like frequent breaks, making sure I don't work beyond a certain time everyday, planning for the day {velocity > speed} etc) which re-energized me. And at the end I know, health will win over wealth so it's important I exercise and enjoy each day and worry less about work when I am not working.

</comment><comment><USER28> The burnout symptoms may be a form of resistance.

The more important an activity is to the evolution of our souls, the more resistance we'll feel toward it.

On this subject, Steve Pressfield is masterful> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdVhG7YUs1w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdVhG7YUs1w)

</comment><comment><USER29> You aren't too old to do something new.

People working in this industry are often required to display unfelt enthusiasm for things that really aren't terribly exciting. One can be forgiven for being through with this nonsense by the age of 30.

I would never consider working as a software developer but for my sincere interest in the value that my software provides and my enjoyment of the craft. Otherwise I think it would be comparable to accounting, the quintessential boring yet rewarding career.

Do what you truly wish to do. To be concerned about being too old at the age of 30 is just silly.

</comment><comment><USER30> If isolation is an issue, perhaps there is a co-working space or public space at which you can work. If you don't want to work in public, maybe you just need to go to some meetups, professional organization, makerspace, or some other type of group where people come to socialize. You may want to try a mix of tech and non-tech type groups. I found when I was running my own business in my early 20s that a local user group provided a good way to meet new customers and interact with people. I also tried things like board game meetups, "young professional" groups, etc. even if I didn't like the people or never went back, I found it a good to break up my routine. I would also make sure to spend time outside, at the public library, just leave the apartment for lunch, etc.

I have often thought about leaving tech or going to a different area within tech, I can empathize that its scary to think you are a specialized cog that can't really do anything else. It may be helpful to reach out to a career professional for some advice - for example if you went to a college/university, they usually provide career counseling for alumni, local libraries also often have resources or people who may help. If you are thinking of staying in your own business, you may want to try your local Small Business Association chapter (or equivalent if you are outside of the US).

Remember, your greatest asset is often not what you know, but that you know how to think and make critical decisions. I am sure you have learned a new programming language or figured out how to deal with a bad customer. Those are skills which can be generalized and applied in other areas. It may be hard or scary to take the step on how to apply these skills in a different area, but you may be able to think of low risk ways of trying it out. Maybe there is some type of freelancing gig outside your realm or even outside of tech you could try. Some of the networking ideas about may help you bump into someone who needs your skills - even if its not paid work, they may buy you a coffee just to pick you mind.

I would also second some of the other comments on getting a mindless or corporate job for a while, taking a vacation, tech detox, etc.

In sum, the first step is to break out of your routine and try something. You may have heard of paralysis by analysis... sometime you have to just take that first step and not worry about having the perfect optimal, zero risk plan in place.

</comment><comment><USER31> Working alone is extra exhausting. Why don't you just find a new job, where you actually have coworkers, instead of quitting tech?

</comment><comment><USER32> Stop reading HN and other such. It's giving you a horribly distorted view that seems to have wormed its way inside your head and is damaging you. To paraphrase Mary Schmich, "Do not read SV news websites, they will only make you feel like a failure."

</comment><comment><USER33> i've been there. I also tried to think of new ideas to work on but I couldn't put any energy into it. I used to think I was a very creative person but even that I started to have serious doubt about. That's when I decided to take a break. I think you ran out of energy NOT because you're working in tech, but because you're working for yourself (This is pretty natural). Take a break and mindlessly work for someone else. After 6 months to a year you'll have recovered completely and probably be overflowing with ideas and energy.

</comment><comment><USER34> You're not gonna quit, you're just going to take a break. Pretty soon you'll be ready to go again. Just take a breather.

<comment><AUTHOR> lel

yup.

back at it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> I'm considerably older than you (47, still a software developer because I like it) and I think you're being too harsh on yourself. You also need do do something about that burn out - that's a different point

Let's look at the "too harsh on yourself" part. So you're not the founder of a Unicorn startup that you started in your dorm room at an ivy league college. You know what that makes you? It makes you a perfectly normal person who has decided to follow your entrepreneurial instincts instead of getting the development version of a McJob. That's highly commendable.

It also may have not worked out in the way you wanted it to work out because you're not filthy rich and cruising around on a Megayacht (or whatever else your dream is). That is the case for most entrepreneurs - my first endeavour bombed so badly I ended up paying for it until about six years ago (ie, for over 10 years) after the lawsuits and and the other not fun stuff. But I also gained something extremely valuable called experience. I've since had a couple of other companies that made money, and it actually made me more valuable as an employee because I learned entrepreneurial skills that I wouldn't have otherwise.

Not being an overnight success is actually an advantage in my book - <USER2> lessons you learned are important and will massively increase your chances to succeed in the future.

One thing I've learned over time is that you need balance in your life, and you can only achieve that if you do more than one thing. To me it sounds like you've poured everything you have into a single vessel (work) and now that work didn't provide the results you expected, you're staring at emptiness because there isn't anything else.

So, first advice is to find something else you're interested in and give it some time in your life. _Don 't_ try to make it another business, but something you expressly do to counter your 100% concentration on building software. That'll help you with the burnout for the simple reason that it allows you to switch of the "tech" part of your brain.

In my case, I work on cars, I build track cars for myself and I do use them as intended. I'll never make a decent race car driver but that's not the point - it helps me balance my life, and it scratches the itch of creation _and_ gets me away from computers. Same goes for the other things I do away from development like gardening and reading non-computing books.

BTW, you're not too old. Nobody ever is.

That said, I am toying with the idea of doing something non-software for the next 20 years or so simply because it's getting to the point for me where very few companies are willing to pay for the sort of experience and craftsmanship I can bring to the table. So I'm developing some other interests that may or may not turn into a second and third career.

</comment><comment><USER36> > Ask HN: When should you quit?

You should quit when you write up a post like this and submit it to HN.

Go take a well deserved break to find yourself. Meditate, or do activities that you feel are meditative.

If you need a place to stay and rest, look to your friends/family.

If you have a business that needs to be taken care of, either sell it or hire someone to take over things like customer support, etc.

If you're feeling burnt out it means you need to take several months off because you haven't been taking care of yourself or doing the things that energize you.

I wish you the best of luck.

— Speaking as someone who went through this type of thing.</comment>


Ghost 0.3 (Kerouac) Launches - <AUTHOR> http://blog.ghost.org/launch <comment><USER2> Site looks great and congrats on the release.

This announcement suffers from the common problem of assuming readers already know what Ghost is. A few paragraphs down you mention Markdown and Jack Kerouac so I assume Ghost is related to text editing, but a sentence or two at the very top that explains Ghost would make this much better.

Again, congrats on the launch.

<comment><USER3> Does a website have to summarize the purpose of the website in every article it contains? Could you have just looks at the address bar, typed in ghost.org and found out easily?

<comment><USER4> I think not every article. Probably a good idea around release though...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is only semi-on-topic, but it's really cool how Ghost is a non-profit organization:

[http://ghost.onolan.org/what-it-means-to-be-non- profit](http://ghost.onolan.org/what-it-means-to-be-non-profit)

and the post does a good job explaining what that means and why it was chosen. I definitely want to see more mini-Mozillas :)

<comment><USER6> Come on guys, this is just money an promesses right now. Mini Mozilla seriously…

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I thought I'd mention that this is the release for Kickstarter backers only right now. Unfortunately, I didn't find out about this project until after the KS so I am out of luck for a few weeks.

If you don't know what Ghost is, I suggest you take a look at John O'Nolan's post from a while back that precipitated Ghost: [http://john.onolan.org/ghost](http://john.onolan.org/ghost)

</comment><comment><USER7> 0.3.0 snapshot: [https://mega.co.nz/#!71IC1LoT!QHVtaCL21w5-VzPBsSPdJRo3ayIeGu...](https://mega.co.nz/#!71IC1LoT!QHVtaCL21w5-VzPBsSPdJRo3ayIeGuFJY2f0UfUWbVY)

<comment><USER8> I wonder how many people are foolish enough to download and run unverified code like this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Wordpress is plug and play on almost any webhost out there (some even have installers for it). Ghost is node.js which is barely supported by webhosting companies (you will most likely need a VPS or some specific node.js HaaS, at least).

How will this not be a huge barrier to achieve the same traction Wordpress has?

<comment><USER10> It WILL be a huge barrier. It think Ruby was one (of many) reason(s) Diaspora* never took off. RoR is mainstream compared to Node.js. In my opinion Node is a wacko choice for a non-profit company looking to create a broad appeal blogging software which will be a real alternative to WordPress.

<comment><USER11> No, the lack of interest from hosting providers wasn't why ruby failed. It's due mostly to performance issues, some of which are due to its design and some of which are due to its implementation.

<comment><USER12> However with Ruby 1.9 - 2.0 (2.1 will support generational gc, finally) the performance of Ruby (with ORM and non-c frameworks, like phalcon and Yaf) is drawing close to parity with PHP.[1] I think that what drove diaspora's failure is the lack of people who truly care to run their own nodes. There's a pretty steep "cost of acquisition" to get a single diaspora user.

[1]: [http://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/#section=data-r6&hw=i7...](http://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/#section=data-r6&hw=i7&test=db&l=3y8&f=zik0zj- zi8sfz-34v)

<comment><USER9> Wait, Ruby is actually slower than PHP? So whenever some webdev laughs at me for using PHP and points me to that "A fractal of bad design" article, I can just laugh back and say "Well, at least my language is faster!"? Amazing.

<comment><USER13> Ruby, as generally served with Rails, has historically been _much_ slower than SQL-in-the-page PHP with APC/etc.

One example[1], from 37 Signals back in 2009, showed a 320ms response time (gack!) with 9,000 requests per minute on 10 4vcpu/4gb VMs in a private cluster.

Assuming they had a reasonably tuned storage subsystem, this is pretty terrible performance. That's about 150 requests per second for 10 VMs with 40 vcpus and 40gb RAM. However, that doesn't quite match up with the 320ms claim, which would have them pushing a little lower. I'll assume a rounding error.

Things have gotten better in many cases, but hardware and scaling up and out is still the best way to improve rails performance.

[1] [https://37signals.com/svn/posts/1819-basecamp-now-with- more-...](https://37signals.com/svn/posts/1819-basecamp-now-with-more-vroom)

<comment><USER11> I don't think I could find a better summary for why rails was bad for a CMS than that post. You could do much better with ruby but until some more killer non-rails ruby web apps are written, ruby's reputation will be inseparable from that of rails.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I'd love to try this, I'm just in the process of creating my blog with jekyll but this seems like a good alternative. Any chance I can contribute now and get on the list?

</comment><comment><USER3> Awesome news. I'm assuming Ghost saves to a database. Hopefully it is written in such a way that it will be easy to plugin a static-generation module. Since this is Node.js I'm guessing you are using Express, and it would be great if backends could be implemented as middleware. Really looking forward to taking a look at the source!

</comment><comment><USER15> Can someone share his/her view on what made Ghost go up to £196,362 out of £25,000 goal on Kickstarter?

<comment><USER16> Its a modern open source blogging platform using current popular technologies. Add in the simplicity of markdown based editing, what promises to be a good theme and plugin development experience, and I can see the attraction over stuff like wordpress and drupal. I could easily start a rant about PHP, so suffice it to say that the chance of a good new blog platform NOT WRITTEN PHP is a pretty huge deal.

<comment><USER17> Out of interest, what _is_ it written in?

<comment><USER18> Javascript on Node.js

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Thank you for not forgetting RSS support ! And, wishing the 'Ghosts' all success !

</comment><comment><USER20> Super nice domain name. Now they should buy ghost.com and build a hosted version. ;-)

<comment><USER21> before it was tryghost.com, so i'd say this is a certain improvement!

i would be surprised if they didn't try to build a hosted version, wordpress style.

<comment><AUTHOR> I believe it was actually [http://tryghost.org](http://tryghost.org)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Congrats, this is one kickstarter that delivered, not to be taken for granted.

Unfortunately I was late for the campaign, but once it hits the public, I'll give it a try.

For those who don't know, it's a new blogging platform based on Node.js that tries to break away from the wordpress bloat and get blogging back to basics. And with great looks :)

<comment><USER14> What are some good/ cost effective hosting solutions for node?

<comment><USER23> Here's a decent list:

[https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Node- Hosting](https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Node-Hosting)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Is this the demo?

[http://blog.tryghost.org/](http://blog.tryghost.org/)

<comment><USER25> This is probably a better representation: [http://ghost.onolan.org/](http://ghost.onolan.org/)

<comment><USER14> Can you create additional, non post pages? (work, contact etc)

<comment><USER25> I'm not sure exactly. I just follow John on Twitter and get updates via that. There are lots of unanswered questions that I think we'll be getting answers to over the next few weeks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Why not let people buy it? Says the public release is in "a few weeks" \- I'll probably have forgotten it exists by then, but now I would probably impulse pay $20 for early access.

Also, is the code going to be in github?

<comment><USER27> From the link: "In a couple of weeks, once we've ironed some bugs, smoothed some edges, and given those people a chance to try Ghost out... we'll be opening up Ghost to the public. The Github repository will go public, and everyone will be able to sign up for an account on Ghost.org."

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> It seems the code is not yet public on github. Any idea when it will be ?

<comment><USER29> "In a couple of weeks, once we've ironed some bugs, smoothed some edges, and given those people a chance to try Ghost out... we'll be opening up Ghost to the public. The Github repository will go public, and everyone will be able to sign up for an account on Ghost.org."

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Did an email go out to backers with how to download the release (asking because I haven't received anything)? /edit scratch that, we got an email!

</comment><comment><USER31> Congratulations, your blog site somehow manages to freeze and crash Firefox 24 Android each and every time I open it.

</comment><comment><USER32> What sets Ghost apart from other blogging platforms or even from just pushing markdown files to github?

</comment><comment><USER33> Congrats! I've been waiting for this</comment>


Ask HN: Working remotely in Portugal for an Irish company - <AUTHOR> Hi,
the Irish company I am working for offered me to work remotely.
I have heard that in Portugal it is possible to have a very good tax rate 20% with the NHR system.
I am a software engineer (Data Scientist).
How does the system work? Would I pay 20% on my gross salary? <comment><USER2> If you become tax resident in Portugal, ie live here more than 183 days per annum, you can pay zero tax for 10 years, if you source your income from UK company you have shares in via Dividends. Not sure if Ireland is the same, but probably is, assuming they have a double tax treaty with Portugal and no withholding tax on dividends. I moved to Cascais nr Lisbon last summer because of Brexit. Wonderful climate food beaches city, great infrastructure, , airport roads etc, cheap 200MBS Fibre, safe with v low crime rate, friendly English speaking locals. Loads of expats moving here because of this tax, property market is on fire. A few negtives, no Amazon, shops expensive for Electrical goods Furniture type items. VAT 23%. Terrible dangerous incompetent drivers, many crapy little dangerous cars because car tax is insane, shame becuase they have great motorways. Bureaucracy not as bad as expected quite easy to register with authorities, I paid our Estate Agent who found our house to help, she was brilliant, better than the lawyer. Services like law and accountancy v cheap here. €500k in property investment (home or several apartments) gets you a golden visa so insurance for us, if UK crahes out of EU without a deal. Also private medical insurance remarkably cheap full best cover including dental for famaly of 4 well under €200 per month. Electricity Gas v expensive though pool costs a lot to heat.

<comment><USER3> Would you have a link for more information on the €500k property investment visa?

<comment><USER4> It's the golden visa program. [http://www.sef.pt/portal/v10/en/aspx/apoiocliente/detalheApo...](http://www.sef.pt/portal/v10/en/aspx/apoiocliente/detalheApoio.aspx?fromIndex=0&id_Linha=6269)

Spain, Greece, Malta and few other countries have similar programs.

<comment><USER3> Thank you so much!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Your first step is to get registered with the Portuguese fiscal authority, social security and health system. You'll have to do that in person, but from then on interactions will all be online. Your best bet is to go to a "Loja do Cidadão" (citizen's shop), where all services are in one place. There's a Loja do Cidadão on major cities.

Then, you'll have a few options. If the remote company has no Portuguese subsidiary, you'll have to operate as an independent contractor (trabalhador independente) or as a one person company (sociedade unipessoal). It's basically the same, except as a company you must have an accountant. As an independent contractor you may have an accountant, or you may choose a simplified accounting model where you don't declare expenses, and your profit margin is estimated by the fiscal authority.

Income tax is progressive. You should be able to read the brackets here: [https://economiafinancas.com/2017/escaloes- irs-2018/](https://economiafinancas.com/2017/escaloes-irs-2018/)

You declare your income in May, and pay income tax in July/August.

Social security is a fixed rate: 29.6%. It is a mandatory retirement savings, and provides disability income should you require it. You pay social security quarterly or monthly.

Access to the national health service is not dependent on any tax or regular payment. You don't need health insurance.

As an independent contractor, you would pay VAT, but cross-border transactions are exempt, so your VAT is probably zero (check this with an accountant; EU's rules on cross border transactions are in flux).

References:

[https://www.portaldocidadao.pt/](https://www.portaldocidadao.pt/)

[http://www.portaldasfinancas.gov.pt/](http://www.portaldasfinancas.gov.pt/)

<comment><USER6> That's a pretty high social security rate. I am in a similar position to OP, but in Spain. My overall tax burden (including social security) is around 30% which is not bad at all. So, if you're flexible and just looking for something new, I definitely recommend looking at Spain.

<comment><USER7> _I definitely recommend looking at Spain_

I'm in Catalonia, Spain (for a few more weeks) and do not recommend. I don't know what you are making, but I am also an Autonomo, and I'm being royally fucked on social insurance and taxes. My tax and SI bill for this year will be around 60%, and fuck that. And yes, I have tried different accountants. Essentially, the tax department decided that a lot of my expenses are not allowable, and because I have bank accounts in other EU countries as well as Spain, they decided that I am "probably hiding something" (their words). I can go and spend a lot of money on lawyers, or I can just pack up and leave.

Combined with the bullshit Catalan independence movement and accompanying social and economic instability, generally unfriendly Catalans, terrible quality of food (essentially salt, with a hint of whatever it claims to be on the package), and the "we will bill you whatever the fuck we want, good luck clawing your money back" utilities (literally opened a 400 EUR bill from the phone company 10 minutes ago), I am totally done with this place.

I have lived in many countries, and all places have challenges and ups and downs. This place, however, is the pits.

<comment><USER8> Head to Rwanda.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> You are probably referring to the non-habitual residence scheme.

As far as I know, the 20% tax rate only applies to domestically sourced income. Income from Ireland would be exempt from taxation in Portugal if it is taxed in Ireland.

I'm not sure if and how this scheme affects your social security contributions and eligibility for health care and pensions.

If you don't speak Portuguese well enough to really dig into this yourself, I would suggest you get professional advice.

</comment><comment><USER10> This is a serendipitous discovery! I'm also a data scientist working for an Irish company in the process of moving to Portugal. My email address is in my HN profile if you want to talk.

</comment><comment><USER11> Both are in the EU/EEC. You could simply move to Portugal, change nothing about how you are remunerated, keep an irish Euro bank account and everything should work fine surely.

</comment><comment><USER12> The Portugese non-habituall-residence status has a reduced tax rate, or no tax rate if the tax on the income had been paid elsewhere in a non-tax haven.

You can apply for it if you have been non-resident in Portugal for more than 5 years, and lasts for 10 years.

It does not apply to Social Security which in Portugal is very high.

It is very critical to structure everything in the right way otherwise you may end paying more tax and Social security than you would in Ireland!

Getting the right advice is critical. I got the wrong advice and it took it years to solve.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you mean that in addition to the discounted taxation I should pay an extra for the Social Security?

<comment><USER5> Yes. NHR status affects your income tax, but not social security. It is pretty much designed to attract retirees from other EU countries (and those are almost non-affected by social security).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Drop me an email at moura até oko dot ai. I am from Portugal and I am available to answer any questions you have.

I've recently been in a similar situation with a company from Belgium.

</comment><comment><USER14> Will you be an employee or a contractor?

<comment><AUTHOR> I do not know. We have not defined the formal contract yet. I guess we can decide how to do that. At the moment I am an employee.

What would be the difference?

<comment><USER14> Quite a difference. When you work in Portugal you need to pay the local income taxes, but your company needs to pay the relevant local taxes as well (for example half of your health insurance, depends on country). In order to do that they need to be registered in Portugal (without a tax id you can't pay taxes) which means opening a subsidiary. As you can see it asks a lot from the company and they might not be willing to do that for one employee.

With European tax law, when you live and work in Portugal, still for any day you work for your Irish employer in their Irish office you have to pay income tax in Ireland (double taxation agreements between the countries). If it's less than 5% of the work days per year it doesn't matter. If you have to go to Ireland for whole weeks for meetings or training you might have to pay taxes in both countries. Well file taxes in both countries for the percentage of working days. Again the double taxation agreements between the countries guarantee that you don't pay taxes twice (or if so you can claim the extra amount back).

As contractor it's easier. You live and work in Portugal and pay local taxes. Of course you need to register as sole trader or single-person company (whatever the equivalent in Portugal is). Any trip to Ireland is simply a business trip. It's both a cost and (ideally) you invoice that to your client (the Irish company). Your salary needs to rise because now as a sole trader you have additional cost (other insurances, slightly different taxes, you have to pay for a computer yourself, you no longer have sick days and no longer get paid for days not working e.g. holiday).

A third option is to find a Portuguese company (e.g. small agency) where you become employee and they send invoices for the Irish company.

The company will likely try to get you to work as a contractor because it's an easier setup. For you it's better to stay an employee, ideally get reimbursed for any trips to Ireland, but you have to deal with filing taxes in both countries.

<comment><USER15> All very true. I'm in a similar position, living and working in Portugal for a UK company. Basically because it asks a lot of the company I am a contractor, registered in Portugal, paying taxes, social security, etc. But because of the greater burden on me and not on the company I negotiated a higher rate.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Mounting criticism of NIH's relationship with the alcohol industry - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/04/i-dont-f-ing-care-in-wooing-67m-from-big-alcohol-nih-nixed-critical-study/ <comment><USER2> As far as I can tell the harmful effects of alcohol are both grossly underestimated and severely overestimated. It's the strangest contradiction.

I think as an addictive and potentially life destroying substance that promotes bad behavior our culture has a blind spot, or a kind of denial.

However the research suggesting that alcohol also decreases all cause mortality relative to abstinence, even when consumed heavily, seems pretty strong and not influenced by the factors referred to in this article. The link between alcohol intake and lower obesity also defies intuition.

The research is also hampered by the premise that it's unethical to do a intervention study that has heavy alcohol use as one of the groups.

The whole thing seems like a misuse of research, to me. The effects of alcohol, both positive and negative, are mostly apparent to anyone who looks around.

Edit:spelling

<comment><USER3> Minor point, but Dr. Jason Fung has a very interesting and, in my opinion, compelling explanation of obesity and weight gain. He argues that the main driver of obesity in the long term is insulin rather than total calories, and because alcohol doesn't significanlty raise insulin it doesn't contribute to obesity, despite the calories.

[https://youtu.be/YpllomiDMX0](https://youtu.be/YpllomiDMX0)

<comment><USER4> Alcohol itself may not raise insulin but what about the rest of your hard apple cider or miller lite?

<comment><USER3> Miller Lite has about 12 calories from carbohydrates, so not much. Roughly the same for most red wines. Not sure about cider because I don't drink it, but in general most of the regularly consumed alcoholic drinks have a lot fewer carbohydrates than you'd think.

<comment><USER5> Do you mean to imply that premixed alcoholic beverages aren't regularly consumed?

I suppose you mean the wine beer and spirits that people regularly consume with a meal, or some such.

But also, there are plenty of people who regularly drink one or more premixed alcoholic beverages.

<comment><USER3> I should have said "many", not "most". I have no idea what percentage of people consume wine, beer, hard liquor or mixed drinks. Just pointing out that the carbohydrate content of red wine, lighter beers, and straight liquor is not as high as you would think.

<comment><USER5> Ok, no worries, thanks for clearing that up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The most damning evidence IMO is the promise, straight from the mouth of NIAAA director George Koob, to suppress future research that might be critical of the alcohol industry. Utterly disgraceful.

Koob's defense of that email -- that he was merely referring to research that is "not of the highest scientific quality" \-- is pretty pathetic, given that Jernigan's and Siegel's work apparently met the NIAAA's past and present quality standards.

<comment><USER7> TBH, I find it difficult to see value in that particular line of research: it stands to reason that there would be a link between advertising and consumption in all age groups, so spending money to confirm that seems wasteful. Also, I haven't checked, but I'd be surprised if there hadn't already been some studies done on this.

Of course the reason some people are upset is because they would like to see restrictions on advertising, and were hoping another study would give them another argument in favor of such. But a positive result does not imply that such restrictions are necessary.

<comment><USER8> Yes, I'd be more concerned if they were suppressing studies that have to do with actual health effects.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> It's funny how each time a scandal comes out in America, it's treated as if it's new and separate. The truth is that there is one solid pattern in every single American scandal, and that is corruption.

America is built on corruption, and is corrupt from head to toe.

<comment><USER10> Is corruption really uniquely American? Every country and institution that I've studied seems to suffer from corruption and my intuition is that corruption is a universal element of human behavior.

<comment><USER9> I think most countries are corrupt, but the amount that it's normalized in America is certainly unique. People in most countries act like corruption is a blight, here it's not even commented on.

<comment><USER11> There are countries where it's normal and expected to pay bribes to every governmental official you interact with, America the worst offender nor is not unique in any respect.

<comment><USER9> Consider how you would get yourself out of prison. In one of those countries, you pay the bribe. There's problems with that, but we know it's a bribe.

In America, we can't bribe our way out of prison, because the corruption is so much deeper than that. You get sent to prison because of corruption you can't even see:

\- the prison guard union lobbied the state congress for tougher pot laws via "campaign donations" so that their members have jobs

\- the local police chief needs to be "tough on crime" so that the mayor gets reelected, manifesting in "stop and frisk" laws

\- the local police department arrested you so they could confiscate your vehicle, via DOJ-aided civil forfeiture laws

\- the police department negotiated a higher salary for their members, so long as it was cost-neutral, so now they need to ticket poor people to make money, which is how you got pulled over.

That's the gist of it (I haven't even gotten to private prisons, Fox News, or the NRA)! And don't this this is a Republican problem either, Democrats have been pretty bad at this sort of thing for the last 30 years too.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Non moralist argument against the alcohol industry: most of the alcohol revenue comes from a very concentrated core of heavy drinkers who blow through the liver health guidelines and definitions of binge drinking. So the industry would suffer a massive shock if the relatively small group of people damaging their livers were to decide to stop doing so. This means that the industry relies on the intentional harming of a small group of people's bodies in order to survive.

<comment><USER13> Do you have any data on this? There are certainly heavy consumers but my (not data backed) feeling was that there's a fat tail - if there are thousands of high consumption binge drinkers then there are millions of casual "several drinks a week" drinkers that would dominate the actual dollars spent.

Also, unlike say internet bandwidth, there is actually a logistical limit to how much alcohol you could consume in a week, and it doesn't seem like it could be much more than 1 order of magnitude over the average casual consumer (3-4 drinks vs. 30-40 per week).

<comment><USER14> Washington Post had an article and a chart on it. The top decile has 74 drinks per week, way more than the bottom 90% combined.

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/09/25/think...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/09/25/think- you-drink-a-lot-this-chart-will-tell-you/?utm_term=.74527673ce0a)

<comment><USER13> Unbelievable. Thanks. The top decile actually consume over 75% of the alcohol (by number of drinks, probably less by dollars)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Whenever news like this comes out it makes me more cynical towards any sort of life sciences research that produces actionable health advice. Which is really a shame, because I want to be able to decide and participate in which activities are healthy!

<comment><USER16> That's why logic is superior to many "scientific" studies.

It's clear that the environment we evolved in lacked much alcohol, therefore studies showing alcohol is healthy should be taken with a grain of salt.

<comment><USER11> It's clear that the environment we evolved in lacked much penicillin, therefore studies showing use of penicillin is healthy should be taken with a grain of salt.

<comment><USER16> To be clear, over usage of antibiotics is a MASSIVE health issue. Penicillin was an amazing discovery, but less than 100 years later we're discovering antibiotic resistance and lifelong gut issues due to antibiotic usage.

<comment><USER11> How do you know that this is a massive health issue? What pure logic brought you to that conclusion?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Does the NIH provide most funding to university researchers working in health research?

<comment><USER18> It's the single largest source of such funding in the US (and I imagine in the world, too), yes. I don't know that it's >50% though, but it's certainly a large fraction. For example, it's budget is 4 times that of the NSF or CDC.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> > The $100 million-dollar, 10-year study is now underway and will ultimately > enroll 7,800 participants aged 50 or over at 16 sites worldwide. Half of the > participants will abstain from hooch, while the rest will imbibe one serving > a day. Scientists will track participants for an average of six years, > looking at risks of heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and death.

Wow, how do you recruit people for a study like that? It would hard to convince me either to completely abstain or to drink every single day for six years, much less to have one of those randomly chosen for me.

</comment><comment><USER20> Does everything in America need to be healthy in order for it to be legal? Is that why the alcohol lobby so badly wants to prove that booze is good for us?

<comment><USER21> Depends on who is being hurt. Given the issue of drunk driving killing children, and given the current push to restrict rights to save children, I think informing the public of the number of children killed because of alcohol is important so that we can push for banning it (not a total ban, but a ban of the most dangerous stuff, which I will begin calling assault alcohol).

<comment><USER22> I think heavier taxes and more limits would be a better approach rather than a ban. Similar to smoking. In America we used to have to go to special stores only open certain hours. Alcohol is everywhere now, grocery stores, commercials, etc. Ideally there is a middle ground between prohibition and ubiquitous.

<comment><USER23> > In America we used to have to go to special stores only open certain hours

That was (and is) entirely state dependent.

<comment><USER24> I always thought it was kind of fascinating that dry counties "still" exist-

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dry_communities_by_U.S...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dry_communities_by_U.S._state)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Pirate Party MEP Elected Vice-President of EU Parliament - <AUTHOR> https://torrentfreak.com/pirate-party-mep-elected-vice-president-of-eu-parliament-190704/ <comment><USER2> As a citizen of the Czech Republic, it's quite interesting seeing the outcome of the EU elections, since a lot of the people considered their campaign to be quite vague and overall not very good. I was personally a fan, because the alternatives were quite abysmal.</comment>


Teeny Tokyo: A surprisingly-powerful image resizing app [For OS X] - <AUTHOR> http://teeny.tokyo/ <comment><AUTHOR> I'm an indie developer and I'm so excited to share this with you!</comment>


U.S. Directly Blames China's Military for Cyberattacks  - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/07/world/asia/us-accuses-chinas-military-in-cyberattacks.html?hp&_r=0

<comment><USER2> Lots of people claiming the US does this as well, which is true to a certain extent.

There are major differences though. The Chinese government (sometimes via state-owned enterprises) steals information and technologies - military, industrial, and commercial - from military and civilian targets and leaks these to their military and industry. A large part of China's success in the last decade stems from these stolen technologies.

China as a whole is a massive IP stealing machine, and their work is nearly done. They've neither licensed nor innovated the vast majority of the technologies they use - they just steal. This is changing now as they've stolen nearly enough to catch up, and now innovation is finally coming from China.

All countries do this to some extent. Not all countries make a policy of the practice and use the resources of their military and government to carry it out. There are lots of other IP stealing tactics - from joint ventures, to technology "partnerships", to "trial order inspections".

You've got to give them credit: they've play the game very, very well, and taken full advantage of the west's naiveté.

<comment><USER3> It's interesting that we use the word "stealing" for this. Intellectual property is a wishy-washy term, defined entirely by the laws of the land. If China's laws and philosophy don't recognize United States IP laws, then it's not really "stealing" on their end.

Perpetuating the mentality that US ideas of IP are the only ones in town does a great deal of harm (see: RIAA, MPAA), and quickly leads to absurdity. Maybe we all deserve Chinese justice on account of us stealing their paper technology?

<comment><USER2> This has nothing to do with different ideas of IP. China has similar IP laws as the US, and certainly tries to enforce them when the theft is in the other direction.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> "The Submarine" [1]

In a way, this article promotes the idea for more cyber-security, which is one of the only _growth industries_ [2]. A simple Google News search for "china cyberattacks" returns almost a million results[3].

Computer security is, basically, misunderstood by non-technical people, who are in charge of managing various computer systems. So the constant stream of "cyberattacks" (literally) creates a market of more eager buyers of security product and services. (It's almost getting to the point of "nobody ever got fired for buying security products/services".)

Is that a bad thing? Maybe or maybe not.

However, from my own experiences, I think it's better to build a foundation with good security practices instead of applying band-aids on top of a crumbling foundation.

[1] <http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html> [2] <http://www.google.com/search?q=cybersecurity+growth+industry> [3] [http://www.google.com/search?q=china+cyberattacks&aq=f&#...</a>

<comment><USER5> Someone benefitting from a story does not mean there is a PR conspiracy afoot.

<comment><USER4> I did not say these stories form a conspiracy nor is it a public relations campaign. I merely saw the similarities of "The Submarine" essay and the increased frequency of stories about "cybersecurity" in various news outlets.

From Paul Graham's essay, " _PR is not dishonest. Not quite. In fact, the reason the best PR firms are so effective is precisely that they aren't dishonest. They give reporters genuinely valuable information._ "[1]

There's nothing wrong with someone benefiting from a story, but, maybe, there's more to a story than what's on the surface...

[1] <http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I am currently working for a large multinational corporation here in Texas, we had a meeting with the network security guys about this a couple weeks ago (yes, this corporation actually have a group dedicated to mitigate hackers).

They told us it's even funny to monitor network traffic and see it explode between 8am and 5pm Beijing time. It's like they have a bunch of guys whose day job is to hack.

<comment><USER7> From a network security perspective there is absolutely no new news in this article. For those who watch networks, the impact of China on network security is as obvious as the sun coming up. The news is rather that the U.S. has taken one step up the ladder of international relations, toward some kind of consequence.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Here's the full report: <http://www.defense.gov/pubs/2013_China_Report_FINAL.pdf>

</comment><comment><USER9> I'd assumed up to this point that the "Great Firewall" of China was primarily intended to censor and control China's own population. Now I'm thinking it's main purpose was as a strategic defense initiative. Now they can attack more freely without fearing for their own infrastructure.

<comment><USER2> It's a good point.

Censorship is also a cloak for protectionism. Facebook, Ebay, Google, etc have all been banned or throttled to make way for censorship. It says something that censorship is more tolerated by the world than overt protectionism, and that trade protectionism must be done in the good name of censorship.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I think we should all be clear on what's happening: China's use of tons of man and computer power to attack commercial interests has led to the militarization of the internet (which, in all fairness, would have probably happened anyway)

So those saying "it's all the same" -- no, it is not. You don't bring up a new server at a site in South America and see a hundred attacks from American computers, but you'll sure as shit see attacks from China. The Chinese have notified the world early on through their actins that the internet exists to be plundered. While in the west the net is a symbol of individual freedom and power, to the Chinese it is another tool of the state.

This will continue to escalate until it ends up with people dying or both sides back down.

<comment><USER11> _This will continue to escalate until it ends up with people dying or both sides back down._

Or everyone just keeps up this new _internet_ war just like we kept the _cold_ war going for decades, with no one being killed by it.

<comment><USER12> Plenty of people died (directly or indirectly) due to the cold war.

<comment><USER11> Well yes. Plenty because even one human is plenty. But plenty compared to how many people died in WWII? Or WWI? Or any real war we had before?

Compared to what happened immediately before, the cold war was incredibly peaceful.

So I suspect this new cyber war will continue the trend and keep real killings to 0. I do believe we will have a real internet hacking and protecting and counter hacking "war" if you will. But I suspect, and obviously hope, no one actually dies from it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > The name of China's first aircraft carrier was also misspelled. It is the > Liaoning, not the Lianoning.

I wonder how many people spelt TianAnMen as Tienamen...

</comment><comment><USER14> What I do not get is why do governments and so on keep vital infra connected to the damn Internet! Haven't we learned anything from BSG? You don't keep nuclear plant computers on the same network with Facebook!

<comment><USER15> That's rather myopic. There's a very enormous category of computers whose security needs fall between 'Facebook' and 'nuclear plant' - in fact, almost every computer being used by government agencies, NGOs, media, multinational corporations, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> As Steve Blank says in the last article: <http://steveblank.com/2013/04/29/fly-high/>

The US is doing the same with their Cyber Attack units... in fact spending 10 to 15 more money than any other country of the world in this.

Of course Obama does not talk about that, he wants more money spent by the public sector, and TSA members on every street.

<comment><USER17> But US does it for FREEDOM. China does it for oppression. Surely you can see the truth in this?

<comment><USER18> I can't decide if you are being sarcastic or simply naive.

<comment><USER19> He's sarcastic.

<comment><USER18> Gotta upgrade my sarcasm-o-meter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> >When the United States mounted its cyberattacks on Iran's nuclear facilities

Stuxnet? I wasn't aware there was any definitive proof it was the US.

<comment><USER21> [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama- ord...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave- of-cyberattacks-against-iran.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I don't get the whining. US spies on everyone, Israel spies on the US heavily, Russia spies on the US as well. Why the hell does the US keep whining about Chinese spying? What's so special about China? Can't US protect itself from cyber attacks from what's not even a first world nation?

<comment><USER22> The difference here is that it's not just US government entities being attacked -- it's US companies, particularly those already doing business in China. The counter-argument is a "you reap what you sow" vis-a-vis low cost offshoring, but in a lot of cases the risk is justified by the immense opportunities of participating in a 1B consumer domestic market.

Coincidentally or not, I received an email from one of my colleagues in Hong Kong this morning asking some IT security questions (as part of a customer IP audit of our greater China operations) regarding collaboration tools we use and whether they could be restricted to on-premise access and whether we could prevent content from being shared externally. Companies are taking notice, but I'd wager that almost none have deep enough pockets or internal expertise sufficient to erect reasonable security measures.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Pot calls the kettle black?</comment>


Taking Medium to the Next Level - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/the-story/taking-medium-to-the-next-level-cb7f223fad86 <comment><USER2> Please tell me the new logo is satire.

I cannot even recognize it as an "M" anymore.

Well, actually the small one almost works. The large one ahown in the article itself doesn't. At all.</comment>


Are High Profile CEOs Effective? - <AUTHOR> http://watchmojo.com/web/blog/index.php/2008/06/08/are-high-profile-ceos-effective/ <comment><USER2> If not ingrained in the company theory and practice or if they do not strive to be ingrained they are nothing more than high paid figure heads.</comment>


Twitter Vine is a marketer's six second dream - <AUTHOR> http://successfulworkplace.com/2013/01/24/twitters-vine-is-a-marketers-late-christmas-gift/

<comment><USER2> This has a lot of potential as it is completely in line with the 'feel' of twitter- short and sweet. It also integrates well with twitter- 6 seconds is comparable to the time that it takes to read a tweet. It'll be cool to see what users do with this.</comment>


Why Undergraduates Should Learn the Principles of Programming Languages - <AUTHOR> http://mt4.acm.org/educationboard/2010/06/why-undergraduates-should-learn-the-principles-of-programming-languages.html <comment><USER2> I have to admit, I've never been satisfied with any of the arguments for teaching this, other than intellectual stimulation. Now, I took a PL course before my working career, so I don't have a frame of reference, but does it really make a difference?

That is, does a Programming Languages class make it faster to learn new languages, give us the ability to choose the "right tool for the problem," or provide any other benefit? This paper (and my professors) all said so. But I can't help but wonder if this is confirmation bias: most of the time, language choices seem to be made based on what other people are using on the target platform, and there's no scientific way to track how quickly any given individual learns a new language.

<comment><USER3> From my POV as a corporate Java-trained accidental software engineer with an Econ degree, yes it makes a difference. Besides everything the paper mentions, all of which I agree with, there are a few other things it does for you.

I'm not a computer scientist, as the article seems to target, but a practicing software engineer, but I feel more like an amateur hack. The reason is b/c with almost every problem I'm tasked to solve or app to build, I'm never quite sure whether I'm solving or building it the most efficient, robust way (and some times I know I'm not, but am limited by my tools).

That lingering doubt makes me feel like a charlatan, or a used car salesman, hocking my wares while suspecting their quality.

To fix that, I've recently taken a sabbatical just to cram through SICP, PCL, Norvig's AIP, K&R and some other C and kernel hacking books, and Haskell and Ocaml, Erlang and/or Google Go, and probably some of the other highly regarded books on the topic (Code Complete, etc). It was just too slow-going trying to do that while working full time. If there were a degree program with that curriculum I'd go do it, but there's none that I know of.

Consider it your due diligence. Doing it as thoroughly as possible gives you confidence and a valuable psychological edge, be your opponent a tough problem or a ten-cent-per-hour rent-a-coder overseas.

The other tangible benefit is to your personal brand marketing: there's not much more of a clear signal that you are curious, eager to learn, open minded, and passionate about and dedicated to your craft than learning multiple languages, and these things are essentially requirements if you ever hope to work for/with the best programmers and engineers in the business. The only things better are grad school and having built and made money off a cool startup or app. If you want to get away from the slavery of the 'enterprise java douchebag' shops, to quote Zed, this is one good way to do it.

<comment><USER4> This is a new one - guilt as the ultimate professional motivator? :)</comment></comment></comment>


A student asked Quora to do his homework for him - <AUTHOR> https://www.quora.com/Homework-Question-How-do-I-write-a-program-that-produces-the-following-output-1?share=1 <comment><USER2> or yahoo answers, or google, or...</comment>


Kroger to stop accepting Visa credit cards at more of its stores - <AUTHOR> https://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/news/2019/03/01/kroger-to-stop-accepting-visa-credit-cards-at-more.html <comment><USER2> Really bold move, good for Kroger. However, I wish they had a substitute in place - like they started accepting Venmo, PayPal, or build their own "Bill me Later".

<comment><USER3> Or maybe some cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.</comment></comment>


There are already over 20 TOML Parsers - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/mojombo/toml#implementations

<comment><USER2> Indeed, and I think many of them are of questionable quality.

I'm trying to remedy this with a language agnostic test suite. [1]

[1] - <https://github.com/BurntSushi/toml-test></comment>


Show HN: Weekdone, weekly status reporting for teams - <AUTHOR>

Hey HN friends,
This week we launched in public Weekdone (http://weekdone.com/), a really easy and simple to use weekly team status reporting tool. We already have a lot of startups using us, even in small teams of 4-5 people.
Many use us in addition and in parallel to Basecamp, Asana, Jira, Trello, Pivotal etc. While there is a lot of data in those systems, nobody has time to read what others are up to. So each team member posting their key plans, progress and problems weekly is something everyone has time to read. We'll add import of headlines from the systems above in the future as well.
Any feedback? Would you use this at your startup? <comment><USER2> Hmmmm. The only clickable links on that page, without scrolling _twice_ on my 1680x1050 desktop monitor, seems to be the "Register free" button, home, and Sign in. Immediately my "annoy" meter is high. So I scrolled - nada. The graphics on the home page are so small that I can't really see anything useful. So I scroll again. Aha - there's a link: "Read in more detail". Not a particularly inspiring choice of words. I don't want "details" yet - I want a basic overview of WTH you do. I haven't gotten that from the home page really.

Anyway, I clicked the link. And then I see 10 - _ten!_ \- links that I have to click through.

Sorry - I'm out. My thinking on stuff like this (SaaS) is that, if the website design goes against how I like to consume/work, then the software itself will be the same way.

Best of luck to you. I like the concept, I think, but the implementation at this stage is just a bit too white-spacey and designer-y for my tastes.

<comment><USER3> Are we looking at the same site? There's an obvious walkthrough link sitting at the bottom of the page, no scroll required.

<comment><USER2> I don't know if we are or not. I clicked the link OP provided. Are you looking at a different page than that one? For me, on my desktop screen, I have to scroll twice to get to the "bottom of the page".

<comment><USER3> I went to <http://weekdone.com/>. My screen resolution is 1440 x 900. Screenshot: <http://i.imgur.com/oPLMUq0.png>

<comment><USER2> Yeah, my screen is very different: <http://i.imgur.com/4qEJZOF.png>

Must be something javascript then as NoScript has blocked something.

That said, your screenshot doesn't really change much for me. If OP is expecting visitors who don't want to click the "Register free" button to visually scroll, scroll with their eyes until they finally locate the Walkthrough link in the footer, I think he'll find that they don't.

<comment><AUTHOR> Interestingly the walkthrough or some other service description being visible right away has lowered the conversion, both into registered users (you might argue they register because they don't understand what the service is about) as well as engaged (and later paid) users. But your criticism is valid and I agree with a lot of what you said.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'll look it using this in my dreary day job. You would be suprised how hard it is to keep track of 12 staff that report to you and know what they are actually up to when you are extremly busy yourself. It would add a lot of pressure to their working weeks to commit to what they are doing and have to report against it.

Great tool I say!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you! Let me know if I can be of any assistance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I hate weekly status reports. Anyone else? or is it just me.

I am not saying anything negative about weekdone in specific.

Its just that I hate weekly reports or meetings where weekly reports are being collected.

<comment><AUTHOR> I've seen status reports that people hate and ones that everybody loves. The main difference is is there something valuable in it for the person who needs to fill them in? Do you get feedback? Do you value the information provided by others?

Quite often managers or other team members never read them, so you're spending valuable time to write into black hole. One key is for managers to always provide feedback on your report. Even just knowing someone has read it makes it more positive. In Weekdone we have 5-point scale review ratings and managerial comments for that.

Another thing is the reports being too long. We've found anything more than 5-7 achievements or plans per week is the maximum anyone will read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I think this is another one of those apps where it would be killer to be able to play around with a demo before registering. "Sign up to save your data" sort of thing.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good idea, will look into offering that. Have discussed that with our team before, but have lacked resources to do that really well. Definitely in the future.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Clickable link: <http://weekdone.com/></comment>


So, it appears Google is serious about +1 - <AUTHOR>

Wanted to discuss this issue with other YC'ers... it appears that Google is very serious about the +1. In fact, if you were in Google's position and you wanted to compete with Facebook (someone, whom I believe the only true competitor Google faces right now) -- what would you do?
Well, your power is in your search... so.. if you want people to use the +1, you tie it to search results ana make sure that people know the +1 DOES influence your ranking.
Anyone else seeing this? <comment><USER2> Not related to +1, but related to Google going social.

If I were Google, Android would come with an app called something like "Google Friends" and it would connect with your friends that have the app on their phone.

Easy app, message, video and photo sharing between friends.</comment>


Where Semiconductor Technology Breakthroughs Are Needed - <AUTHOR> https://semiengineering.com/what-euv-cant-solve/ <comment><AUTHOR> What are the big challenges for semis?</comment>


Ask HN: youtube video request - <AUTHOR>

What are your thoughts about a website that lists requests that users have for specific youtube videos to be created? <comment><USER2> _My_ thoughts? Okay, how about this: <http://rachelbythebay.com/w/2012/06/17/vidbid/>

<comment><AUTHOR> interesting..</comment></comment>