Female Founders Conference Live Stream [video] - <AUTHOR> https://blog.ycombinator.com/watch-the-female-founders-conference-live-stream/ <comment><USER2> Pretty cool lineup. Even just a few speakers in, it's clear for as much commonality as exist between companies and founders, there are also a lot of differences in how to successfully approach different industries. It's validating(?) to see how different companies' & founders' personalities interpret and make good on otherwise simple aphorisms, "be tenacious", "measure, achieve, repeat", "just start". I like seeing that different interpretations are in themselves successful when applied to the appropriate domain.

</comment><comment><USER3> I really appreciated the insight by Poppy CEO Avni that pursuing your passion might lead you to think you know what you're doing and not be open to feedback, whereas pursuing a combination of curiosity and frustration is much healthier. Food for thought.

<comment><USER2> An important nuance between the idea that you should be trying to solve _a_ problem vs _your_ problem. Identifying _your_ problem gets you aimed correctly and can be a significant insight, but if you don't accept feedback by dint of determined (unselfish?) curiosity you're likely to overshoot what is actually marketable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I had never even heard of NIO before, probably because I don't watch Formula E racing. That EP9 electric supercar looks stunning. I look forward to watching the CEO's talk at some point (I don't have time for the live stream right now and I've probably missed it anyway).

So they seem to have the EV technology down. Their goal is an autonomous EV. I wonder how their autonomous technology stacks up, does anyone know?

</comment><comment><USER5> More info here: [http://www.femalefoundersconference.org](http://www.femalefoundersconference.org)

</comment><comment><USER6> Was this advertised a few days ago somewhere else? It would've been nice to know about it ahead of time.

<comment><AUTHOR> we'll post the talks on youtube after the event.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> There are at least several comments in this thread right now that are some version of "I don't like this because it is segragatory".

Here's why I _do_ like this: because I have young nieces, and I want them to have role models that look like them. I have a 12 year old niece that I try to expose to as much positive encouragement around her ability to create things as I can, and things like this are a HUGE help.

So good. I'm glad this exists, and I hope this continues to exist for years so that when my nieces start getting older, I can show it to them.

I think if you don't have daughters, or don't have young girls in your life, it's really easy to overlook how powerful the zeitgeist is. Music, movies, pop culture, business, everything seems to be wanting to steer these people in a specific direction, and if that direction is something you disagree with, it's REALLY difficult to get around it.

<comment><USER8> I'd love to live in a world where women were just equally represented at these things as a matter of course without making a big deal about it but until that world actually exists we need things like this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The comments here have been weird. The moderation intense.

It is a valid question: Why does women organising together create such hostile excitement?

Perhaps it is an illustration of the need for such organising?

<comment><USER10> I am quite glad for heavy moderation on these topics, look at reddit for example, this kind of talk would quickly go off topic and devolve into mud slinging.

There is certainly an odd dynamic on the "nerdy" websites when it comes to promoting the under-represented gender.

That said, comments like yours (and mine) are only adding to that problem. I guess I'm a hypocrite.

<comment><USER11> Not taking any sides, but this whole "HN is more mature than reddit on these topics" meme is wrong and out-dated. I mean, goodness, look at this thread (well, if you have showdead on at least).

<comment><USER12> If the comments are dead, they are not representative, in fact, they are clearly exactly what the community rejects.

<comment><USER11> And, in my observations, similar toxic conversations and people acting in bad faith are downvoted on reddit.

Who cares? My point was more that "at least we're better than reddit" is tacky. I don't think either of us are likely to objective make an assessment here either way on "toxicity of a topic on HN vs reddit".

<comment><USER10> >And, in my observations, similar toxic conversations and people acting in bad faith are downvoted on reddit.

I suppose I disagree with you there, as someone who hasn't used this website super much (about a year maybe?)and has been using reddit for about 5 years, HN seems much better to me in providing a longer, more concerted discussion. I didn't realise it was a meme though.

But that's just a personal opinion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> First off, if you want to see hostile excitement, go look at what happens when men try to get together to talk about real legal discrimination rather than just low representation. A skeptical internet thread is nothing compared to the protesting, fire alarm pulling, slander and career sabotage that occurs.

Second, people don't like it because it's special pleading, funneling disproportionate attention to a minority in the industry for the sake of the omnipresent boogieman of "cultural pressure". Of course coupled with heavy handed moderation that if you disagree, you're a bad person.

The fact that it is easy to get support for stuff like this is paradoxically used as evidence that it's hard. But coverage does not equal incidence, and equal opportunity has not lead to equal occupations in those countries focusing the most on gender equality. Thus the goal posts get moved again in search of a 50/50 utopia that will never happen.

<comment><USER14> We detached this comment from [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667704](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667704) and marked it off-topic.

<comment><USER13> Thank you for proving the point. Criticism must be punished, even when it's directly addressing raised questions. It is exactly these sorts of actions that create the "hostile excitement" OP was complaining about. Cause and effect is a bitch.

All you had to do was not treat the subject as sacred.

<comment><USER14> That's inaccurate. The problem is that people's passions about the hot generic things are so strong that they blast them into every remotely related context, obliterating the specifics that make a given post interesting. The term 'flamewar' expresses vividly how these dynamics consume everything in sight if allowed to. On HN we're trying not to let that happen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> > I'd love to live in a world where women were just equally represented at > these things as a matter of course

serious question: why? what would make it better?

to be clear: i am not opposed (in any way) to equal representation. i do prefer (real, meaningful) equal opportunity, rather that homogeneity.

<comment><USER14> > _serious question: why?_

Please read [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667456](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667456) and [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667379](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14667379)

We detached this subthread from [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14668250](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14668250) and marked it off-topic.

<comment><USER15> if your problem is that the conversation has been had, why not remove/flag/off-topic the baitparent, too?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> What if they are biologically different in certain areas, and they do not WANT to be in that area? Do we continue to force them into roles that they don't want to meet a quota?

I am not saying that is the case in EVERY male dominated field, but it could be in some. For the reverse, I have no desire to be a nurse or a nanny or a elementary teacher. I know there are programs to get more males in the first and third of these, but not sure it can be that successful. Because I have 0 desire to do either. Perhaps many other males share my feelings. That could easily explain the imbalance, not discrimination.

I think the end game to equality is to not have a quote for every single thing. Oh the population if 49% female but this job only has 12% females, it needs adjusted. The end game of equality is to be race/sex/religion blind in all hiring decisions. Literally hire the best person for each job.

<comment><USER17> Nobody is saying anything about quotas or forcing anyone to do things they don't want to do.

<comment><USER16> From above

> I'd love to live in a world where women were just equally represented at > these things as a matter of course

What is that isn't the natural state? What if 50% of the people that want to do X aren't of gender Z?

How do we decide if we should do more to encourage X to do Z, or realize that Z doesn't WANT to do X, and focus on other issues?</comment></comment></comment>


New Dropbox API Features: /delta, /copy_ref, OS X SDK - <AUTHOR> https://www.dropbox.com/developers/announcements/18 <comment><USER2> Is it just me or /copy_ref could be used to make an awesome warez site? I hacked a quick prototype and it seems to work:

\- User authenticates with Dropbox on my web app

\- User sees his/her files and select the ones he/she wants to share

\- Another User searches through the shared files, and by clicking "Download", and using /copy_ref, the file will appear on his/her Dropbox

I'm still undecided if I should use a full Root Dropbox access or just App Folder. The later would give users a more security sense, but would require more effort to share files (move the files to the app directory). What do you think?

<comment><USER3> It really looks like the functionality that my Dropship hack offered :-)

Except that it's easier to trace, as the person sharing the file has to give explicit permission, instead of just giving some anonymous description of the file. I guess they can use that to punish "wrongdoers".

<comment><USER2> Thanks Wladimir :) I learned _a lot_ in the process and by reading your source code!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Now we have /delta to get proper diffs, we only need the Events API to make awesome Dropbox-based apps. Currently there is no way for Dropbox to notify your app on a remote server about updates in a user's Dropbox folder. You have to poll. If you still have votes left, please consider voting for this feature at <https://www.dropbox.com/votebox/5972/events-api>

</comment><comment><USER5> Surprised to see it's not idempotent. What if, for whatever reason, the caller fails to receive the response? Some information on changes is then permanently lost.

Would have expected to see something like /delta?since=<timestamp_here> but perhaps that's harder to implement & requires much more data to be logged.

<comment><USER6> It looks to me like the 'cursor' parameter does that.

<comment><USER5> Ah yes thanks - should have read more carefully.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Am I the only one that would like to see some kind of locking support in the API? So if you have multiple clients working against the same file it could take out a lock for x minutes and the other client could query to see if a file is locked. Useful for synchronization between clients..

<comment><USER8> We really need this in the API. We do our own version of this that is hacky and error prone but it's all we have right now. I was a bit amazed initially that this didn't already exist.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> /delta is great but I've been holding out for an event/webhook API.

</comment><comment><USER10> I'm surprised we aren't seeing more web apps using Dropbox as the datastore. Anyone know why?

<comment><USER11> Lack of a sync API I'm guessing is a big one. There's no way to guarantee a file you place in a Dropbox will be there in the future unless you're notified if it's gone (which you can now do with /delta). Also, storing files isn't that big of a challenge, it's not like Dropbox is equipping you with a new skill. There needs to be a very compelling reason to put someone through an OAuth flow that requires a third-party service subscription for something that can easily be done transparently on the server or using S3 directly.

I personally don't think it's compelling for everyday file storage, like S3 is. However, I think there are a ton of other possibilities that are very compelling: data export, save to Dropbox, collaboration and sharing amongst multiple users, etc.

<comment><USER10> > There needs to be a very compelling reason

For instance, it would be useful to crop an image with the online Pixlr editor, save it to Dropbox -- and then inside of Wordpress to select the image to be viewable on my blog.

I guess this option would be most useful when using media with multiple services.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I have never used the Dropbox API, but I'm surprised that /delta wasn't available before this update. That seems like a great feature.

<comment><USER13> yeah - it was kind of a pain, because it is such a useful pattern when dealing with dropbox. Super glad this was implemented.</comment></comment>


My Favorite SSN Screwup - <AUTHOR> One of my favorite bits of lore from a prior life: https://www.ssa.gov/history/ssn/misused.html<p>This made the rounds every year or two when I worked on Wall St.  It was the canonical example of why "you never primary key ANYTHING by SSN". <comment><USER2> Submit it properly, the link in the URL field.</comment>


MongoDB strategies for the disk-averse - <AUTHOR> http://engineering.foursquare.com/2011/02/09/mongodb-strategies-for-the-disk-averse/

<comment><USER2> Hm, link seems to result in a hung request right now. How's engineering.foursquare.com doing? ;)

<comment><USER3> Overwhelmed by the crowds from HN i guess :-)</comment></comment>


NoSQL No More: Let's double down with MoreSQL - <AUTHOR> http://tatiyants.com/?p=1261

<comment><USER2> If this post was meant satirically, well played.

If it was meant seriously, wouldn't it be better just to use the right tool for the right job?

<comment><USER3> Is there really any confusion? It has constructed the typical strawmen to make for easy competitors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Great post, reads like Steven Colbert's 'The Word'

<comment><AUTHOR> thank you, that's a great complement</comment></comment>


Weight gain in rural areas is responsible for lot of the global rise in obesity - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2019/5/8/18535711/obesity-global-public-health-rural-urban-science <comment><USER2> weight gain is responsible for rise in obesity.</comment>


Amazon's Antitrust Antagonist Has a Breakthrough Idea - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/07/technology/monopoly-antitrust-lina-khan-amazon.html <comment><USER2> That was a lot of words for very little content. I still don't really know what this breakthrough idea is but I do know way more than I need to know about Lina Khan. The only 2 paragraphs that allude to it are:

In Ms. Khan's view, a company like Amazon — one that sells things, competes against others selling things, and owns the platform where the deals are done — has an inherent advantage that undermines fair competition.

From Amazon's point of view, however, it is a problem indeed that Ms. Khan concludes in the Yale paper that regulating parts of the company like a utility "could make sense." She also said it "could make sense" to treat Amazon's e-commerce operation like a bridge, highway, port, power grid or telephone network — all of which are required to allow access to their infrastructure on a nondiscriminatory basis.

<comment><USER3> > I still don't really know what this breakthrough idea is ..

As far as I can tell it is the European monopoly model. (My info all comes from Stratechery's coverage - errors are all mine.)

Monopoly regulators look at consumer harm, with US regulators focusing on price. Increasing prices are seen as monopoly power, and that is what they coordinate around. That for example (as the article notes) is why Facebook, Google etc are not seen as monopolies because they charge consumers zero.

Conversely the EU approach is looking at supply - eg can there be new entrants? The Google shopping stuff was an issue because it is way harder to be a new entrant if Google (where many find the sites) demotes or hides the new comer. Facebook is an issue because it is impractical to start a new social network. A new network has to get users to re-do their social graph - they can't just get a copy from Facebook. GDPR making more sense now?

With the "supply" view on, you can see how network effects keep making Amazon more and more efficient (economies of scale) while also making it increasingly difficult for there to be competitors. Their size also lets them impose their own policies (eg see ebooks over the years).

<comment><USER4> > you can see how network effects keep making Amazon more and more efficient

If we were in court, the argument that you just gave would be used by the amazon lawyers, in defense of why they shouldn't be regulated.

Networks effects are a good thing. Making companies more and more efficient is a good thing. Cheaper goods and services are a good thing.

I have yet to see anyone bring up any arguments as for why any of these things hurt consumers.

In order for me to support regulation, I want to see actual consumers being harmed, and for the things you mentioned, such as efficiency, to be protected and encouraged, instead of discouraged.

<comment><USER5> Why do the consumers deserve government subsidy to protect them against negative effects of monopolies, but not employees or small business owners?

<comment><USER4> Well for one, the government isnt subsidizing anything. They are instead allowing customers to do what they want with their money.

And 2, I don't care what happens to business owners. They are wealthy enough to handle themselves. (Yes, if you are even a small business owner, that still counts as "wealthy" in my book. Most people don't own much of anything)

And 3, we are talking about a product monopoly, and not an employment monopoly. Nobody has shown any evidence that Amazon has any sort of monopoly on hiring people. People are instead arguing that they have a monopoly on the markets that they sell in.

Consumers deserve the protections because they are much less well off than either large or small companies.

<comment><USER5> You don't need the government for that - you just let people do whatever they want. Any sort of anti-monopoly legislation is a subsidy in a sense, because it gives those protected some degree of economic power that they wouldn't otherwise have, enabling them to make better deals etc. And there's nothing wrong with that in principle, if you believe in common good - but then the question of scope arises.

And we're talking about all kinds of monopolies. The effect that Amazon has is not so much on its own employees (although there are some obvious issues there as well), but on employees of all the competitors that it puts out of business. All those people also benefit from the lower prices that Amazon offers - but that is more than offset by the loss of income. It's kinda like Walmart - it's more affordable, but at the cost of making a lot of people poorer such that they _need_ that high affordability. For the owners, it's a win-win, of course, because it creates a lock-in. But I don't see why we should accept that as a society.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here is shorter article describing the issue for a general audience written by Lina Khan herself [https://qz.com/282971/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about- ama...](https://qz.com/282971/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about-amazon/)

<comment><USER7> This was a great article. I like how she highlights how predatory pricing and cross business subsidization used to be considered wrong and it was a shift in the courts that changed that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I wonder if there is any good writing on how any potential regulation would play out.

Amazon is already a platform, so what about it would actually be changed if it was "treated like infrastructure"? Ok, players like Google who have been blackballed could list there, so that's a small win. Would it also mean restricting Amazon business units from seeing data on their platform? I'm not sure that's actually a win for society. Is it forcing Amazon to share this data with competitors? That would be interesting, but starts running into privacy challenges. Is it enforcing some idea of neutrality in ranking items? That seems a very hard thing to regulate well without destroying the utility of search.

As part of the EU Anti-trust ruling against Google Shopping, Google has made Shopping into a fully separate (accounting wise) business unit and opened up shopping ad slates for bidding to competing sites, but the sites who instigated that action aren't happy because they are not actually able to monetise those slots as effectively as Google can.

These companies are powerful, and maybe regulating based on price is short sited as the article claims, but a long term view should not seek to destroy power for no other reason than it exists.

<comment><USER9> Imagine AWS being a seperate business from Amazon. Zero personnel in common, no shared office spaces, selling services to each other on a commercial basis with SLAs and pricing negotiations the same way they do to external customers.

Similarly, imagine APS - amazon parcel service, an abstraction layer on package delivery through Fedex UPS USPS courier etc, spun out as a separate endeavor and selling services to all comers the same way they do to internal amazon.

And Amazon Logistics, warehousing and fulfillment, sold the same way. Amazon- product-sales is just another client who pays the same price as anyone else.

Ditto Amazon product sales vs amazon the website. The website continues much as they are now, organized around selling things to people and doing the recommendations / marketing / discovery bit and taking a cut from everyone. The product sales business becomes a separate stockkeeping and inventory buying company. As you say, Amazon-the-product-sales-business could operate just as easily through catalogs or phone orders or late night infomercials.

I'm sure there's at least another half dozen parts of amazon that would be industry leaders in some sub-industry instead of part of the degenerate conglomerate as they are now. It's interesting to think about the places you could draw those lines.

<comment><USER8> The question isn't "what splits could you make", but "what concrete benefits and downsides are there from making the splits".

Splitting AWS off basically has no impact since they are already run as pretty separate entities and AWS already sells to external customers.

Your example of Amazon Logistics also already exists, it is called Fulfillment By Amazon.

Amazon the website also lists plenty of things from other merchants, so again, is already provides services to other players.

Maybe there is some subsidization going on here that forcing Amazon to ensure everyone is treated equally and doing proper accounting would expose, but everything we know about Amazon is that they already do this internally, which isn't surprising since every business unit in every large company needs to show how they benefit the company and "charging" internal customers the external price is an easy way to show value.

As far as I can tell, the only piece of this that isn't available to external parties is the data on consumer habits.... but people have been complaining about fast followers long before Amazon, and you can usually make a good estimate about the market just by looking at the volume of reviews.

I mean, there are cases, e.g. Diapers.com where Amazon has clearly abused its market power, but that seems like a thing we could handle directly with laws declaring that large companies cannot sell products below cost, with proper accounting for all of the fulfilment/etc services they use.

<comment><USER10> What's the external price for a full-width ad at the top of Amazon.com? Can Google pay them to drop Fire TV like they did Chromecast? Can Anker pay them to block third-party sales like they do for AmazonBasics?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Sincere question: when I read this article, it had this sentence: "Unwilling or perhaps unable to accept that a woman wrote a breakthrough legal text, they keep talking about bearded dudes."

Is "dudes" acceptable in NYT's style guide now? The term seemed incongruous either way.

To reiterate, I am only asking about the term "dudes" and only quoted the whole sentence for context.

<comment><USER12> I also thought it was an incongruous/bizarre sentence (what men are they even referring to?), because the context isn't explained until much further down.

But then it does make sense -- it refers explicitly to this cover [1] and the content within ("Battle of the Beards"), where "bearded dude" really does feel like an appropriate description. So I'd call it bad article organization but not a style problem.

[1] [https://www.competitionpolicyinternational.com/wp- content/up...](https://www.competitionpolicyinternational.com/wp- content/uploads/2018/05/AC_APRIL.pdf)

<comment><USER11> I saw that. I understand use of the word bearded, given the cover, if not the authors (a woman, a bearded man and a clean-shaven man.) I am specifically wondering about the NYT allowing the word "dudes" since it seems to be used as slang for men and not as a term necessary to describe the criticism.

<comment><USER13> I, like some other commenters, objected to that sentence, but now after understanding the context about the linked article further down I think I get it now, and I agree I hope it's just how some reorganization during editing that made its meaning confusing.

I think "bearded dudes" is used specifically because the article was named "Hipster Antitrust", i.e. "dudes" being used to highlight the way the word "hipster" was used to ridicule Lina Khan's ideas in the first place.

<comment><USER11> I think I'm questioning the idea that portraying a bearded hipster is portraying a "dude" specifically, rather than a "man" (more formal than the reported article) or even just a "hipster" (would be a repetitive use.) Was it that they could not come up with another synonym and the NYT made an exception, or does the NYT generally allow a term like that now?

I'm also curious about whether the NYT has changed its policy of adopting a source's language style to report on it (just for reporting, as an op-ed has different standards and already allows this.) That seems like a new development, but I'm not a daily reader of the whole newspaper.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I thought the A&P story in particular was peculiar, since they presented it as an argument for not regulating Amazon, but looking more carefully into its history (on Wikipedia), I would say what happened to A&P was probably beneficial to consumers long-term. So if FTC looks at how the government handled A&P in the 40s and uses that as a model for dealing with Amazon, I would say it's not necessarily a bad thing.

</comment><comment><USER15> Never once was a de facto antitrust law mentioned that Amazon had violated. Plenty of talk regarding how antitrust laws are weak how they they could apply to Amazon by way of their ability to undercut competitors but that does not really "wash" since 53% of Amazon is third party sellers:

[https://www.statista.com/statistics/259782/third-party- selle...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/259782/third-party-seller-share- of-amazon-platform/)

Ultimately Being a monopoly is not against the law if the company avoided exclusionary or predatory acts.

<comment><USER5> The whole point of the article is that the definitions of monopoly abuse that underpin our existing laws are not broad enough.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> >* Unwilling or perhaps unable to accept that a woman wrote a breakthrough legal text, they keep talking about bearded dudes.*

I wish they would leave these comments out. If they wanted to protray the opposition, they could have printed some of their arguments. Maye the accusation is true but you can't just make accusations and move on. It's not something that should be treated that lightly...

</comment><comment><USER17> For those wondering about the 'bearded hipster' comment, it's specifically referring to this: [https://www.competitionpolicyinternational.com/antitrust- chr...](https://www.competitionpolicyinternational.com/antitrust-chronicle- hipster-antitrust/)

This is written later in the article.

</comment><comment><USER18> As a novice, it seems extremely difficult to define what's too big. Her argument is that Amazon owns the platform where the deals are done and thus has an inherent advantage that undermines fair competition. Any established company has an inherent advantage over those just entering the market. They have market share, infrastructure, marketing, and so on. Amazon has a platform but of course anyone can sell through other channels. It's just a matter (of course a non-trivial one) of gaining traction. Personally I think Amazon is way too dominate, but I just don't know how you codify what line they've crossed. Maybe it's like the old porn definition - "I know it when I see it."

</comment><comment><USER19> >> "As consumers, as users, we love these tech companies," Ms. Khan said. "But as citizens, as workers, and as entrepreneurs, we recognize that their power is troubling. We need a new framework, a new vocabulary for how to assess and address their dominance."

That's a good point; governments have to face the fact that people aren't just consumers but also producers. In fact, based on how much time people spend working each week, it's fair to say that people are more producers than they are consumers. If this is the case, then surely the government should take steps to protect people from monopolies.

</comment><comment><USER20> Why all the energy on Amazon when the organization we'd expect to break up the monopoly _is an actual monopoly_ in so many ways?

If we ask the government to break up Amazon, should we expect it to break up the post office?

Amazon already may be in the decline - myself and many of my peers no longer trust it to deliver items we purchase.

They have a big Fake Review problem [0] and there's competitors popping up all over the place.

[0] [https://www.gimletmedia.com/reply- all/124](https://www.gimletmedia.com/reply-all/124)

<comment><USER21> Well, the difference is the "actual monopoly" here can be voted out democratically. Give the workers of Amazon and other companies the same power to influence the board through one person one vote or a liquid democracy, then we can talk about the supposed hypocrisy involved in asking government to break up monopolies.

<comment><USER20> But we can stop voting for the thing by... not buying it. If enough people stop using Amazon, Amazon goes away.

Now think of how large the demonstrations have been to protest various government policies, and how little change has come about.

I've not yet been able to figure out how to vote out drug warriors, and whoever the hell it is in the government that supports the US global military empire.

If you can tell me who to vote for to legalize drugs and end the wars, I'll do so in a heartbeat!

I think the government would like us to continue to think that we have say in its going-ons, via once-every-two-year elections.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> The NYT's editorializing is tiresome and distracting. Why the need to mention her husband several times, and the unfounded allegation that she found opponents because of her gender, and the "bearded dudes" reference.

I applaud Khan for starting this conversation, but I'm worried about misguided legislation on these antitrust issues. Internet centralization is inevitable and unstoppable, and regulations are likely to hurt competitors (in the form of increased startup costs) more than the incumbents.

<comment><USER23> Your arguments word for wordcoud be applied to breakup of ATT, and yet it proved to be a great idea.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Lina Khan is a rising superstar in antitrust/policy circles and the next Democrat in the White House should appoint her to the Supreme Court so she can start to undo Bork's Chicago School influence on antitrust doctrine.

[https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novemberdecember-2017...](https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/novemberdecember-2017/the- democrats-confront-monopoly/)

</comment><comment><USER25> > She has her own critics now: Several leading scholars have found fault with > Ms. Khan's proposals to revive and expand antitrust, and some have tried to > dismiss her paper with the mocking label "Hipster Antitrust." Unwilling or > perhaps unable to accept that a woman wrote a breakthrough legal text, they > keep talking about bearded dudes.

So we are just presuming sexism? OK David Streitfeld, I immediately trust you and believe that all critics of her paper are evil dudes who just hate women. Oh look, we are moving on from that point immediately to dive into her back story and not backing it up with anything. Guess I'll just have to take your word for it that her critics disagreed with her instead of her work.

<comment><USER25> Well, three quarters of the way through the article we got our answer.

> The April issue of the journal Antitrust Chronicle, edited by Mr. > Medvedovsky, features a drawing of a bearded man on the cover right above > the words "Hipster Antitrust." In the middle of an ... there's a photograph > of a bearded man taking a selfie next to the chapter heading "Battle of the > Beards." It is perhaps relevant that only one of the 12 authors or experts > in the issue is female. > The Hipster issue was sponsored by Facebook, > another sign that Big Tech is striving to shape the monopoly-law debate. The > company declined to comment.

Interesting. I'm annoyed that the article moved on well enough for me to come post a comment on the comment that stuck out like a sore thumb.

<comment><USER16> That explains the beard but what about the accusation of sexism?

> _It is perhaps relevant that only one of the 12 authors or experts in the > issue is female._

Hopefully that's not all that was said in support of it.

<comment><USER26> It must be sexism because 11/12 authors were male. Obviously. If you disagree, you are sexist.

Also, my cat is sexist because she had five kittens and all five are male.

I don't like discounting ideas because of the flaws of their originators, but I'm likely going to ignore all articles that make such spurious claims without evidence.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Of course the NYT would publish a 1k word profile of a virtual nobody as long as they're criticizing big bad tech companies.

Tech companies are only an issue for the newspaper business, they are a boon for the economy as a whole.

</comment><comment><USER28> > Don't let the government pursue Amazon the way it pursued A.&P., Mr. Muris > and Mr. Nuechterlein warned.

why, because Amazon is so precious?

</comment><comment><USER29> Of course the NYT would publish a 1k word profile of a nobody as long as they're criticizing big bad tech companies.

Tech companies are only an issue for the newspaper business model they are a boon for the economy as a whole.

</comment><comment><USER30> While reading this article, I was presented for an ad for AWS. Checkmate.

<comment><USER31> I'm going to shamelessly hijack this question to pose something that came to mind reading this, and the more abridged exploratory linked by another commentor ([https://qz.com/282971/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about- ama...](https://qz.com/282971/what-everyones-getting-wrong-about-amazon/) for the interested), since AWS was mentioned.

I propose a thought experiment:

Supposing government takes Kahn up on this modest proposal and starts levying real regulatory eyeballs on Amazon and actually end up with something on the House floor. Asking the HN crowd: how do you think this would even affect AWS as a product and would it have any sort of ripple effects to the industries and working engineers that rely on it?

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Scholarly sugar coating, what about the monopoly of other industries such as "printing the dollar". Amazon is just competing, it didn't usurp power, or conquer a foreign land.

</comment><comment><USER33> Does Linus hold a monopoly over operating systems since maybe 80% of servers and mobile phones use Linux ?

Maybe he twirls his mustache every night thinking about how much cash he will make once he aggressively starts charging everybody 100 dollars to upgrade their Linux version, and all he has been doing over the past 20 years is under price until he has absolute vertical domination ?

Linux harms legitimate 'small business' owners who cannot sell their operating system for 10,000 dollar / license to recoup their investment.

\--- BIG RED /S ---

Lawyers trying to create laws about macro economics is no different than me telling a doctor how to perform eye surgery, it's what got us into this mess.

So if Amazon has a monopoly, and you think that is bad why not put you money where your mouth is and aggressively fund its competitors ?

Where were you when for 20+ years shareholders of amazon were funding it's growth, taking all the risk, most amazon investors have not seen any actual cash from their investment, if tomorrow amazon makes a bad decision or mistake, then all the unrealized capital gains wealth that is it's stock price would plummet.

You could solve this anti-trust issue really easily you know ? China has alternate e-commerce sites, so does India, instead of the populist message of "Eat Bezos" maybe give some of your salary to actually solve the problem ? I know amazon shareholders did, and they didn't have our hindsight.

Of course I am not going to take their talk seriously unless they actually buy shares in Amazon's competitors, ask the EU how the shakedown of tech companies is helping them, they could seize all of Bezo's, Zuck's, Sergey's wealth (which is in stocks anyway, how much would it be worth after nationalization ?) and still not figure out how to solve the problem.</comment>


NSA Targeted "The Two Leading" Encryption Chips - <AUTHOR> https://theintercept.com/2016/01/04/a-redaction-re-visited-nsa-targeted-the-two-leading-encryption-chips/ <comment><USER2> It is possibly true that most chips are compromised by various state actors, but the outrage here is the leak. If the NSA must compromise US Tech, could it at least ensure the compromise remains secret? Kudos to the Chinese for at least maintaining the appearance Huwei hardware is free from backdoors.</comment>


Kotlin 1.0.4 is here - <AUTHOR> https://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2016/09/kotlin-1-0-4-is-here/ <comment><USER2> Interesting to see but sadly not an alternative to me as long as there is no Netbeans support.

Considering it the moment it has Netbeans support. Same goes for Ceylon.

<comment><USER3> There is now: [https://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2016/09/kotlin-netbeans- pl...](https://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2016/09/kotlin-netbeans-plugin-beta- is-out/)

<comment><USER2> Nice! I kind of do like those Jetbrains people.</comment></comment></comment>


Bookstores and serendipity - <AUTHOR> http://benwerd.com/2011/04/bookstores-and-serendipity/

<comment><USER2> I used to spend my Sunday afternoons browsing several bookstores. Then shortly after the bubble burst those stores abandoned me.

They cut by 80% the computer titles and business titles by half. They started adding music/video and carved out space for a coffee shop. When business went down they cut wages and lost the knowledgeable staff which were replaced by minimum wage drones interchangeable with those working at fast food restaurants.

I'd started buying books online in late '94 but strongly felt the majority of the money I spent should be supporting the local stores.

I no longer feel any loyalty at all and in fact probably only visit my old haunts no more than twice a year at most.

</comment><comment><USER3> Many is the time that I've gone to Amazon's site, clicked on a genre and spent 30 mins working through the top 100 list, which remains fairly static, and wondering where do I go from here. It's all rather frustrating when Amazon trumpets 15,000 books in some genre but there's means or mechanism to get at them, no way to dive into the middle of them all and just "browse about".

As a weekend hobby I've been toying around with some way to "deep browse" Amazon book offerings. <http://goo.gl/tPPJz> I'm very interested in any thoughts on how this is best done. Are carefully curated recommendations by a select and passionate few the right way to go? The current set social book sites seem focus on the "hits" being read by the "masses". But the deep long tail isn't being addressed. But how?</comment>


Tell HN: I will help solve your roadblock/s for 1 hour of your time - <AUTHOR> I have a pretty diverse set of skills, I mostly work with node and do front end dev. Currently, I work doing a little bit of everything at a small fintech company. I could add value/help you with:
setting up and implementing a social meda strategy and campaign.
Doing a quick mockup or design critique.
Competitive strategy. Looking at the space you are in and finding non-traditional competitors, changes and partners. Or thinking about a business model.
Letting you vent for a bit because contrary to what you tell everyone, maybe you aren't "killing it, I love being an Entrepreneur!" Or "just gabbed coffee with [well known sandhill entity] and I'm getting tons of interest"
Looking at your product and company and providing a thoughtful critique.
Etc.
I need maybe 1 hour of someones time to help me think about structuring my project. It will have a forum with users, entities that are organizations that might not be active, articles (like news not db) and just generally how to think about the data. I haven't really scaled anything out and there is no reason to beleive this will be massive, but I am just not sure how to set up the dbs and website to serve 10-100k users, obviously not "big data" but more of just a way to get some best practices and find some good resources.
Anyway,
Maybe you don't need any of thr stuff I listed, it would be cool if you coukd get/give help from someone else as this isn't just about my small experiment.
Cheers <comment><USER2> > and just generally how to think about the data > but I am just not sure how > to set up the dbs

Your pseudo sounds German maybe you can read French ? If yes, what you need is the "Merise method". This is the one true way to model your data as long as your requirements don't include a non relational database (NoSQL).

Sadly Merise remained a French thing and to my knowledge was never translated. It's old and unsexy, but it makes designing a relational database schema a breeze.

However I don't do web dev so I can't help you there. But I'm sure you will find plenty of web people here.

<comment><AUTHOR> [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merise](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merise)

Interesting this is helpful. I am looking for a conceptual model and inplementation. I have done small prototypes with crud, but I want to make sure I build with intent. Another component will be users who subscribe to 1-10 data feeds that in a poor case should not be more than 1 sec stale. Just trying to move from sloppy project to basic security & optimization.

This looks like a decent concept and I am currently thinking about the relational model, so thanks.

You stuck on anything?

<comment><USER2> I'm not stuck on anything right now, however I'm not against helping a fellow hacker for free as long as you don't expect too much.

Let me remind you that I don't have any significant experience in web dev, so I can help you with the relational model, offer opinions about what DB to use but after that I'm of no use.

You can reach me by email : same than my HN pseudo, at gmx.fr</comment></comment></comment>


Ask YC: quitting job and starting a startup - <AUTHOR>

i'm in the process of quitting my (money-wise: decent, work-wise: crap) job and starting a startup. But i don't feel as confident as i'd like me to believe... i was wondering if this is normal or i'm, in fact, not ready to start a startup yet? <comment><USER2> I'm 23 and I just left my first job of two years to build a startup about three months ago. I'd like to believe that while you're young (if you are) and/or while you don't have to support anyone (e.g., a family), there's no reason why you shouldn't give it a try. If it doesn't pan out, you can always try again or just go back to having a regular job.

And I'll agree with some of the previous comments that all you really need to worry about is the money. Be sure that you can afford to not have any reliable income for a long while. Otherwise, if you think you have a good enough idea to pursue, just keep your morale up and you'll be fine.

</comment><comment><USER3> Pretty scary during the process of untangling yourself from your job but...

The next day when you sit down at your own desk with only yourself as boss is just the greatest feeling.

<comment><AUTHOR> yeah.. i can already smell it :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Sounds normal to me. Definitely try and get someone else to work with, that'll at least mean that someone's got your back.

<comment><AUTHOR> getting a co-founder turned out to be a problem actually. though most of my friends appreciated the idea/effort, none is actually willing to give up the security of well-paying jobs to come work on a startup. PS: i'm in India. and startups have not really caught on as well here as they have in US.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Sounds pretty normal. Don't worry about quitting your job, worry about doing the startup well.

<comment><AUTHOR> well i'm not worried about quitting the job. its 'doing the startup' well part. i have a couple of ideas and not too afraid to fail either. its just that sometimes these voices at the back of my mind keep telling me otherwise :)

<comment><AUTHOR> i guess those voices will fade away as i start getting busier with the startup :)

<comment><USER6> Those voices fade away as soon as you accomplish something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's normal. Now close your browser and get back to work.

</comment><comment><USER7> the contradicting voices will bother you all the time till u get settled with ur startup - in the beginning you will feel very lonely but doing something from scratch will make u happy as well - i'm in the same boat so i understand u well - make sure that u can survive for at least 6-12 months financially. if u want to contact me then visit my profile "ideas101" on <http://programmermeetdesigner.com/> \- u can send me a message from there. good luck</comment>


RIM's app store shamelessly dubbed App World; developer site goes live tonight - <AUTHOR> http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/03/04/rims-app-store-shamelessly-dubbed-app-world-developer-site-goes-live-tonight/ <comment><USER2> Shamelessly? They sell apps. WTF other word should they use?</comment>


Ask HN: Public domain vintage/ video footage? - <AUTHOR> I am looking for websites that have video footage in public domain (short clips of cartoons, dancing videos etc) that I can use commercially for a music video. <comment><USER2> A DDG search for "public domain video clips" came back with this page listing a number of such sites: [https://filmora.wondershare.com/video-editing- tips/best-webs...](https://filmora.wondershare.com/video-editing-tips/best- websites-download-free-public-domain-footage.html)</comment>