Two big announcements - <AUTHOR> https://37signals.com/ <comment><USER2> Very interesting announcement. I'm sure they're making the right decision, and I'm even more sure they did a ton of user testing.

However, it's weird to lose the 37 Signals brand. I actually don't like Basecamp as a product, but I _love_ 37 Signals. I treat their books like a bible, and read their blog posts religiously. Somehow, they seemed like more like a philosophy than just a product, and Basecamp (and Rails and their books) were a side effect.

I know it's the same people and nothing will really change (A rose by any other name...), but it's still so weird to me to lose 37 Signals.

<comment><USER3> I agree, I actually don't use any 37signals products.

Basecamp doesn't work for how I organise projects, and Campfire is a poor competitor to HipChat.

But I frequently point to them as an example of how to run a company. And they know their customers really well.

I guess I'm just not one of their customers.

<comment><USER4> HipChat was a clone of Campfire that out-did them. It's a smart tactical move to give up on that conceding to Pete, Chris, Gary, et al. which did a superb job on HipChat.

Personally, I enjoy using FlowDock and Hubot.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> 1999 founded.

2004 first product launched.

5 years after the company and team came together.

5 years of time to hone the skills and struggle.

Oh yah, and another 10 years to grow to 43 people.

Simple reminder of the commitment to patience it can actually take to build a remarkable business.

<comment><USER6> What struggle?

They were formed to design websites and that's what they did for 5 years. Though I guess you _can_ view web design as a "struggle" with all that IE6 testing and what not, but some people really enjoy it :)

<comment><USER7> _but some people really enjoy it_

Who.

0_o

<comment><USER8> I used to love battling with IE6 to get a webdesign looking great, cross- browser compatible and degrading gracefully. Ok it was maybe more like love+hate, it was a challenge, a puzzle and particularly trying to solve it in the least (subjectively) "hackish" way possible.

But then, I also used to write 4096 byte demos in x86 asm. And a bunch of other crazy things that don't even occur to me now, some things with JS ...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> We use basecamp and campfire at work. Basecamp is mediocre, not horrible and not great. Campfire sucks compared to similar tools that I've used in the past.

Seems to me that they've been successful mostly because of their involvement in the Ruby and startup world, rather than making great products. Nothing wrong with that, but it's good to be clear about the distinction between a company that makes great product and a company that's good at marketing itself.

<comment><USER10> What are great alternatives to Basecamp? (I don't use Basecamp but am interested in the space.)

<comment><USER11> The thing that Basecamp does well is that it is a generic project management tool that can be used for any kind of project - thus its wide appeal. The most interesting alternatives are ones that specialize in particular types of projects. For example, if you are a designer there is Solo and if you are a product manager there is my product Aha! - [http://www.aha.io](http://www.aha.io). These alternatives specialize by taking the common elements of project management software (like todo lists, calendars and comments) and tailoring them towards a particular job function.

<comment><USER10> Thank you! Checking out Aha! now. Seems Solo may come in handy too sometime...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I think it's commendable to take this approach. They are doing a few things very right. 1.) Not shutting down existing products and leaving users without a service, 2.) Not wanting to just sell it to the highest bidder but actually are concerned about their users, 3.) Having the guts to just put everything on the table and changing major things up. I feel like a lot of companies feel like, 'Well we have these products we have to either keep them going and scale or kill them.' Their solution here is a wise one that is certainly putting users before dollars and ease.

While everyone may not be happy with it, it's certainly better than a lot of shut downs and other moves startups have made that have pissed a lot of people off.

</comment><comment><USER13> Interesting. I always saw 37Signals as a good example of a diversified portfolio. I notice they're going to keep the side projects (books, job board) which probably have the highest margins and require very little ongoing investment of mental energy. I don't see where the growth in Basecamp is going to come from, but then I don't use the product (tried it once, too limited.)

Also, did Jason Fried step out of a time machine with his IBM Selectric typewriter to compose this? 37Signals have always been on the hipster end of things but the design of this letter is ridiculously so.

<comment><USER8> > Also, did Jason Fried step out of a time machine with his IBM Selectric > typewriter to compose this? 37Signals have always been on the hipster end of > things but the design of this letter is ridiculously so.

I gotta admit, while it's the content of the article that has 99% of my interest (going to miss the "37signals" name, but it sounds like they know _exactly_ what they're doing, so good for them!), I did also pause and wonder about the Courier font as well as the "scribbly" version of the Basecamp logo.

But then, that's me, and sometimes a font is just a font? :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I predict that GitHub will acquire Campfire.

<comment><USER15> My bet was going to be Atlassian. They have the clearest competitor to Campfire (Hipchat), a history of pulling off acquisitions (Bitbucket) and from 37Signals perspective could probably make a better case that they could take care / migrate their customers.

<comment><USER16> I doubt unless they want to kill Hipchat and use Campfire.

 _We will not sell either of these products to a company that is planning to shut the products down._

IMO Hipchat is a better chat tool than Campfire.

<comment><USER17> Why kill either? They are already a big player in the market, if they have Campfire too their will dominate it.

<comment><USER18> Maintaining two products that overlap that much is going to look like a waste sooner or later.

<comment><USER19> They could just have two different frontends, everything else the same.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "Based on current revenues, current growth rates, and a conservative multiple, Campfire will sell in the single digit millions, and Highrise will sell in the tens of millions"

Anyone care to take a guess to what Campfire and Highrise revenue? What type of multiple of revenue do they expect to get?

<comment><USER21> I'd guess a 6x multiple of revenue, considering their sales, staffing and acquisition models. (I.e. no-touch, low-overhead, referral/word of mouth.)

[Addendum] Perhaps 6x was extremely low given the current market. Need to update my priors: [http://tomtunguz.com/saas-valuation- bubble/](http://tomtunguz.com/saas-valuation-bubble/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Congrats on figuring it out and having a clear focus, but also to trying a lot of things over the years and figuring out what works. And thank you for being so responsible with the future of your legacy products. There are too many companies that are too happy to simply shut down things as soon as ROI numbers don't line up.

Here's to the future.

</comment><comment><USER19> Great success.

Though my guess is all the people who applauded 37signals for their product strategy, will now again applaud 37signals.

And there will be a book "The One Product Company".

</comment><comment><USER23> Am I the only one who doesn't get why Basecamp is praised so much? I think it is okay, but nothing exceptionally. Also if I didn't knew the product, I would never signup when looking at the frontpage, it looks very outdated, and not very trustworthy. Hopefully a better focus, will make the experience more up- to-date.

<comment><USER24> _" I would never signup when looking at the frontpage, it looks very outdated, and not very trustworthy. Hopefully a better focus, will make the experience more up-to-date."_

Almost certainly a sign that you're not the target market for basecamp. They do a lot of testing on their landing pages (see [http://signalvnoise.com/posts/2991-behind-the-scenes-ab- test...](http://signalvnoise.com/posts/2991-behind-the-scenes-ab-testing- part-3-final) for example.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Understandable move, focus on the one big product. And as far as company name is concerned, nobody outside our tech bubble has ever heard of "37 Signals".

The Q & A does highlight the reality distortion field around the cult-like status of 37 Signals though:

> Q: This is a really unusual strategy (..)

No. No it isn't. But if Jason Fried claims it is, I'm sure that will be echo- ed on HN.

(Not trying to be super negative, I consider 37 Signals a major source of inspiration, and I'm a Basecamp user.)

</comment><comment><USER26> From the FAQ:

> _Based on current revenues, current growth rates, and a conservative > multiple, Campfire will sell in the single digit millions, and Highrise will > sell in the tens of millions._

Amazing that those products are doing so well and they've largely been on autopilot for the past few years. This info + the switch to focus on Basecamp can only mean that they're making an absolute killing with Basecamp.

</comment><comment><USER27> Am I the first person who realized "Signal vs. Noise" blog move to [http://signalvnoise.com/](http://signalvnoise.com/)?

</comment><comment><USER28> Seems like a weird strategy. I admire the focus shown, but what if Thomas Edison had decided after 10 years to rebrand GE as Something Something Light Bulbs, Inc?

<comment><USER29> If all they were making would be light bulbs, why not? RIM rebranded to BlackBerry (though RIP may have been a better choice :( ).

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> It's a good idea for them to take the plunge and do this, because it pretty much just aligns their official strategy and brand with their actual strategy. Campfire hasn't seen an update in forever, and the rest of the ecosystem also felt like it was already in maintainable mode.

We already migrated away to Hipchat as a result, and I get the impression that others might have been doing the same.

</comment><comment><USER31> So uh... is this going to be a problem? [https://twitter.com/basecamp](https://twitter.com/basecamp)

<comment><USER32> If the account hasn't been active for 6 months (which appears to be the case) Basecamp may be able to get the handle. Policy: [https://support.twitter.com/articles/15362-inactive- account-...](https://support.twitter.com/articles/15362-inactive-account- policy)

<comment><USER33> The last I heard, it needed to be entirely dormant (meaning not a single log in) for 30 months in order to be eligible to transfer. Though they might have a trademark claim that would likely help.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> And I was just about to integrate Highrise into my app...moving on! Any suggestions on a Highrise competitor that is stable, etc.?

<comment><USER35> Give us a shot... [http://close.io/](http://close.io/)

We've also got an easy migration tool for any existing Highrise users: [http://close.io/highrise](http://close.io/highrise) and a solid REST API [http://developer.close.io/](http://developer.close.io/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Big news! We've been big fans of 37signals for a decade or so and in many ways they have inspired us in building Close.io. I love that they are able to make the hard decision to focus on one thing.

We want to take great care of any Highrise customers looking for a new home: [http://close.io/highrise](http://close.io/highrise)

Check out [http://close.io/](http://close.io/) \- mention that you were a Highrise customer and I can make sure you'll get a special discount.

Close.io is a next-gen sales communication tracking tool with an easy 1-click migration from Highrise, as well as automatic 2-way email syncing, call tracking, etc. See what our customers say at [https://www.quora.com/Reviews- of-Close-io](https://www.quora.com/Reviews-of-Close-io)

<comment><USER26> Your comment implies Highrise is going to disappear - however, that's not the case. They're either going to sell Highrise (to a buyer who is committed to keeping it running + growing) or continue to run it themselves in maintenance mode.

<comment><USER35> I don't think it's going to disappear, but I do think many customers will consider alternatives when it's clear the original designers are no longer onboard with the product anymore.

Highrise was an amazing product years ago, but let's face it, Highrise has almost been abandoned for the past couple years at least. Could a new owner take over and revamp it to be amazing? It's possible, but not the common outcome of acquisitions.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> There are so many project management apps out there, the competition is fierce. For a proj mgmt app to succeed, there either has to be USP and massive value. For example, Asana is especially good. I haven't tried Basecamp recently but it wasn't as lightweight, low-cost and nice as Asana.

<comment><USER36> I am extremely interested in this space, both as a user and as a developer[1].

As it happens, I use (and pay for) both Asana and Basecamp. I use Asana internally with my own staff, and I use Basecamp externally with clients.

My clients tend to be non-technical businesses with custom software needs -- and most of them would be like "WHAT. THE. FUCK. HELLLP~!" if I asked them to use Asana. Keyboard shortcuts, context menus, sliding popovers, disclosure widgets, multiple views onto the same data/work-graph, _aiiiighhhhh_!

On the other hand, Basecamp has really nailed their niche -- the project management app that really is simple enough for 'average folks'. Making that choice completely alienates the tech-savvy power user that most of their competitors seem to be targeting (e.g. Flow, Wrike, Teamwork PM, Azendoo, Dooster, Teambox, TeamLab, Do.com, FMYI, to name just a few that I have evaluated and rejected).

Which 37Signals, oops I mean Basecamp, is obviously OK with, given Basecamp's massive user base and success. Basecamp is a pretty cool software story, and actually a pretty cool piece of software, even though it is too limited and underpowered for me to use it as my own primary project manager.

[1] I develop software (among other roles) for a living, but I develop project-management web app software mostly just in my fantasies and rage- imagination... spending many hours in a week in these apps _really_ makes a person want to develop the One True Project Management app, though.

<comment><USER37> It's not easy building that project-management app that is usable by both geeks and customers.

We ([http://countersoft.com](http://countersoft.com)) are pushing the approach of a single tool for both project tracking (geeks) and ticketing (customers). It's not easy to say the least because customers love to just do everything in email!

<comment><USER4> There's different use cases. There are high-level / strategy oriented task systems and low-level microtask work systems that tend to have more specialist features for getting shit done baked in. As payware goes, JIRA is a pretty well-rounded high-level one. Gitlab seems fairly popular for dev work because it emulates much of github and is more integrated with source control (getting shit done) than say redmine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> HOw is having two versions of Basecamp (old and new) simplification?

Also I think Asana is beating Basecamp in terms of having both simplicity and power, although I would say that the Basecamp UI is more simple than Asana, Asana is a lot faster and a lot more powerful and Asana is free for up to 15 users. I think Asana will take a lot of business away from Basecamp over the long term.

Having said that, in our business we use Jira, Asana and Basecamp (part of the reason for using all 3 is that we integrate our product with them). We keep Baecamp as a central repository of information and for that purpose Asana is not really as well suited.

For task management, Asana is way better than Basecamp.

<comment><USER4> Asana is really good. There are very few surprises and it seems to just get out of your way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> I started a software company years ago with three friends. We had some good success. We then saw an opportunity to start another product that was adjacent to Photoshop - basically a tool to improve Photoshop productivity. We moved most of our engineering team to focus on this product. Then Adobe built the functionality we provided right into the product, and our entire installed base moved to that. Meanwhile, we had neglected our core product and customers had become frustrated with the lack of progress and were moving onto other tools.

I tell this story because I wonder if this is what happened with 37Signals/Basecamp.

</comment><comment><USER40> This is really cool. I love basecamp and have been a daily user since close to day one. However their maintaining legacy basecamp in parallel to new basecamp seems to make even less sense to me now then it did then.

It seems to me if the transition process between the two could have been smoother they could have got all their users on board for the upgrade.

I'm really hoping that as part of their renewed efforts with basecamp they might re-address people that are stuck in basecamp classic due to the much less than smooth upragde process.

</comment><comment><USER41> My hunch - as I was reading - was that the second announcement would be that they'd open-source the other products.. I was wrong.

</comment><comment><USER7> Now, a question.

If your business has a great product, is it the best idea to follow Basecamp nee 37Signal's trajectory? In other words, build those other products, then later consolidate?

Or take the GitHub route and stick to (basically) one awesome product and leave it at that? I wonder what's a better choice? I lean towards the latter personally.

</comment><comment><USER42> They did this for another reason as well. They can't grow past 50 employees or they will have to pay through the nose for Obamacare. If they continue to grow, they would inevitably require more staff besides developers that need expensive healthcare. Obamacare is a great way to keep small companies small.

</comment><comment><USER43> Brilliant. 37signals inspired a generation of developers, nearly every modern web framework and dozens of direct competitors. Makes complete sense to double down on their biggest winner. Many people talk about cutting, simplifying, focus, editing - but few people and even fewer companies follow through on it.

</comment><comment><USER44> I really like 37signals, for Ruby, Rails or basically their taste for tech and their startup culture / their books. But none of their product really catches me. They are from ok to very good. But not great. Actually Basecamp was the only very good one.

Preferring Trello or Pivotal Tracker.

</comment><comment><USER45> Based on the lack of attention the new Basecamp has gotten after launch, this is incentive enough for me to more to a new project management tool. The only real incentive to say was the _very_ minor integration with Highrise

</comment><comment><USER46> So, what about Basecamp Classic? That's something they won't sell to another company, but is it something they'll continue supporting? I'd imagine it's simple to maintain.

<comment><USER47> FAQ at the bottom of the article says:

Q: What about Basecamp Classic?

We are fully committed to running Basecamp Classic forever. As long as we're around, Basecamp Classic will be around. A large chunk of our customer base loves Classic and we'll make sure they'll always have their Classic. The same rigorous uptime standards of Basecamp also apply to Basecamp Classic.

Background: Basecamp Classic was the original version of Basecamp we launched in 2004. Then in 2012 we released the all new version of Basecamp. Customers had the choice to stay on the old version, transition to the new version, or use both.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Hats off to the simplicity and focus these guys have. I have loved and admired this company over years. These announcements have only added more respect for them.

</comment><comment><USER49> 1) I never understood the odd trend of having a jpeg of a handwritten signature included in a digital email. A signature is supposed to designate authenticity, but a letter on a authenticated website is inherently authentic.

So it's forced, and decorative. And makes me think the author is trying too hard.

2) I respect Jason very much and think this decision is the right one from a consumer perspective. If they are only going to make one product going forward (which is the right decision), there's no need for a separate company brand. Good call by them - and no doubt a difficult one to make.

</comment><comment><USER50> We are still using the old Basecamp version because time tracking didn't make it into the relaunched version. Maybe you guys add time tracking now?

</comment><comment><USER51> So what happens to the other products?

<comment><USER52> Q: If you're going all in on Basecamp, what happens to Campfire and Highrise?

In the short term, everything stays the same. Business as usual. No interruption in service, no changes that affect our customers.

In the long term, one of three things:

SCENARIO 1: We'll spin them off into separate companies where we'll retain partial ownership, but another fully-dedicated team will run the products and own the majority of the company. This would be our ideal situation as it would ensure continuity and no interruption for our customers, but we'd have to find the right entrepreneur/team with the right experience and enough financing to make it work.

SCENARIO 2: We'll sell the products outright (either separately or together). The key for us in this scenario is that the products, and our customers, are well looked after. We will not sell either of these products to a company that is planning to shut the products down. And since no one from our team goes with the sale, this is not an acqui-hire situation. We're looking to sell to a company that wants to add well-respected, well-established, profitable, growing products to their portfolio.

SCENARIO 3: If we can't find the right partner or buyer, we are committed to continuing to run the products for our existing customers forever. We won't sell the products to new customers, but existing customers can continue to use the products just as they always have. The products will shift into maintenance mode which means there will be no new development, only security updates or minor bug fixes. We did this successfully in 2012 with Ta-da List, Writeboard, and Backpack, so we know how to make it work.

If you're a company or team interested in exploring scenario 1 (spin-off) or scenario 2 (outright purchase), please get in touch. Based on current revenues, current growth rates, and a conservative multiple, Campfire will sell in the single digit millions, and Highrise will sell in the tens of millions, so serious inquires only please. Disclosure: We're currently in early discussions with a few interested parties.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Docker-like move: it's good to be focused on what is popular AND makes net $.

</comment><comment><USER53> Some how reading all this Sounds like Jason is envious of Evernote on some level.

</comment><comment><USER54> Surprised they didn't do this sooner.

</comment><comment><USER55> It's "37signals."

<comment><USER56> Actually, it's Basecamp.

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> Appreciate that 37signals is moving on.

</comment><comment><USER58> Extremely vague useless title.

</comment><comment><USER59> bold move.

</comment><comment><USER60> 37 Signals is the reason I started learning how to make web apps. They are really the poster child of successful independent software vendors. Not focusing on burning investors cash but growing as a profitable business. One can only dream to match their level of success.</comment>


Performance tests in a continuous deployment pipeline - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/patents/WO2014027990A1?cl=en

<comment><AUTHOR> Another completely pointless and potentially damaging patent - <USER2> tests in a continuous deployment pipeline</comment>


Peter Thiel Is Said to Bankroll Hulk Hogan's Suit Against Gawker - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/25/business/dealbook/peter-thiel-is-said-to-bankroll-hulk-hogans-suit-against-gawker.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0&mtrref=www.nytimes.com&gwh=33C4F8AEF6CD394FBFE3854A7855B67B&gwt=pay <comment><USER2> dupe, earlier and still active discussion here:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11766621](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11766621)

<comment><USER3> No clue why you're getting downvoted. I've seen at least two other (now- closed) posts about this that linked back to the original you pointed to.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> So? What's wrong with that?

Gawker is predatory in terms of how they approach "news". I'm glad they got hit back in kind (someone with resources took on their legal resources). I'm not sure they have enough redeeming qualities to overcome their bottomfeeding approach.

<comment><USER5> It just feels shady, an "anonymous benefactor" who's actually funding a legal assault he'd otherwise have no involvement in simply because he has an axe to grind. I agree with your feelings re: Gawker Media though- they're basically on par with Buzzfeed in my mind.

<comment><USER6> Buzzfeed has a lot of excellent reporting and long form articles.

I'm surprised that they're shamed on HN of all places, when they've found a great business model where they take money from clickbait to finance good journalism.

<comment><USER5> The "tak[ing] money from clickbait" is precisely the problem. Reputation matters.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I dropped this on another comment thread but think it'll apply here on the NYT take as well: My perspective is this won't have a chilling effect on _real_ journalism.

This, to me, simply re-iterates the ingrained expectations of conduct that journalism attempts to envelop and embrace as a profession. There are newsworthy stories, and there is muck raking. They are different, and on completely different ends of the integrity scale. Personally I like that the courts are a venue for recourse when there is perceived harm; sure, things could be improved mechanics wise but at least there's an attempt at "checks and balances" the way laws are written.

</comment><comment><USER5> So Peter's basically choke-slamming Gawker because they outed him as gay earlier on. I'm conflicted because I think Gawker is a click-bait cesspool, but at the same time feel uncomfortable with someone else's desire for vengeance fueling a legal offensive.

<comment><USER8> How does the fuel matter? The case has legal merit or it doesn't. If you are assessing worth based on who is funding it, then you are looking at it the wrong way.

<comment><USER9> That's a very naive and optimistic assessment of how our adversarial legal system works. The $$$ you bring to bear on a case matters just as much as the legal merit. Poor folks are put in jail because their overworked public defender was sleeping when they should have objected. A billion dollar company can bury a mom and pop shop with patent litigation, etc.

<comment><USER8> I'm not sure what this has to do with what I said. The original commenter expressed that they "feel uncomfortable with someone else's desire for vengeance fueling a legal offensive." If the legal offensive has merit, why does it matter who is behind it?

It's one thing to express discomfort that someone if funding a _frivolous_ lawsuit, but without some opinion on the merit of the case, I'm not sure how the involvement of money should be seen as a good thing or a bad thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The primary issue I have is that it's.... small.

Of all the things that he could use his money and power on, it's garden- variety petty vengeance.

Of course, it's his money and time. He can do whatever he wants with them. It just seems like poor prioritization.

</comment><comment><USER11> If part of Gawker's strategy was that it could break the law because its victims lacked the financial resources to properly fund legal action, then Thiel is simply correcting a market failure. Ideally this would happen much more often.

However Gawker has also shown some mettle in resisting DMCA takedowns for stories that I do not consider frivolous mischief. Considering how pliant and officious the mainstream press is, Gawker's overall attitude is refreshing. But it's in poor taste to out someone's private business when doing so accomplishes nothing other than embarrassing that person.

The key ingredient for a respectable and effective press is a public that demands it.

</comment><comment><USER12> Gawker sites advocated harsh punishment for nude leaks of other celebrities. This is just holding them to their own standards.

</comment><comment><USER13> Somewhat OT, but while I am not a reader of Gawker at all, I do enjoy posts on Jalopnic and Gizmodo quite a bit. It would be a shame if those sites got dragged down with Gawker.

</comment><comment><USER14> Very mixed feelings on this.</comment>


Paying a 'professional' to review my SaaS product? - <AUTHOR>

I have a fairly narrowly-targeted MVP that I aim to release as a SaaS product, soon.  It will be targeted at web developers, bloggers, or even just people with tumblr pages.  It will come with an API, JavaScript libraries, and documentation.
I've never released this sort of product for this type of market before.  I want to have my design and functionality nailed down, well before I release, so people take me seriously.
How would I get people who are very experienced in these markets (like many of you) to critically review this, beforehand?  Is there a service that lets me pay experienced professionals for review? <comment><USER2> Wouldn't it be better to offer the service for free initially and get people hooked? If you are willing to "pay" to get visitors, this seems like a way to do it while building your future customer base. If you pay someone to review it, their feedback won't be very valuable - you want to hear feedback from people who will actually use the system.

I'm not an expert in any of this, and have not launched a product of my own. So take it all with a grain of salt.

Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER3> I'd be happy to review for free.</comment>


How to Succeed as a Graduate Student in the Sciences - <AUTHOR> http://www.chemistry-blog.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Gassman-and-Meyers.pdf

<comment><USER3> I recently got my PhD in CS at a European university, and I could directly translate many of the points from chemistry to the CS field. The article is 20+ years old, yet it somehow seems universal even today. I did a LOT of overtime, and often "just" to make a decent work that I wouldn't be ashamed to put my name on. I also met other grad students who wasted most of their time at the office on trivia (lunch, coffee, newspapers), people who rarely talked to their supervisors, people only superficially interested in their work, as well as people who did not really like what they were doing, yet they were striving to do their best. During my PhD years I learned at least as much about myself, academia and different kinds of people that I'm going to meet later in life, as about CS. One of the most important lessons was learning how to handle people who treat their work as a 9-5 chore instead of something to excel in.

\--

Long time ago, while I was still an undergrad student, I asked one of the professors about grad studies. We had a long talk, from which I remember two things. 1: your PhD topic does _not_ determine the rest of your scientific career (he shifted his area of interests a number of times). 2: whatever you do, _always_ have a pen and small notebook with you. The latter has proven to be a golden piece of advice.

</comment><comment><USER4> A little Googling suggests that this was written by Paul G. Gassman, a professor of organic chemistry at University of Minnesota, who passed away in 1993.

This probably reads a little harsh, especially to the software hackers among you, but I can say that my thesis advisor espoused most of the same core ideas ideas, even if he would not have written them down in this form. Strip away the snarky comments about re-shelving his books, and this is the core of what is expected by most research advisors at top universities.

</comment><comment><USER5> I thought this was an excellent article with some solid advice on how to succeed in the field. At the very least it's an honest description, up front, of what's expected so people can decide whether a career in the sciences is worth it.

That said, I'm also struck by the notion that unless you were particularly passionate about the idea of doing scientific research the best thing an intelligent person could do would be to pursue a career in a field where the rewards were higher or the sacrifices demanded lower.

</comment><comment><USER6> As a Ph.D. Synthetic organic chemist who went on to postdoc in a top group at Harvard in the 80s, I can attest to the tone and content of these memos. Both Gassman and Meyers, though not giants in the field were very well respected researchers and were not famously hard ass. I'm surprised I hadn't seen these memos before but there wasn't anything there that I didn't know intuitively by my second year of grad school. The most profound advice there is that what your thesis advisor thinks of you is the most important thing you get from grad school. Like many fields, it is an old boy network and your future career is entirely dictated by recommendations. For some reason, many of my lab mates didn't get this and led horrible relationships with the boss. Even if you are a competent researcher, when your recommendation contains the phrase "he's a pain in the ass to work with", you are not going far in this line of work. I'm not saying to be a brown noser, but your ability to function well in a group environment is extremely important to employers.

</comment><comment><USER7> Read the memos! Sending this to someone at Purdue.

"Thus, when you do not perform your research duties with diligence, dedication, and efficiency, is it any wonder why your research advisor seems to always climb all over you?"

"In effect, I am choosing where I think you should go in your professional career. This is an awesome task with considerable control over your own life and I accept this responsibility with the utmost of concern."

</comment><comment><USER8> Political correctness and emphasis on public image may have created some measure of accountability over the last few years, but more than too often it means that what is actually going on is simply never said aloud. Instead it must be inferred and gathered second hand.

Reading this stark honesty is really rather quite pleasant and refreshing. It's nice to know what somebody actually thinks and what they're going to do instead of a washed out and contrived 'official statement' which requires severe interpretation to understand.

</comment><comment><USER9> The professor mentions that 10 hours a week should be spent reading and, at a bare minimum, 6 or 7 particular journals should be read.

Is there an equivalent regular reading list for the computer sciences and/or software engineering? I'm aware of things like arXiv and a handful of journals but it can be hard to dig through the often extremely theoretical stuff to the things that better reflect useful modern and progressive thinking in these disciplines (though I admit I might be approaching it wrong).

<comment><USER10> (a machine learning phd student here) 10 hours a week reading seems about right for me, although often is a lot more or less than that. Usually most of my reading come from: google scholar searches on a topic of interest, following the references cited in a paper I'm trying to study, following the google scholar list of papers that cited an interesting paper I'm trying to gauge the influence of, and (a few times a year) some 10 to 15 papers that are freshly released from one of the top international conferences in machine learning or natural language processing that had interesting titles or abstracts. A very small amount of reading comes from my advisor or colleagues. I do follow some arxiv feeds about research in ML, but it's very rare to find good papers there that I would not find by some of those other means.

I'm not sure how much of this translates to software engineering, but I find it helpful to keep a loosely organized reading list with papers and topics I should browse or read more carefully. The important thing, I guess, is bootstrapping an initial reading list for you to expand. Search for top conferences (ACM, IEEE, etc) on SE and browse the titles/abstracts of papers. Also look for seminal papers on something that interests you, and see who cites it, find interesting abstract/titles, etc. Then find out where were these papers published and search for more papers there. Maybe keep a note of the good publishing spaces in the areas that interest you and check up on them once a year or so.

I've right now got around 20 papers/books open in my notebook, only 1 was got from arxiv, around 10 from conferences in the area and the rest from google scholar or references.

However, a note of warning: most papers I've on software engineering and horribly dull, uninteresting, and unscientific. Take a look, though, at experimental software engineering conferences, because they seem to be producing very interesting things and slightly improving the face of the field.

<comment><USER9> Thanks for the tips. I'm interested mostly in search and natural language, so there are quite a lot of papers coming through arXiv and Google Scholar. Thanks for the tips and leads, though, I'll give your techniques a try.

 _Take a look, though, at experimental software engineering conferences, because they seem to be producing very interesting things and slightly improving the face of the field._

Could you suggest a few "experimental software engineering conferences"? These sound like exactly the sort of thing I'd be interested in following, but a scour through the ACM's events list nor asking my Twitter followers didn't give me many good leads for events like that.

<comment><USER10> <http://www.springer.com/computer/swe/journal/10664>

<http://esem2010.case.unibz.it/>

[http://portal.acm.org/browse_dl.cfm?coll=ACM&dl=ACM&...](http://portal.acm.org/browse_dl.cfm?coll=ACM&dl=ACM&idx=SERIES11098&linked=1&part=series)

<http://lens-ese.cos.ufrj.br/ese/>

These are the links I know of in the area.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> So is this supposed to be shocking? This is actually one of the reasons I've always had significantly less respect for the 5-year masters programs. Undergrads typically have neither the maturity nor the time to dedicate themselves properly to learning the material. As an undergrad I was assigned to a lab where RAs were expected to work 40 hours a week, and on Friday afternoon they were standing by the door looking at their watches.

I've always thought that an advanced degree (past a BS) requires a ton of dedication, and the goal should be to know a topic better than anyone else. But I guess the advance of non-thesis masters degrees gives the lie to my belief.

That one point about how "in effect I am choosing where I think you should go in your professional career" reads pretty harsh, but if you think about it most of us do that when giving a recommendation. If I get a call from an R&D shop, I would naturally think about different parameters and behavior than if I got a call from a sales department.

<comment><USER12> > So is this supposed to be shocking? This is actually one of the reasons I've > always had significantly less respect for the 5-year masters programs.

I don't think it's supposed to be shocking. Both the title and comments sound pretty positive. <Freud> Perhaps you wish it were shocking because it would confirm your negative impression of modern research? </Freud>

My own experience is that there are "relax labs", where students (perhaps interested in research but not as a full academic career) grab a diploma before going on to employment, and "serious labs", where students go to become a professor or really develop an expertise. The first kind isn't necessarily unproductive in research, but they tend to work on more applied stuff - <USER2> gadgets motivate these students more than deep theoretical work.

<comment><USER11> Should you read this - nah, I actually have a positive impression of modern (as well as older) research. I have to admit that I was surprised to see such a strong set of opinions presented by the article, and after some reflection, I was pleased as well. It's nice to see someone saying "You want to be good at this, you better work your ass off to show me that you want it." rather than the typical modern schoolchild approach which engenders the idea that everyone is good enough.

I think you're right about the different kinds of labs, though I would characterize it as more of a continuum, but it seems to me that the "relax labs" ought to be more corporate or at least corporate-sponsored. But that's a whole different topic.

<comment><USER12> > it seems to me that the "relax labs" ought to be more corporate or at least > corporate-sponsored

Oh yes, I completely agree on that. I've worked at one of these places, and what they made was exactly the definition of "cool gadgets". To my eyes, it wasn't research, it was pure development. Stuff like this should be funded by a company to build a product, not by universities.

I can't go too much in the details, but one of the things they built was a blogging robot. It has a PDA and blogs your location for some reason...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think much of what he wrote is good advice for doing a PhD. That being said,I would recommend avoiding an advisor with this kind of attitude if at all possible. Despite what he says, he sounds like many professors who focus on the reputation game, carefully weeding out any students that might adversely affect their reputation. In other words, education is _not_ their priority.

As far as the RA memo, what the author failed to mention is that the grant-RA relationship is a two way street. PI's need students to do their research for them and they need students simply to receive grants. They are not supporting students just because they are nice, but rather because they need them.

</comment><comment><USER14> vanishingly few people find something to do which is essentially compelling to them.</comment>


Ask HN: Where to find web 2.0 graphic designers? - <AUTHOR>

Hi HN, I know most people here are programmers, and also sorry to use the term web 2.0 if that offends anyone.  I've been having a hard time finding a part time graphic designer who can design clean, stylish stuff.  Most of the portfolios that I get back from sites like craigslist are very old school, they look like they're from templates.  Here's a random example of one I consider to be pretty good: http://www.zennaware.com/cornerstone/index.php
Can anyone recommend a place to find good graphic designers?  Someone suggested that I use 99 designs or another crowdsource site to find someone I can work with, and then hire them part time.  Thanks
Also if there is a better way to phrase it than "web 2.0 graphic design", please let me know. Thanks <comment><USER2> Better to just hire someone to do the design mockup and then find a UI Developers - aka someone who can translate the psd's/mocks into actual css3/html5 and javascript and/or js framework code preferred (or code it yourself).

While it's not impossible to find someone that does it all, I've found it's easier to outsource the design and code it myself.

I personally don't have anything against 'web 2.0' - I assume this means html5 + css3 skillset at a minimum.</comment>


Patch for Nvidia drivers unlocking NVENC sessions limit - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/keylase/nvidia-patch <comment><USER2> This is a fascinating patch. The open source community came around and fixed a bug in a binary driver. I would love to know the story of how this was found and how it was derived.

[EDIT] I found the answer at the bottom of the README: [https://habr.com/post/262563/](https://habr.com/post/262563/)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Nvidia allows only 2 concurrent accelerated video encoding sessions for consumer-grade GPUs like GeForce. It appears this limitation is enforced programmatically in Nvidia drivers. This patch is known to remove such limitation for x86_64 Linux binary drivers, allowing 60+ parallel video encoding sessions restricted only by practical hardware limits.</comment>


Shanghai sets population at 25M - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/26/chinas-shanghai-sets-population-25-million--big-city-disease <comment><USER3> The problem they're trying to solve is city slums, which is common in Asia. I've worked in India before, and every major city (Delhi, Chennai) is filled with massive slums of migrant workers who obviously haven't kept up with the modern development. Without turning this into a pity post and sounding like an uncultured asshole, it was horrifying to see and really broke my heart that people are living in conditions like this. This is very common in SE Asia as well if you look at cities like Manila, Jakarta, etc. It's a tried and failed approach to have "open migration" policies in developing countries and have labor conditions race to the bottom. To a lesser extend, Beijing + Shanghai has this problem as well. I was in BJ 7 years ago (so my experience may be outdated), but there are parts of the old city that still has Hutongs, which are slum like buildings that have largely been vacated but migrant workers have "illegally" occupied. (I put "illegal" in quotes because human beings aspiring for shelter shouldn't be illegal, anyways, off point)

The root of the problem is migrant workers moving into cities for slave-like labor and are commonly exploited by local residents and employers. They're offered "jobs" that are way below the legal minimum wage and are often paid under the table. They can't say no because their employers have power over them (threat to report to police, etc). In many sense, "illegal" migrant workers are not that different from "illegal" immigrants.

In order to raise the living standards of an entire area, you have to enforce issues like safe labor practice, minimum wage, vacation days, etc. Without heavy hand regulation in a developing countries, these things don't magically come at the kindness of employers. They must be forced. The developed countries all went through this stage much earlier this century (think back on all the activists who died pushing for labor rights in U.S. in early 1900s). When you have a massive population of people who are in dire situations and who don't have anywhere to turn, it's difficult to force employers to raise working standards.

It's a difficult issue. On one hand, it's pretty heavy handed and inhuman to tell a migrant worker they're not allowed to live in a city that's part of their own damn country. On the other hand, we don't want cities to race to the bottom with unsanitary and slum like conditions. What's the balance? I've no idea, but I'm glad Shanghai at least understands this is a problem instead of copying other Asian cities that have failed at this

<comment><USER4> I wonder how many days have ever stay in beijing?

As one grew up in Beijing and lived for 26 years, I can definitely say that comparing Hutong to Indian slum is really really ignorant. You can ask anyone in Beijing, they will tell you that many people live in Hutong is one group of the richest people in Beijing. Nearly all people live in Hutong are Beijing natives, and their houses inside the hutong are called "siheyuan" which are among the most expensive real estate in beijing. Most "siheyuan", houses inside the hutong, are build decades ago and owned by local natives for long time, and its value increases much fast than other real estates as nearly all located in the center of beijing. I just check on an agency site, the cheapest house are more than 5 million us dollar, and many are more than 10 million us dollar. only the most successful people in Beijing will buy those houses. (if you know Chinese, you can check on this site or by google translate: [http://esf.fang.com/house/i34-kw%cb%c4%ba%cf%d4%ba/](http://esf.fang.com/house/i34-kw%cb%c4%ba%cf%d4%ba/))

if you have ever been to, you can have a visit and talk to people in hutong, you will know how wealthy and happy like they are.

and there are also many other statements in you text are totally wrong and with groundless prejudice. No employer will threat to report to police because of work's identity, you may again ridiculously think beijing as America. Beijing is china's capital, more than third people there are not locals, they also don't need any documents to go to and stay in their capital. And nowadays, most rich people in beijing are not locals, they come from all over the china.

<comment><USER5> i understand being upset at being included in a standard that is by any definition upsetting but just because the value increases doesn't mean it's not a slum fyi there are places in mumbai too w/ astonishing market values and disgusting living conditions

<comment><USER6> > there are places in mumbai too w/ astonishing market values and disgusting > living conditions

Also in San Francisco

<comment><USER7> We have bad conditions for sure in San Francisco and poverty elsewhere in the US that all Americans should be ashamed of. Frankly the state of poverty in America is unacceptable. But the poverty we have is nowhere near the scale and absolute horror of Mumbai slums. I've traveled extensively through South America and seen horrific conditions there but nothing was as shocking as Mumbai slums.

I find posts like yours are misguided and demonstrate total ignorance regarding human suffering.

<comment><USER8> Having traveled extensively as well I agree nothing compares with the slums of Mumbai. But the bad areas in America carry an extra connotation of crime and drug use that poor areas elsewhere may not. I didn't spend any time in the slums of Mumbai, only observed from afar, but I suspect I'd feel safer walking around them than the bad parts of SF, LA, Baltimore, Detroit, etc ...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Genuinely curious : What's a good alternative to setting a population limit per city ?

Having lived in cities that are crumbling under poor infrastructure, unchecked growth, excessive pollution (from vehicles, stuck in endless traffic jams), shortage of water/electricity, I wonder what can be done to fix this. Everyone from across the country wants to migrate to a few big cities that provide good employment. We shouldn't stop them from seeking opportunities but at the same time the local government has to ensure a minimal quality of life for the existing residents. What would be a short term solution (implementable in 1-3 years) that can balance this ?

<comment><USER10> As long as people are migrating, people are voting with their wallets that a city "crumbling under poor infrastructure" etc. is better than whatever place they're migrating from.

<comment><USER11> But people already in that city can't vote with their wallets to stop the immigration.

<comment><USER10> They can vote by moving to another place?

<comment><USER12> Or they can vote in government that would put population cap...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Friendly reminder that China is the biggest bubble in 10,000 years of human history: [https://www.crescat.net/crescat-capital-quarterly- investor-l...](https://www.crescat.net/crescat-capital-quarterly-investor- letter-q2-2017/)

Imagine a country with 1,000 different Enron's or Countrywide's that instead of being investigated by the government are getting cover/protection instead.

Upcoming movie about this: [https://youtu.be/MRm3SYaG7k0](https://youtu.be/MRm3SYaG7k0)

<comment><USER14> As skeptical as I am about predictions on the imminent demise of the Chinese economy (which occur regularly going back at least to Gordon Chang), I'm intrigued to see what an experienced documentary maker like Alex Gibney will add to the discussion. Thanks for posting the link!

<comment><USER15> In the media, it has been just been Gordon Chang. But China is due for a normal bubble crash, which occur quite frequently in normal economies, but who knows when that will happen.

Pro-china people will always interpret crash as collapse to create a red herring against anyone who isn't bullish on the Chinese economy. Likewise via the opposite for anti-china people. It makes any discussion basically a red herring fight.

<comment><USER16> Trust, human is the biggest bubble in the history of earth. We all gonna die in another million year.

<comment><USER15> The biggest bubble is the Big Bang of course. That bubble will eventually collapse and it will be the end of everything (really!).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> If "excess" people are moved to a second-tier city X miles away, what happens when that city is full - create a third-tier city Y miles away? Will there be a separate transportation network between first-tier cities? Permits/visas to travel between city-states?

<comment><USER18> Yes. I have friends who are on waiting lists for residence permits in Shanghai, etc.

<comment><USER17> Is it a FIFO queue or are there qualification criteria or scoring systems?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Because they have learned their lesson with Hong Kong when they cant really control property market and what problems it leads to.

<comment><USER20> What problems does it lead to in Hong Kong? I'd have thought Hong Kong is one of the most livable cities in China

<comment><USER19> Here is two recent article from SMCP

[http://www.scmp.com/news/hong- kong/economy/article/2097715/w...](http://www.scmp.com/news/hong- kong/economy/article/2097715/what-hope-poorest-hong-kong-wealth-gap-hits- record-high)

[http://www.scmp.com/business/article/2064554/hong-kong- named...](http://www.scmp.com/business/article/2064554/hong-kong-named-most- expensive-housing-market-world-seventh-straight-year)

No other developed place / cities poses a problem as bad as HK. If you just look at how it compares to Sydney and Vancouver.

Housing affordability leads to lots of other social problems. And Social instability is the last thing China wants.

It was one reason why I think the recent article on Fouder's salary using data from

[https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/](https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of- living/)

Dont necessary put things in right prospective. The one bed room prices while being cheaper in San Francisco, its Living room is likely bigger then the total size of the one bed room apartment in HK.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Wonder how they decide who the 25M will be... wouldn't such a policy artificially inflate the price of "living there" by jacked up real-estate prices? Now that the supply is stopped and the demand is not..

<comment><USER22> You can get a feel from these two articles depicting the expulsion of migrants from Beijing which also has a population limit.

Campaign to Drive Out Migrants Slams Beijing's Best and Brightest([https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/11/world/asia/china- beijing-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/11/world/asia/china-beijing- migrants-tech.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FChina))

Why Parts of Beijing Look Like a Devastated War Zone([https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/world/asia/china- beijing-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/world/asia/china-beijing- migrants.html))

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> China's policies are confusing, first they wanted to move everyone to the major cities, now the cities are saying they will cap the populations.

Anyone know what is going on?

<comment><USER24> That's not true, China does not want to move people into major cities, that's why they have the "Hukou" system, which is a residency registration.

What they want is urbanization of the less developed areas, many of which were farmlands from before.

<comment><USER25> yeah, that's why they plan to give pretty much half of the migrant workers urban hukou

[https://thediplomat.com/2016/02/chinas-plan-for-orderly- huko...](https://thediplomat.com/2016/02/chinas-plan-for-orderly-hukou- reform/)

<comment><USER24> That's how the Hukou system works, there are two tiers: Farm/Country and Urban, and they want to urbanize farmlands, which will upgrade existing farmland hukou to city ones.

They are not talking about moving farmers into existing cities.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> As there's various discussion of hutongs here, I wonder if anyone can say whether practice of charging for parking to upgrade things like sewers and bathrooms as described in [https://www.shoupdogg.com/wp- content/uploads/sites/10/2015/0...](https://www.shoupdogg.com/wp- content/uploads/sites/10/2015/04/Charging-for-Parking-to-Finance-Public- Services-May-15.pdf) has spread?

</comment><comment><USER27> Isn't Shanghai an "autonomous" region? I wonder how much this has to do with preventing Shanghai from becoming larger than Beijing.

<comment><USER28> Probably nothing given that the article states Beijing has an even lower target population cap.

<comment><USER27> that's what I get for not reading

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I don't trust these numbers. It was thought the undocumented population of Shanghai was this number in 2007 when I lived there.

</comment><comment><USER30> People should not be curious about such things happened in China since they are controlled by the CCP. Some stupid officers can make all kinds of ridiculous policies, sometimes the basic reason is just to consolidate their regime. The simple reason is that, if the city is too big, it becomes more hard to control for them.

</comment><comment><USER31> How did western countries deal with this kind of problem? Or they havent faced anything of such scale till now?

<comment><USER32> It took >100 years for them to deal with it. It was often much worse than China now.

In the UK, in the 1800's, millions moved to London, and lived in shocking slum conditions. Life expectancy was ~30 years, diseases like cholera killed many, because of overcrowding and poor sanitation. Pollution was awful, As recently as 1952, 10,000 people died in four days in the great smog of London [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog_of_London](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Smog_of_London).

In summary, it took a long time to address the problem.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> We need population targets for the world and for countries as well. Once the population stabilizes, growths in productivity will go toward comfort improvement instead of survival of an ever growing population.

I can't wait for it.

There are almost twice more people on the world now than when I was born. This is crazy.

</comment><comment><USER16> Thank god, China finally learn something from USA. "American First" -> "Shanghai First". Trump leads the great America to another success just like CCP lead china!

</comment><comment><USER34> I don't know and so I ask: how much is the Chinese public opinion against pollution affecting if at all the directives of their government? Is there more public concern ?

</comment><comment><USER35> In the middle of XX century, small-to-medium sized cities looked like an attractive place. That was unprecedented before and it doesn't look like it's going to repeat.

<comment><USER36> I think we will live a revival of these places, they provide better quality of life in many aspects, and can be very interesting for people who are fed up with the big city.

<comment><USER35> People who are fed up with the big city will much more likely prefer mountains or tropical islands or deep lakes, something that most of small-to-medium cities built around an university and a factory just don't have.

Also, in the big city people get used to theatres and museums and events. Smaller cities just don't have the density.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> That makes me sad, I like Chinese mega cities and it seems like a "problem" that should solve itself without government intervention.

<comment><USER38> These kinds of heavy-handed interventions seem to almost always lead to processes of waste and corruption -- ie so who gets to live in Shanghai? That will be decided by bureaucrats and lawyers which opens up cronyism. By contrast, previously the market provided an efficient, free-to-use, and arguably fair system that allocated the opportunity to whoever was willing to pay for it.

People will say "but they need to tackle pollution, and congestion," and I'm in the Pigouvian camp that it is more fair and economically efficient to _tax externalities themselves_ (the disease) rather than making heavy-handed and arbitrary rules.

Anyways, in China this is not the worst thing their government is doing.

<comment><USER37> Agreed. And unfortunately, it's a policy that will heavily enrich current Shanghai real estate owners (most of which are already wealthy) and residents so there won't be much political opposition.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Closed immigration policies and immigration quotas are descrimination - <USER2> and simple. They're a violation of human rights and treating people equally - whether in China or the USA.

<comment><USER40> Sure, but how can you legally removes the accumulated wealth from the 1% or 0.1%

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> China can take ambitious practical goals like that seriously. The West cannot, the West is problematically irresponsible.

<comment><USER42> In the West, we decided that individual liberty is more important than mass control. The Chinese government is corrupt to the core. Do you want that kind of government controlling you?

<comment><USER43> I certainly don't want my organs harvested because I smoked weed on my birthday.

<comment><USER44> Very interesting, I've never heard anyone in China have their organ stolen by smoking weeds or taking drugs. China may execute drug dealers but not drug users.

<comment><USER15> Organ harvesting of condemned prisoners continues although China has promised to to stop it multiple times. It's why china has some of the quickest turn around times for organ transplants even though it has one of the lowest voluntary donation rates.

<comment><USER43> Thank you for shedding light on this. Amazing how we are being downvoted for speaking the truth. I thought HN was illuminated?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What to Study After Computer Science? - <AUTHOR> I am finishing my undergraduate in CS this month and was asking myself, what to study after that. I don't want to study just CS again (Master). I'd like to study a field which could benefit the most from a fresh perspective of a CS Student. Biology? Neuroscience? Philosophy? <comment><USER2> Easy, MBA with an emphasis on Marketing. Don't just study it. Make a plan on how you will apply it while you are studying it and after you graduate.

You could study another stem field but the real value in any field of study is to make a difference in the world. Another stem field will only get you deeper in study without really knowing how to apply it.

</comment><comment><USER3> There are many applications of CS in quantitative finance. See the thread "In Battle to Recruit New Quants, Hedge Funds Outpay Banks" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21908914](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21908914) .</comment>