Tech layoffs more than double in Bay Area - <AUTHOR> http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_29880696/tech-layoffs-more-than-double-bay-area <comment><USER2> That layoffs have increased should not surprise anyone at this point. Unlike the dot com explosion it seems painfully difficult as a regular employee to have divested some of your equity gains mid-bubble. That makes it more painful.

However, every time there is a great deflating, it is because the market is tired and preparing to embrace something different. So far I've been through several of these, chips in the 80's dot coms in the late 90s, storage in the early 2000's, and now either web 2.0 or social (depending on how you score it). Three threads are competing for the next round, IoT, Machine Learning, and Bioinformatics. CRISPR derived technologies could be in there too but I see a lot of regulatory hurdles headed that way which will be hard to dodge.

The thing to keep in mind though if you are one of the folks getting laid off, it isn't you its them. Seriously. Layoffs happen when the world shifts and your company didn't shift with it. That said, it still sucks to suddenly be out of a job and the temptation will be to grab at the first thing that offers you something. My advice to you is to be thoughtful. Think through what you want to do, what the world is going through, and how you want to look back at your role on that. Then head for the area that best meets those needs.

<comment><USER3> The interesting thing to me is is that each of these inflection points, the industry had a set of 2-3 possible "next big things", and then _none_ of them happened and the actual next big thing was something different.

In the early 90s, the next big thing was WebTV, VR, or PDAs. Instead, we got the WWW.

Post dot-com crash, the next big thing was P2P, enterprise software, and the semantic web. Instead, we got social networking.

In 2008, the next big thing was casual games, (micro)blogs, and embeddable widgets. Instead we got mobile and the sharing economy.

Now, the next big thing is wearables, IoT, or AI. And who knows what we're going to get?

Looking at the patterns, it looks like the mistake most people make is to extrapolate the _last_ big thing into the next, not being willing to make a big enough conceptual jump. So enterprise software, the semantic web, and P2P are all offshoots of the WWW and all enjoyed some modest success, but a _different_ offshoot of the WWW (social) connected it to a different area of peoples' lives. Casual games, microblogs, and embeddable widgets are all offshoots of social, but a _different_ offshoot of these social changes was enabled by mobile, which enabled totally different ways of interacting.

<comment><USER4> I have a hard time seeing how that is accurate. People misjudge the timing and widespread it will be, but those next big things you mentioned are billion dollar industries now.

WebTV -> YouTube, Netflix. VR -> Warcraft, EVE Online, Minecraft. PDAs -> iOS, Android. P2P -> Spotify, Skype, BitTorrent. Enterprise Software -> A lot, but obviously not well known, say Atlassian. Semantiv Web and APIs have largely failed, probably because of the shift to mobile. Casual games -> Rovio, Supercell, King. Microblog -> Tumblr, Instagram, Vine, Twitter. Embeddable widgets -> All the big companies. Failed dot com things -> "sharing economy" and of course earlier things like Amazon.

And most of those things are still successors to other technologies that performed the same function.

Most of the things happend, just as we know wearables, IoT and AI is going to happen. It's when and how that is the question. The people who hype things are always going to dominate over the people who argue the facts, at least in public forums. Look at any discussion on HN about space, self-driving cars, digital currency etc.

<comment><USER3> As is often repeated around the tech industry, "Early = wrong". Knowing that mobile became a huge hit in 2010 doesn't really help the folks writing apps for NewtonScript in 1992 or Palm in 2000. WebTV was a specific Microsoft product (that was gonna be huge, it was the next information superhighway!) - it was actually a set-top box more like GoogleTV or AppleTV - and Microsoft benefitted not a bit from YouTube or Netflix's success. If you got the "casual games" part right but missed the "mobile" part, you ended up like Slide, Newgrounds, or Kongregate, all of which are in decline now, usually bought for 2x invested capital or so.

<comment><USER5> > Knowing that mobile became a huge hit in 2010 doesn't really help the folks > writing apps for NewtonScript in 1992 or Palm in 2000.

Which begs the question "were predictions too early, or were early executions insufficient". There are a million examples of first movers who didn't execute. Off the top of my head Yahoo, Blackberry, and IBM OS/2 were first to market for generational techs and then lost.

<comment><USER6> > Which begs the question "were predictions too early, or were early > executions insufficient".

Its not A or B; its A, in part because of failure to correctly anticipate B. Predicting market success is, inherently, a prediction of market participants successful execution.

<comment><USER4> To succeed you often have to get in early, which means that barrier to entry will be low and competition will be extreme. Plenty of these things didn't fail because they idea failed, but because they got beaten by another company, or a simpler or more advanced technology. I think market success is a higher bar than concept or technology success. Which probably means it is more relevant for discussions (more qualified discussion are better).

I said this in another thread. We know that self-driving cars are gong to be a thing in the future. That doesn't necessarily mean that the effort a company like Google makes today is going to be that valuable. It might be that when full autonomy is ready for mass implementation, we already had cars running around with (much cheaper) sensors for years. Since things like highway autonomy and active safety systems are lower hanging fruit. On the other hand if they gather enough patents and full autonomy explodes in 10 years, they have a good position. There's all this complexity yet most of HN is like "Google is the self-driving company".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is a necessary, if painful, lesson.

I remember the layoffs right before leaving LivingSocial in 2012. A raw, human catastrophe. Watching friends pack up their things, who had been sold on the culture and vision of what the company could be, was an eye opening experience.

This is why you focus on business fundamentals. Not because it is sexy, not because you can tell ProductHunt about your run rate, and not because you want impress investors.

Because if you fuck up, everyone who depends on you gets fucked.

A few words of advice:

\- Before you raise money, ask yourself if that valuation is realistic or aspirational. If it is aspirational, know that you have to reach that valuation without raising another cent, just to break even. Ask yourself if you are default dead or alive.

\- Before you start a company, ask if it is solving a problem for customers or your desire "to be an entrepreneur."

\- Before you hire anyone, ask if their position is a need to have or a nice have. Like customers, few businesses can afford "nice to haves"

\- There is always capital available for businesses with strong fundamentals who are solving real needs.

Layoffs are like throwing up from drinking. Not fun and nearly always your (the founders/managers') fault.

\- Pace yourself.

\- Build a company you're proud of.

\- Build something that people need.

\- Growth is great for slide decks, but employees can't use it to pay rent. Don't chase hypergrowth as an end in itself.

Markets can stay irrational far longer than you can stay solvent, but they can also snap back to reality before you can wake-up.

<comment><USER8> Right now it seems like there are two reasons for creating a company. One is for making a profitable business that creates wealth for the people invested. Two is for creating a product or service that customers need or want. These two revolve around servicing those invested, or the consumers of the product/service, or both.

It's surprising to me that no one starts a company solely for creating an amazing place to work. A great workplace and work would be the product/service, and the employees the consumers of the product/service. Sure, you would have to have paying customers to fuel it, but that could always be secondary in some sense. Right now it seems like the workplace is secondary, so why not swap it? I'm sure there are a nice subset of people who would take less (even half) of their current salary just to work in a place that revolves around them and their experience working.. which is the majority of most of our days.

Viable? Probably not, but it's interesting to think about and trying to imagine what that place would look like for you personally.

<comment><USER3> Google tries (tried? it's been a couple years, and the culture was changing when I left) very hard to do that, and they actually have the money spigot to make it work (for the most part).

The problem with the idea in general is that money usually flows from the party deriving the benefit to the party providing it. So if the company's top priority really was to provide a great place to work, then logically, the employees should be paying it to work there. Indeed, places that are often considered great places to work (Google, Palantir, Fog Creek, philanthropy, non-profits, education) are often notorious for underpaying their workers relative to where they could employ their skills elsewhere. If a company took this to the logical extreme - making the employees the consumers of the product/service - then it would cease to be "work", and would instead be a "hobby/internship/volunteer/education/experience".

<comment><USER9> "If a company took this to the logical extreme - making the employees the consumers of the product/service - then it would cease to be "work", and would instead be a "hobby/internship/volunteer/education/experience"."

Tangentially related, but an early strategy of the Ford motor co was to double the standard factory wage of it's employees, so that the purchase of one of its automobiles was within reach and seen as the bonus of employment. It did wonders for their introduction of the automobile to America.

<comment><USER10> The pessimist in me wonders just how altruistic the intention behind the wages in the Ford example was. If that were a modern example, I fear the rationale from management would not be about putting the vehicles _within reach as an _optional_ bonus_ , but rather that it would be an unwritten rule that employees are _expected to purchase one_. Not buying the company's product? Enjoy your status as an employee who doesn't "fit the company culture".

Realization: I have become extremely cynical in my middle years with all the crap I've seen from employers. :/

<comment><USER11> I share your suspicious. Before they raised their salaries, they were having to hire 52k workers/year despite only having a 15k workforce, due to a tremendous turnover. And the extra money wasn't free; you had to subject yourself to the "Ford Sociological Department", whose 200 investigators would make sure you complied with the company's rules: be married, keep your wife at home, abstain from alcohol and to ask for permission before making serious purchases (like buying that Ford car).

<comment><USER12> Very interesting indeed

[http://jalopnik.com/when-henry-fords-benevolent-secret- polic...](http://jalopnik.com/when-henry-fords-benevolent-secret-police-ruled- his-wo-1549625731)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Since I'm old and I went through the .com crash (I didn't get to participate in the boom) I hope my input is valid. This feels like more of a correction than a disaster.

The job market has been super easy and mediocre workers have been commanding excessive salaries because of various socio-economic forces (high valuations and cost of living). At some point there had to be a cull of bad startups and workers. It's unfortunate for the individuals and companies involved but I think in a couple years we will be through this and it won't have been so bad.

<comment><USER14> The problem is that these crashes hurt both good and bad workers.

Every week you see the nth article posted here on how hiring is broken, from HR filtering to recruiters to interviewing. So how do good developers survive, if their skills and experience are essentially worthless in an opaque hiring process?

One common answer is "networking" but that's a non-developer skill- a mediocre developer could be better at networking (maybe correlated - he's in the bar handing out business cards rather than working on his latest side project). A lot of good people get hurt in a downturn and either leave the industry or end up in low-paying, mediocre jobs just to hang on.

<comment><USER15> It is not a problem. It will HAVE to happen at some point.

Maybe the downturn of the market will drive companies to be pragmatic when choosing candidate, instead of trying to humiliate them with whiteboard teasers.

Nevertheless, I don't think there is that much you and I can do about this, not the market, nor the hiring processes. What stays unchanged is when looking for a job, don't put eggs in one bucket.

<comment><USER14> If companies aren't pragmatic now, when supposedly demand outstrips supply, why would they change when conditions are reversed? I suspect they'd just double down and network will become even more important (you'll have more unemployed friends needing a hand).

<comment><USER15> Yeah, network will be more important. I think they will stop looking at resumes that are not from internal referrals. And probably still some boring whiteboarding questions after that.

But my hypothesis is, they would really try to hire someone with experience, because they won't spend time training him/her, just like what happens in the IC industry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> If I'm understanding the article, there was a net increase of 2400 jobs in the quarter. That's still pretty good. (Edit: it may seem gloomy by comparing to 2015, which seemed like an extremely good year). I googled a little because I was curious and found this:

[http://www.indeed.com/jobtrends/percapita](http://www.indeed.com/jobtrends/percapita)

San Jose #1, that looks good. Although San Francisco....

<comment><USER17> Are these postings or actual jobs filled?

<comment><USER16> I assumed postings but not sure. It's just the most interesting google result I got looking around on this.

Edit: I meant that my indeed link was about postings. My assumption was that the 2400 figure (800/month) from the article was net jobs added, not postings.

<comment><USER18> "Vitner's analysis of state employment data showed that Bay Area tech firms added only 800 jobs a month in the first quarter of 2016"

I was going to post the same thing as your parent post but I think the source is state data so probably not postings. Maybe that what the numbers in the DE9C are for...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> My dad got laid off from the Fremont Western Digital location just the other day ago. He saw it coming as they were warned layoffs would keep coming (WD has been laying off workers since the middle of last year, I think). So luckily we moved to a nearby city with substantially lower housing prices than in San Jose, where we were spending lots more than we could justify on housing. If we had stayed in San Jose, we would be in some real big financial troubles- pretty much game over. But where we live now (which is actually in a house of the same size, just significantly cheaper) we are living more comfortably and happier without the stress of living in such an expensive city.

Anyone living in an expensive city with a layoff seeming imminent should really be thinking on the long term about where it's best for their family to live. Going day to day wondering if you'll be able to keep your house is not a healthy way to live.

<comment><USER20> Can you mention cities with a better cost of housing? Genuinely curious ... Gilroy is cheap but seems way too far.

<comment><USER19> I am referring to Gilroy. The distance seems "too far" but it's something you adapt to rather quickly. Pretty much everyone in my neighborhood works in tech at Cupertino and surrounding areas. If you're able to work around leaving during rush hour traffic then that's even better.

<comment><USER21> I'm really hoping that more companies embrace remote workers ... so that it doesn't matter _where_ you live

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> This article is very confusing to me. If we are concluding that startups are laying off due to funding squeeze, how is that San Francisco actually saw a decrease in lay offs ? SF is where most of the startups are based. Also, it says that layoffs totaled roughly 3000 in 4 months. Which comes down to 750 a month. Compare this to what the article said later that 32,000 jobs were lost per month during the recession. Finally, I couldn't figure how many jobs were added in this period, to get a context of the layoff percentage. Seems a little alarmist

<comment><USER23> I feel similarly. However, the article points out reporting differences for differently large companies and layoffs. That might factor in heavily. Would be nice though of the article had explicitly addressed that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> "Today the Bay Area's total employment of 3,353,600 as of the end of March still reflects job growth, with 102,600 workers added from March 2015 through March 2016."

The sky is not quite falling yet. There are many parts of the economy that are stalling and the impact on that is felt in companies that sell products into those markets. How things will develop is anyone's guess. I feel "Tech" will keep growing though some areas that perhaps were historically considered "Tech" might shrink. If you look at all the great things we can do with technology I think a lot of stuff is still ahead of us. It's just the natural way that things don't always go smoothly.

</comment><comment><USER25> FYI if you're interested in the raw data from which this story is ostensibly based in part, I've dumped it into this Github repo:

[https://github.com/datahoarder/ca-warn](https://github.com/datahoarder/ca- warn)

</comment><comment><USER26> The mobile wave is ending and we are in the middle of the dip preceding the next big "thing". A lot of companies are betting on IoT but these are mostly service companies pushing their own proprietary stacks, which is why I think IoT is a dead-end because there is either no demand for the hardware or the hardware is at a price point that makes no financial sense.

<comment><USER27> I think joelonsoftware predicted a lot of the IoT failures a decade ago with this piece: [http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000037.html](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000037.html)

There are lots of companies that seem to be looking entirely at how IoT can help _them_ , without actually considering whether their _customers_ benefit. There was a group at CES offering an IoT propane tank valve. It gathers user data, great, but who the hell wants to sink $50 into a smart valve for their grill?

An awful lot of the these companies are offering tiny value propositions to users, and expecting that they'll pay for the chance to give up their data. The "smart grid" is a wonderful dream, but when no two pieces integrate you're just selling some shitty wifi monitors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Can any of you from the Bay Area comment on if you have found it harder to find jobs lately? Are recruiters reaching out less than they did last year?

I would be interested in hearing from some of you that have been laid off. Have you found another job in the Bay Area or did you have to leave?

<comment><USER29> As a hiring manager in SF, my anecdotal experience is that most large companies are still hiring at the same pace they were a year ago, but that capital and subsequently hiring has dried up for smaller companies.

For experienced developers/managers, things seem to be business as usual, but in particular the "top tier" companies generally are more focused on avoiding false positives than in reducing false negatives, so I see us as entering a slightly unpleasant period for non-traditional and entry-level candidates.

<comment><USER30> As a "non-traditional" (self-taught) and "entry-level" candidate who who just moved to SF a week ago (crashing on my bro's couch), I've been nervous as hell about my prospects.

If anyone has any advice other than "go back home", it'd be much appreciated.

<comment><USER31> Befriend some Googlers, do lots of mock interviews with them, then go for Google. (Some for Facebook etc.) They still got oodles of cash.

<comment><USER32> Doesn't Google still but a lot of weight on your degree? Sounds like a waste of time to me.

<comment><USER31> I work for them without one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Krikey - Ghostery blocked 21 instances of a detected video player network on that page. What an overloaded mess.

<comment><USER25> I have to give them props...I've been using AdBlock on Chrome, which seems to do just fine on major sites...this is the first time in a long while that I've visited a news site and seen a pop-up autoplay video ad.

<comment><USER34> It's tough times for local news.

<comment><USER33> ...And interesting times for ad blockers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> If your company still isn't profitable and needs that next round of VC to survive, be very worried.

I've seen the signs and gone through multiple layoffs over the years.

</comment><comment><USER36> How worried should an entry level developer who has been working only 6 months at his current company be? Due to an extremely high cost of living, paying all my bills and student loans and such, I have very little money actually saved up. If I lost my job I'd have to pack my bags and move out of Silicon Valley ASAP. And I really haven't accomplished that much at work during the past 6 months because I joined during holiday season and pretty much spent like 3 months training. I'd be really fucked if I got laid off now.

<comment><USER37> Be concerned. Have a plan.

Consider attacking your living expenses. Request a rent reduction from your landlord -- you're a known entity, and they're more likely to offer this if you ask than if you don't, and them more they've heard that request. Look at roommate situations. Don't make any big purchases. _Do_ put away an emergency stash.

One of the big problems the Bay Area faces right now is one that attacks its ongoing attractiveness as a tech hub: technical labour is losing its flexibility. Employment is contracting, slightly, but housing is _so_ expensive that virtually nobody has any personal runtime if the paychecks stop. A considerable exodus _from_ the area may make it less attractive in future. It's one thing to take a new job down the street, or even switch between San Jose and SF or SF and Oakland. It's another to shuttle back and forth, with household wares, from Cleveland to Palo Alto, every 6-18 months.

It's also an opportunity for a new low-cost hub to establish itself. One with what makes SV tick, but doesn't have its problems.

Unfortunately, most of the candidate destinations lack the legal environment, particularly labour law, which made SV so attractive. It's possible locations outside the US might emerge, though I'm not sure where that might be either.

I'm not calling the end of SV, that would be idiotic (until its not, at which point it will be inspired). But the hub _is_ entering a period of distinct vulnerability.

<comment><USER38> That's the big issue. Multiple $Ks/mo in rent, if you haven't already built up a nice nest egg, make it really hard to ride out a period of unemployment. (And, indeed, make it really risky to bet on something coming along if there's a general downturn.)

I'm less convinced of the uniqueness of SV and the role of labor laws. Places like Massachusetts are doing pretty well these day. (And, indeed, housing near the city isn't cheap either.) This in spite of EMC and certain other employers torpedoing anti-non-compete legislation. But, then, a lot of Boston-area employers don't necessarily put non-compete's in place even though they're more enforceable than in CA.

<comment><USER37> Noncompetes and a great many issues, along with a general sense of disgust at the tech world, and a growing sentiment that it's not delivering on addressing Big Problems[1], all have me sitting out for now.

But the thought of dealing with any of a number of hassles, ranging from commutes to housing frustrations to highly uncertain employment to outright labour-hostile legal codes (and even in light of those, vastly worse employment contracts) has me reduced to essentially zero interest in even considering the game.

Massachussets, New York, Texas, and North Carolina have all done an exemplary job of eliminating themselves from any and all consideration. California's simply not affordable where there's work, and there's no work where it's affordable. Europe's a mess.

Altair IV is looking pretty good.

________________________________

Notes:

1\. See for example, [https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/38skua/what_ar...](https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/38skua/what_are_the_big_problems_2015_edition/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> We're actively hiring. If you were one of that let go people, please reach out to [https://sendsonar.com](https://sendsonar.com)

<comment><USER40> We're actively hiring too. If you need a job, just visit our website at [http://example.com](http://example.com).

No need to explain how much we'll pay you per year, how long the interview process is, how likely it is that we'll hire you after the interview, how well we treat work-life balance, whether our company is dependent on venture capital, whether our company is even remotely close to generating profits...or even what the company _actually does_. We assume that you're desperate...ahem... _brave_ enough for a job that'll you click on our hyperlink and reach out to us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> While it's sad to see people being laid off, on the bonus side there are jobs elsewhere in the country that could use great engineers. I know in Helena Montana there are a number of companies looking for engineers. It's a great fit for those who enjoy great beer and the outdoors.

<comment><USER42> Any willing to pay relocation? :D

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> A lot of these comments have stated the surface level of what is happening. That is, these companies have failed based on bad business tactics/marketshare, over-valuation, etc... And that the employees being laid off are just the tech-bubble fallout, but will be okay 'because jobs are aplenty' or that they'll just have to reapply themselves in some other job sector.

However, what we don't see is the terms of the layoff that the employees are forced into. Generally, employees don't have a say in what they get in their layoff package, and many times it is not a fair amount in comparison to the work they do and in comparison to what management is getting. In addition, employees generally have to sign a legal document that prevents them from defaming the work practices/management/etc of the company. Either they sign and get their package, or they get nothing at all. I'm basing this on accounts from personal friends who have worked in startups, and although I'm speaking from an anecdotal point of view, I don't see what other data points we can draw from given that no one is allowed to speak out legally.

The bottom line is, we will always be screwed over since we lack basic worker protections. We can talk about bad management and how that can be solved, but ultimately I think each and every one of us need to collectively force a set of protections for workers. Either through law or by forming a strong collective. Until then, this cycle will continue.

</comment><comment><USER44> it's mostly Yahoo at this point, which is no surprise there. We've (I've) also seen bubbles burst a couple times in this industry, and it'll do it again. I wonder how long it will take before we figure out not to throw money at bad ideas, overhire, and value companies at much more than they're actually worth. Eh, probably never. Oh well, viva la recession!

</comment><comment><USER45> What's unclear to me is if these are all 'tech positions' or just positions at tech companies.

<comment><USER46> That is a very good point. At my previous company, they had some struggles and laid off a bunch of marketing and random business people, but every single developer kept their job.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> So, I am graduating next year and I have no internship experience (wasn't able to get one for this summer for whatever reasons). How doomed am I? Hopefully, by the time I am done, there is still at least one job left :(

Although, I guess finding a job might be easier since I am willing to relocate etc.

<comment><USER48> If you have some other stuff to show for yourself beyond a transcript you should be just fine.

There are still TONS of places hiring that just aren't big sexy brands.

<comment><USER47> Cool, thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Those comments.... wow.

<comment><USER50> Right? I feel like there's no way to get a good legitimate discussion on any article w/o a community like HN or reddit that cares about their arbitrary karma system.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> How many of the Santa Clara county layoffs were from Intel?

</comment><comment><USER52> In Seattle almost no companies have been hiring entry level devs for several months.

Fortune 500 not excluded.

Could it be lay-offs from CA migrating down to WA?

<comment><USER53> Qualcomm just closed the Seattle and Bellevue offices over the last year, and Intel is doing the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> "Ah, I see one can use the "big multiple of a tiny number" trick for bad news too." Marc Andreessen

[https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/730990038939361280](https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/730990038939361280)

</comment><comment><USER55> I've only read 2 comments so far, and already my brain is melting from the ridiculous buzzwords.

</comment><comment><USER56> Keep Calm and Be in Infrastructure

</comment><comment><USER57> For anyone completely unable to view the article because it hangs trying to load: if you have HTTPS Everywhere installed, try disabling the "MNGInteractive" rule.

</comment><comment><USER58> There's layoffs and there's going out of business.

</comment><comment><USER59> Easiest way to increase profits is to cut some staff. Payroll is a huge expense for just about every company out there.

</comment><comment><USER60> It might be interesting to consider what layoffs cost companies in terms of confidence and morale.

</comment><comment><USER61> This sort of stuff is going to happen one way or the other, no industry is immune from this.

</comment><comment><USER62> Most of the companies came from older tech companies like Yahoo, Intel, etc which had slow growth anyway so they probably aren't responsible for the vast increase of jobs over the last 5 years.

I'm curious what the layoff situation is like for start-ups though since they don't need to report for the WARN act.

<comment><USER63> WARN act applies to companies of 100 or more employees, startup or not.

</comment></comment><comment><USER64> One more reason to support [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_around_the_world](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_around_the_world)

</comment><comment><USER65> Let us not panic here. Unlike 10 years ago most tech companies are taking more risk, investing more capital and building more products. Obviously they are going to hire more and fire more as some of the projects succeed and some fail ?

</comment><comment><USER66> I wouldn't worry about it too much, we have enough unquenchable thirst for filling positions here in the Bay that all of these folks will be quickly and gainfully employed again. One of our local strengths is that the cycle of life here is alive and well. We'll recycle like we always have, nothing goes to waste.

</comment><comment><USER67> I don't understand why people feel the need to saturate the bay area to compete for generally sub-par living conditions and only slightly above average pay. Everytime I ask someone why they are living and working there - they answer something along the lines of "to get rich and move out of here" this type of mentality is why the bay is the suicide capital of the world, unfortunately.

<comment><USER68> Say what? The counties of the Bay Area are all well below the national average suicide rate (age adjusted, per capita CDC data). Explore for yourself at [1]. How did you arrive at this odd belief?

1: [https://wisqars.cdc.gov:8443/cdcMapFramework/mapModuleInterf...](https://wisqars.cdc.gov:8443/cdcMapFramework/mapModuleInterface.jsp)</comment></comment>


Apple's aesthetic dichotomy (2011) - <AUTHOR> http://madebymany.com/blog/apples-aesthetic-dichotomy <comment><USER2> I think sometimes we forget that Apple's primary audience doesn't even know what skeumorphism is, and certainly won't call it "regressive aesthetic infantilism" (it sounds cooler to write like that, so I can't exactly fault the author). But so what if it's an illusory metaphor?

Andy Mangold's appropriately-titled blog post "Skeuomorphism: The Opiate of the People" addresses the role of skeumorphism quite clearly, I think:

"Some people believe that skeuomorphism makes an interface easier to use, or more intuitive for the user, and I simply don't buy that. But what hadn't occurred to me is that it doesn't matter if it actually does make it easier to use, all that matters is that it makes the average person think it's easier to use. In reality, a user must take time to learn any interface, whether clad in faux leather or not. The skeuomorphism in iOS plainly tricks people that might otherwise walk away…" [[http://andymangold.com/skeuomorphism-the-opiate-of- the-peopl...](http://andymangold.com/skeuomorphism-the-opiate-of-the-people/)]

People often quote the goal of effective skeumorphism as leveraging existing patterns (which just happen to be physical, not digital), to make an interface more familiar and easier to use. I think, if this is true, then it's rarely executed on that level. But if a user is more willing, more patient, and more inclined to go through a learning curve because of skeumorphism, I'd argue this is effective design.

Sometimes anti-skeumorphism sentiment sounds really similar to the "aesthetics don't matter as long as it works!" rallying cry. If aesthetics make it more pleasant to use a product, then the aesthetics serve a purpose.

(Edit—regarding honesty and emotive interfaces in digital design, here's another well-articulated perspective on the issue: [http://maxcho.com/2011/10/dont-send-love-letters-in- helvetic...](http://maxcho.com/2011/10/dont-send-love-letters-in-helvetica/))

</comment><comment><USER3> While my personal opinion regarding skeumorphic design falls very much in line with the author's, I don't think that there is a contradiction in Apple's design philosophy.

The hardware is minimal because its true purpose is to let the software shine. It's a magical box that can become anything, from a calendar to a photobooth to a music studio. Apple's visual design choices in software have always seemed to fall under the skeuomorphic end of things (faux brushed aluminum?) and having a minimal hardware accentuates these flourishes.

<comment><USER4> Besides people have proved that they like Apple's approach to design. Whatever the philosophy is, if it has succeeded in the marketplace isn't it superior?

<comment><USER5> If we're judging by success in the marketplace then surely Windows XP is the most loved design on earth, right?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I, for one, am for more realworldness like this on these devices (not misplaced realworldness though).

Given that an iPad can morph into so many things that were formerly analog - books, synthesizers, effects boxes, instruments, the calendar, address book, notebook, etc. - it is quite comforting to distinguish these roles based on the physical features of their real world cousins if possible.

The traditional computer's interface put many, um, "interface" barriers between you and the thing you were supposed to be manipulating - keyboard, mice, gui in particular. With these touch devices, the barrier feels smaller and in some cases so good as to be non-existent - i.e. our natural ability to figure out things in the real world by poking and prodding is what is being carried over into the digital world this time.

SJ said "it feels great to be able to touch your music" (or something like that) when he showed cover flow on the iphone. What purpose does "touching your music" serve? The answer is right there in SJ's statement. If you show a texture on the iPad's screen, we probably feel it in some way when we touch it despite the absence of the tactile sensation.

</comment><comment><USER7> I dunno, it sort of reminds me of the Beatles (another Jobs favorite). John being serious and political, Paul being silly and saccharine. The combination was part of the magic, and everyone had their favorite. I think if you fully digitalized the software, the overall package would be too severe. If you made the hardware whimsical, it would be sickening.

Part of it is that the hardware is a fixed thing. You have it or you don't, and its job is to contain the software. With the software there is a lot more freedom of expression because there is choice. Apple should take that further and let people swap out the official apps.

<comment><USER8> Nokia's phones show some signs of whimsy. I think you are right about the severity of all tech design, but I'm not convinced hardware can't be whimsical.

<comment><USER7> Oh, I'm not either. But you'll note that Nokia runs Windows and Symbian, which are pretty much both all-business. They also carry a lot more models, which broadens the scope for the hardware.

<comment><USER4> What makes you think Windows is all business? In fact it's the most social phone out there.

<comment><USER7> UI-wise. "Authentically digital" -- lots of rectangles and inorganic colors, no hint of skeuomorphism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The computer itself is different because it's just the space where the application lives. Complaining about the duality is like complaining that Dieter Rams' radio doesn't burst into fire whenever someone tries to play The Beatles on it.

The radio, the computer, the modern art museum are very different from their contents. They may be achievements of design by themselves, but are ultimately meant to disappear and give way to the content -- music, software, art. The content may well be kitschy (why not, I think in 2012 we're way past the 'kitsch is bad' presumption), but it doesn't mean the space should be -- in fact, the space might be the one place where kitsch is an objectively poor idea.

Think brutalist architecture covered with overgrowth. In my opinion, minimal shines in present of the fancy, and vice-versa. And personally, I like the permanent to be minimal, and the fancy to be transient.

<comment><USER10> > Complaining about the duality is like complaining that Dieter Rams' radio > doesn't burst into fire whenever someone tries to play The Beatles on it.

Not strictly - Rams didn't DJ at the radio station, but Apple is in charge of both the hardware and the software.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I read these articles bemoaning Apple's skeuomorphic application UIs, usually evoking the spirit of Dieter Rams to put their point across. In this instance it's classed as "horrific, dishonest and childish crap".

I understand the strong feelings of dislike, but I'd much rather be pointed towards alternative designs or even better alternative apps as a means to get away from the designs. Malady without remedy never sits well.

<comment><USER12> Yes.

Reading this I had a sudden flash why Apple might just be right.

The thing is that modern phones and computers are getting to the point where they can display texture to good effect. Textures are very pleasant, comforting things to add to the UI of an application. Yet what other way is there to integrate texture effects besides using images of familiar physical materials? Images of physical materials leverages our intuitions of the physical world.

What alternative approach improves on this? I'm honestly curious here.

<comment><USER13> Here's some analysis of Metro's alternative approach.

<http://www.riagenic.com/archives/487>

<http://www.riagenic.com/archives/493>

<http://www.riagenic.com/archives/526>

<comment><USER12> I would like an alternative approach but I don't see anything in the links here that "just works" in the way that the fake-leather thing in OP just works. I also see stuff that seems nice-looking but not-functional.

If this sounds harsh or dogmatic, sorry.

But any image that falls off the edge of screen is broken as a far as usability-at-glance goes no matter esthetically pleasing it might be. Looked at from the point of view of static beauty, the Metro stuff is indeed far superior. Looked in terms of an app I would use, I see massively wasted real estate and texture that distracts from the task rather than helping it.

I'm just a programmer pretending to be a designer but who really is creating a Facebook client.

It feels like Metro copied really-world typography that works well for situations where people simply read/consume information but I can't see it translating to interaction.

The last quote in your links: " _Fantasy User Interfaces in movies are your best friend._ " Sadly, it seem more Metro is a fantasy user interface. The fantasy user interfaces only exist for the one-way communication from the show-writer to the viewer. They work great for that. Total fail for something people use on an ongoing basis.

I know few will care about this rant but I am honestly a discouraged at how much of failure as an interactive interface Metro seems to be.

I could be wrong. I will keep my eyes open going forward.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> He hates that the skeumorphic things are patronizing, but, there you are, in a word, the very nature of Apple: patronizing.

</comment><comment><USER15> These skeumorphism-is-bad posts are pretty familiar with people who follow Apple blogs, it's been the darling of amateur design critics for years now.

The counter argument is pretty simple, even though it looks hideous and adds nothing to the app's functionality, it is supposed to encourage feelings of familiarity with people who wouldn't necessarily use an computer application. Whether it does or doesn't is up for debate, and I've never seen any stats to support either position.

</comment><comment><USER16> Hmmm. What the author fails to acknowledge is the 'bakelite' phenomenon. When bakelite was first used all those years back, it's sales tanked because it looked like the proto-plastic it was. It wasn't until it was made to look like wood that it became accepted, then the consumers of it were taken on a journey back to the original aesthetic. Put simply, sometimes people aren't ready to accept the intrinsic properties of a thing unless they've been led along a path towards it.

</comment><comment><USER17> Well, Microsoft went with the bauhaus design with Metro, and everyone is mocking them for it.

</comment><comment><USER18> Honestly, I really don't mind. It's entertaining.

<comment><USER19> I think the author is dead wrong. I think most people very much enjoy the patterns and, also, that Apple primarily deals with hardware while letting the developer community take care of the software. If you don't like how calendar looks, go write your own or get one from the app store. That's the whole point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I always laugh at the amount of ignorance when people talk about this topic.

Apple has been doing this since the very beginning of OSX. Aqua, Pinstripes, Brushed Metal etc. And the popularity of OSX is one of the core reasons for Apple's success. The fact is that Apple does do consumer research and would have changed approach if there was evidence it was hurting them.

<comment><USER21> In fairness, Aqua matched the original iMac and blue/white G3 tower. Brushed Metal matched the PowerBook G4 and PowerMac G5.

The author's point is that the hardware design team's aesthetic is now clashing with the software team's.</comment></comment>


Is your Product ready for Scale? - <AUTHOR> https://thesnippet.substack.com/p/is-your-product-ready-for-scale <comment><USER2> Good article.

One thing I would add is that pressure to build scalability into products as frequently comes from programmers as from product managers.

I can't count the number of times I have seen proof of concept demos based on orchestrated containers.

I maintain a healthy side gig helping companies maintain docker based solutions that they outsourced and now can't internally figure out how to even "open" let alone redeploy.</comment>


Is it cool to post hacker events to hacker news? - <AUTHOR>

So in the interest of time, I'm asking for forgiveness rather than permission.
I'm getting the word out for a free event that the Pylons community is throwing in SF for folks interested in hacking webtech and python.
Pylons MiniCon SF, #0
It's from noon to 5pm on Friday 4/29. Ben Bangert and Chris McDonough keynoting about Pylons and Pyramid. Some former mochimedia folks are going to be talking about startup technology decision making @ convore and porting Pylons to Pyramid.
There will be openspaces, lightning talks and 25min short talks as well as food and beverage and shwag and undoubtably roving packs of recruiters.
Deetz on miniconf here: https://github.com/Pylons/miniconference
Apologies if this inappropriate.
-w <comment><USER2> Lanyrd.com is your friend for announcing events</comment>


Why Tim Cook Is Steve Ballmer and Why He Still Has His Job at Apple - <AUTHOR> https://steveblank.com/2016/10/24/why-tim-cook-is-steve-ballmer-and-why-he-still-has-his-job-at-apple/ <comment><USER2> The article is short on details why he thinks Tim Cook is like Steve Ballmer, except for saying that Apple is slowly missing the boat on AI.

I don't know what Amazon does for AI, I haven't seen anything convincing from them, but I'll trust the author that they are working on it.

However it's tough to beat Google in this space, because AI and machine learning is what Google has focused on since _their beginnings_. Google's own Search has always been a limited form of AI on which most humans with access to the Internet have come to depend upon. And it is tough to beat them because they not only have 20 years of accumulated knowledge and talent, but they also have _a lot of data_ on users and haven't been afraid to break users' privacy in order to get that data.

Now say what you will of Tim Cook, but he's nothing like Steve Ballmer, with one big difference being that Tim Cook's Apple is making a stand for privacy and security, which is actually quite rare to witness in this day and age. He's a man with principles and for this I appreciate him a lot, maybe more than I ever appreciated Steve Jobs.

It would also be stupid to try and beat Google on their own turf. It would be like trying to beat Microsoft at Windows or Office, or Amazon at AWS. And for important markets, Apple's secret is that they never had to beat anyone in market share, all they had to do was to take over an important slice of the high-end market, which is something they are really good at.

<comment><USER3> Azure seems to be doing well and some people expect it to overtake AWS sooner rather than later in market share.

The talk that Microsoft is irrelevant is a bit hilarious, given that they beat google on revenue and income last year. They have morphed from a company that is front and center to one that provides the infrastructure for the digital side of non-tech business. Microsoft Office is absolutely pervasive, and it's not going anywhere.

<comment><USER4> > Azure seems to be doing well and some people expect it to overtake AWS > sooner rather than later in market share.

Source?

Edit: Sorry, that was lazy of me. Googled: [https://mspoweruser.com/cio-surey- finds-microsoft-azure-will...](https://mspoweruser.com/cio-surey-finds- microsoft-azure-will-overtake-amazon-aws-infrastructure-service/)

A bit of a biased source, "mspoweruser".

Read a bit more.. We'll have to see how the offerings change or evolve in the next 5 years.

Edit 2: [https://rcpmag.com/articles/2016/08/02/microsoft-behind- aws-...](https://rcpmag.com/articles/2016/08/02/microsoft-behind-aws-in- cloud.aspx) AWS is still > 30% of the overall market, Azure hitting around ~9%.

<comment><USER5> It's all based on Morgan Stanley's "2016 CIO Survey". It doesn't appear to be publicly available.

I've been the drone filling out surveys like this for CIOs in the past. Sometimes those surveys ask these sorts of things indirectly, especially if it's a paid survey. For example, they might assume that O365 utilization drives Azure adoption. (Behind the scenes O365 auth is an Azure service) Another example would be asking if your org has MSDN or an EA. In both cases, that provides some "free"/NFR Azure services.

A few years ago, Gartner pushed a survey like this where 40% of a group of drunken CIO types at some conference claimed that they wouldn't buy PCs or smartphones for employees after 2018. This stuff just isn't that meaningful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My opinion is that the failure of Microsoft has less to do with Ballmer than with the absence of a Steve Jobs.

My experience with large corporations is that they naturally produce mediocrity. The ownership of the final product or service is too diluted, with too many people involved, pulling in too many conflicting directions. They employ people who individually know what "good" means and what should be done in an ideal world. But that knowledge and common sense gets lost with the bureaucracy and the scale of the organisation.

So unless you get someone at the top who will force the company to still achieve something great for their customers, you will end up with an MBA style manager who will make decisions based on options provided by his teams and get products designed based on specs from the top rather than trying to make something great.

A great example is Windows 8. I heard Sinofsky had already been sacked by the time he walked on stage to introduce Windows 8. Microsoft knew it was a shit OS, and decided to push it nevertheless. I have seen this happening so many times in other contexts.

But tablets are another example. Microsoft knew that tablets would be a big thing well before the introduction of the ipad. In fact I remember a pre-ipad interview of Ballmer where he was deploring that the Windows tablets never took off. The problem was that windows-based tablets were too mediocre to create a market.

But Apple is moving in that direction too now. The user experience is deteriorating with every iteration of iOS. I can't think that someone at Apple thinks it's a good user experience to nag their users with all of their services (Apply Pay, iCloud, Apple Music, etc) over and over, with multiple buttons to click to opt out. That will ultimately bite them too. Not overnight, but over 10 years like with Microsoft. Not Tim Cook's fault. That's what large corporations do.

<comment><USER7> > My opinion is that the failure of Microsoft has less to do with Ballmer than > with the absence of a Steve Jobs.

This argument would be a lot stronger had Microsoft not begun making such major improvements as soon as Ballmer was replaced with Nadella.

<comment><USER8> Have they really, though? I mean, sure, they've got the ole' hype train's pistons pumping and the fanboys woohooing, but they still have produced a version of Windows that is clunky and controversial. They open sourced some stuff, but that's only because they are pushing for the clouds, not some actual change in philosophy. Microsoft's changes are all skin deep.

<comment><USER7> Yes, they have. I know there is a lot of institutional hatred for Microsoft from the tech sector that will take a while to overcome. But you'll be able to call changes "skin deep" forever if you choose to explain anything positive away as marketing only.

<comment><USER9> They haven't managed to release a flagship Windows phone for more than a year, Windows 10 is still a disaster, and Surface Book's execution was incredibly botched.

Yeah, there is some good stuff for developers, but their consumer-facing segment is still in shambles.

<comment><USER10> Surface Book is a fantastic device. What was botched?

<comment><USER9> Power management was broken: [http://www.techtimes.com/articles/166667/20160623/microsoft-...](http://www.techtimes.com/articles/166667/20160623/microsoft- surface-book-surface-pro-4-firmware-updates-bring-battery-improvements-and- sleep-mode-fix-heres-the-deal.htm).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Even if I generally agree with disappointment at the apparent "maintenance mode" of Apple's product line, I am not sure Ballmer is the best analogy. My understanding is that Tim Cook actually is responsible for many of the supply chain innovations behind Apple's dominant product lines. This is an incredibly hard technical feat, not just blustery MBA crap. I suppose it remains to be seen whether Apple can put its enormous cash hoard to work in R&D and new product development. It could be possible for Apple to go the way of RIM but I think it would be very hard to kill them given their unique supply chain efficiencies (not to mention brand and balance sheet).

<comment><USER12> If you take a look back, Steve Ballmer was responsible for a lot of the success of Microsoft. He mostly got hate because people hated Microsoft. I'm don't think Ballmer's list of accomplishments at Microsoft is fully appreciated particularly compared to the good press Tim Cook as enjoyed.

<comment><USER7> No, Ballmer got hate because Microsoft's consumer products consistently flopped. The stuff that those of us who flipped to Apple while he was in charge used (Zune, Windows Vista, original Surface, Windows Phone) were consistently underwhelming. However, Ballmer was simply inarguably an effective CEO from the perspective of investors. He grew the enterprise business consistently (which has a huge amount of value for legacy purposes), and some of the stuff he launched to support that (Azure, notably) positioned the company to grow in new ways that Nadella has really leveraged. He wasn't a visionary at all, but Ballmer was one of the best executor CEOs out there.

<comment><USER13> For the kids out there: "original Surface" isn't what you think. It was a "smart table" and its most compelling use case was to present a menu right underneath your place setting: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxk_WywMTzc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxk_WywMTzc)

<comment><USER14> Don't forget this classic parody video:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZrr7AZ9nCY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZrr7AZ9nCY)

<comment><USER13> There's a distinct trend of YouTube commenters who believe that the Surface (tablet) is somehow a descendent of the Surface table, just because their names are the same. Interesting.

Funny video — thanks for sharing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Apple does appear to be losing focus.

For example:

Apple has devalued the PRO moniker under Tim Cook's guidance.

By trying to ram it's Mobile OS into a PRO product (iPad PRO). I mean the UI grid is still 4 x 5 on a massive 12 inch display. Nobody noticed it feels more like Fisher Price? And the iPad "PRO" apps are all dumbed down, feature limited versions of actual pro desktop apps.

Then, by stagnating a once well regarded PRO product, the Macbook PRO, they further eroded the PRO moniker. Did they delay significant updates to the Macbook PRO to see if existing users would eventually give the iPad PRO a try first? Or did they simply want to drive Desktop OS marketshare back to Windows?

And what about the slim Macbook with a fancy new port (USB-C) that's still not available on any other Macbook, even 1.5+ years later!!!? Yes, that's exactly how you devalue the PRO moniker. By releasing new, cutting edge tech on your consumer products first. And then wait years before adding that tech to your PRO line (I know, the new Macbook PRO is rumoured to ONLY have USB-C ... sigh).

Don't even get started on the Mac PRO. Ya, that ridiculously underpowered, overpriced PRO computer that you forgot about, that looks like a NYC subway trash can. [https://www.google.com/search?q=nyc+subway+trash+can&tbm=isc...](https://www.google.com/search?q=nyc+subway+trash+can&tbm=isch) Talk about an awesome PRO design.

Talk about losing focus.

Eerily similar to later stage Ballmer Microsoft.

<comment><USER16> The Mac Pro and MacBook Pro are still very capable, solid, and focused machines. Go into any dev shop on the planet and you will see that's true. The only point your comment is right on is the Pro moniker being attached to an iPad.

<comment><USER15> I'm one of those devs and I'm sure every dev shop has been itching for a significant Macbook update for quite some time. Macbook PRO hasn't seen a significant update since 2012. Just minor speed bumps and force touch in 2015.

So we're getting one next week - but why not sooner? That was one of the takeaways from this article. Pace of innovation has slowed under Tim Cook.

<comment><USER17> 4 years is right on schedule for redesigns of the Macbook Pro. Not sure how the current narrative about Macs being neglected got started, but they're not behind at all if you look at the previous cadence between redesigns. The Macbook Pro also got a minor speed bump in May 2015.

The only difference this year is that Intel has been having problems delivering on time (and without problems).

<comment><USER18> > The only difference this year is that Intel has been having problems > delivering on time (and without problems).

That is the entire difference. You're correct in that this is the expected time between redesigns, but we also haven't gotten a spec bump in over a year. That's unusual, and it's giving real fuel to the usually-overblown "[product] is so stale!"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Tim Cook is a "Bozo" \- He has moved the focus away from computers and the companies core professional users and turned Apple into a fashionable health services company. They will coast for a while on their dominant mobile market share but eventually the stagnation and lack of new products will catch up to them.

He built a watch, which was a "me too" product and answered a question that no one asked. Jobs would never have done this because of the marginal increase in utility that smart watches provides users.

He also wasted company time and resources on trying to build a car, which is completely outside Apple's skill sets (the supply chains and profit margins are radically different). It seemed like he was just trying to do something innovative instead of actually looking at the needs and demands of users inside the computing industry where apple should be focused.

Its unfortunate that Jobs didn't see his lack of product development skills when he made him CEO - Jobs always talked about how product companies falter when marketing/sales/supply chain guys run the company and not product guys.

<comment><USER20> This image [http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06...](http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/10/slide-06-apple- magic-mouse-2-100622394-large.jpg), to me, simbolizes the recent Apple.

<comment><USER21> I don't get the hate for this mouse design. Have you ever used it? Actually - have you ever used a wireless mouse in general? You know how rarely you need to change batteries or charge them right?

To design a wireless mouse around the idea of using it while being wired would be a massive design fail. It would compromise the design of the common use case in order to improve the extremely rare use case.

<comment><USER22> The design fail is not taking the obvious and consistent (albeit spaced out) need to charge the mouse into account. It's not like some people don't have to charge this mouse; everyone will charge the mouse at some point, and they will do so consistently over the years.

With this design, I get a first class experience using it when the batteries aren't empty, but I literally cannot use the mouse when I need to charge it. The idea that a mouse should sacrifice such a basic functionality requirement just for the sake of a slightly better design is hilariously backward.

<comment><USER23> Once a month I need to flip the thing and plug it in. The amount of hassle is almost zero. It charges quickly enough that on a few minutes of charging it can limp along for another hour or so.

I've had other cordless mice that needed to be charged in a special cradle, which is basically the same thing, and I never heard anyone bitching about "hilariously backwards" design. Most people reviewing the product thought that was convenient.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I really like the dichotomy Steve Blank uses between "process" people and "creative" people. I've only been working in tech companies for ~10yrs but all my experience working in companies have shown me that the more a person is obsessed with processes and structure, the less they contribute to the real business value (product, design, marketing, etc). Not only in their own time investment in the company but in their influence on others around them, which tends to be high because they usual get managerial roles somehow.

These are the people who obsess over flaws in how work is done rather than the work itself. Which has it's place in larger companies but even there it really needs to be balanced, much more in favour of outward work.

Being a front-end dev I've had to work with many 'product managers' who spent a big chunk of their time on the process stuff and most of the product ideas were just shots in the dark without backing it up with data or experience, or otherwise entirely reactionary to local customer issues or the bosses moods, rather than with a strong vision or focusing on high level trends in customer behaviour. Largely, I believe, because they spent a lot of their finite resources focusing on the wrong things (internal optimization rather than external, ie talking to customers, value prop).

There are many many traps that startups can fall into and this is a big one. Especially when companies get VC and start adding non-core team members, then feel the need to bring in managers.

</comment><comment><USER25> One important thing that visionaries get credit for, but perhaps shouldn't...

Being in the right place at the right time.

It is a delightful bit of luck that Steve Jobs made it back to Apple. That scenario could have been way different where Apple bought BeOS, and Steve Jobs didn't return to Apple.

If Jobs isn't at Apple, he doesn't have the opportunity or resources to make his vision for the iMac, iBook, iPod, iTunes, iPhone, or iPad a real thing. In fact, he probably wouldn't have had the reason to envision any of the things at NEXT.

Also, you could argue that Jobs being at Apple when ARM got good enough for mass market smart gadgets at scale played into it too. If the tech isn't quite there, it doesn't look as interesting at all.

Without the right tech being available, Apple stalls out at the iMac and Power Mac and so on and is a profitable computer vendor, but not the most valuable company in the world.

So, Tim Cook might not be as visionary, but it might also be a poor time for anyone to be CEO as the opportunities shifted.

<comment><USER26> I'm not so sure. Jobs learned at lot at NeXT, I think the next company/product he would have worked on would have gotten it right, even if it hadn't been Apple.

<comment><USER27> I'm not sure he learned much at all.

There is a very clear through-line connecting all the Jobsian products: an aggressively streamlined approach to features, a fascination with high-quality materials and novel industrial processes, and an aesthetic sensibility derived from Bauhaus/Functionalism/Dieter Rams. All these elements are just as present in his misses (Lisa, the original Mac, the NeXT Cube, the G4 Cube) as in his hits (iMac, iPod, iPhone).

What separates his age of mostly misses from his age of mostly hits isn't any change in his design philosophy; it's the passage of time. His misses mostly came early, his hits late.

What this implies to me is that his later success wasn't due to _him_ changing, so much as the world changing around him. In 1984 and 1990 and 1995, he was trying to sell _objects d 'art_ into a computing market that was dominated by business/enterprise purchasers, who didn't care if the machines they bought were ugly as sin as long as they were functional and interoperable and cheap. By 2005 the market for tech had shifted away from those buyers into the consumer market, where the priorities were completely different, more like those of the fashion business than of the tech business of old.

Suddenly the Jobsian approach stopped being a liability and started being an asset. But that's not because he learned how to aim better, it's because the targets moved so that they were all neatly lined up in front of him.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Luck is generally involved in success.

So maybe this is just regression toward the mean and hasn't that much to do with whoever is the CEO.

In other words, every very successful company is bound to be less successful later. Nothing really exciting about this.

<comment><USER29> That's what I tend to wonder about these visionary types - how much of it is really a skill or talent that they have, and how much is just picking the right thing at the right time. If Bill Gates had stayed in charge, would he have forseen how the industry would change and gotten out ahead of it in time, or be blindsided like everybody else? If Steve Jobs was still alive, would he keep churning out industry-changers, or start to flop? Would either of them do something amazing if they had been born 50 years earlier instead?

<comment><USER30> > If Steve Jobs was still alive, would he keep churning out industry-changers

If he were alive and well, I think so. With the exception of iPad (which wasn't subpar by industry standards but certainly signaled a descent into mediocrity for Apple, and which I would attribute to Jobs' slowly disengaging with the company due to his health issues), Jobs was on an unbelievable streak between his return in the late 90s and about 2009/2010\. In the span of about 10 years, his company did several outstanding feats in holistic hardware/software design, and it can't be a coincidence that the man was then largely healthy and in command.

I do think that would have probably continued until the mid to latter part of this decade had he continued in better health.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I noticed that Apple lost track of usability since Cook came after their release of a new keyboard at first, new arrows buttons on it are completely unusable, on older keyboards they had spacing between the left/right and buttons on top, now they extended left/right buttons and it makes it incredibly hard to "feel" where they are, and the fact that MacBooks pros still have an old layout makes it a night mare to switch between desktop and laptop programming.

Another one is a new lock screen on iOS 10, sometimes the fingerprint does not work or the finger is dirty and i know I want to unlock it with a pin, before I used to be able to just swipe right away and type the pin, now it won't let me and I have to repeatatly press the home button until it figures out that the fingerprint won't work and it has to show me the pin enter screen.

Might be little things but it's what used to separate Apple from the crowd, I don't want them to lose focus on those. And don't get me started on the new OS X, which makes my maxed out 2014 rMBP look like slow PC from 2000.

<comment><USER32> What keyboard has the arrow buttons you are talking about?

When I place the wrong finger on my touchID and press the home button once, it shows me the pin entry to get into the phone. No multiple presses, nothing. First bad read, shows the pin entry.

<comment><USER31> The new keyboard on macbook and external keyboard has a different layout of arrow keys [1] vs the older macbook pro keyboard [2]

[1] - [https://www.evernote.com/l/ABV1fPm7JnBO76pqevjy990uALmIK39uZ...](https://www.evernote.com/l/ABV1fPm7JnBO76pqevjy990uALmIK39uZGk)

[2] - [https://www.evernote.com/l/ABVer15u9rhODaV3U5QafcRx8eVu3HVq6...](https://www.evernote.com/l/ABVer15u9rhODaV3U5QafcRx8eVu3HVq6Io)

As for the touch ID - try double clicking the home button with a finger that has no touch ID, it does not show a PIN entering screen. I used to double tap all the time before to quicker unlock the phone and swipe to enter a pin, now its' quite annoying and not as fast.

<comment><USER32> Double clicking brings up Apple Pay. Clicking once with a finger that doesn't have TouchID brings up the PIN entry screen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> The single useful thing the article could have presented was how or why Cook's/Apple's efforts at AI products will fail while Google's will succeed; how Apple's AI products will be the Windows Phone of Cook's tenure (or, for that matter, how Windows Phone failed or could have been done differently). Without explaining how apparently similar efforts will yield different outcomes, this is all jazz-hands about CEO personalities and Fortune buzzwords.

<comment><USER34> Man, I only have one thing about the pseudo-AI craze that I'd like to hear from Apple to get my business: Seeing how their current top end SoC is so powerful, stop sending all sorts of data to external parties to offload the compute requirements to make stuff like Siri work.

<comment><USER35> I thought Apple specifically didn't send your data to external parties. That's one of the reason Siri is behind Google, which _does_ send you data to their servers.

<comment><USER36> AFAIK that's not correct, which is why it doesn't work offline.

See e.g.: _" [Nuance rep] said that Siri has both embedded and cloud technology for voice recognition, but that the feature is overall a cloud solution."_

[http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/05/30/nuance-confirms- it...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/13/05/30/nuance-confirms-its- technology-is-behind-apples-siri)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Apologies for this most gratuitous of bikeshedding, but if you're going to use proper superscripts, _please_ sort out the line-heights.

<comment><USER38> I've never thought of this and never noticed it until you pointed it out. And now it'll probably bother me forever.

<comment><USER39> I was going to say it's probably like vocal fry, where once you hear it you're supposed to hear it everywhere, but I've never heard it myself. In making sure I remembered the name right and googling it, I found a video and I was able to hear it fairly clearly for the first time. Now I'm afraid I've inflicted myself with this. :/

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> There are clearly many holes in Apple's armor these days, but the one that irks me the most is how Apple's literally handing the Education market to Google. I swear if Apple's hardware announcements this week don't include a Chromebook competitor I'm going to figuratively scream.

Chromebooks are fantastic products but I grew up in the Microsoft dominated 90's and hated it. It feels like Apple's almost trying to make itself obsolete in markets it once owned. Competition please!

</comment><comment><USER41> He's underestimating their push into medical research and apps. It's $3 Trillion in the U.S. every year and they are further along than any other of the Big Techs.

This: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-27/aetna- to-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-27/aetna-to-make- apple-watch-available-in-health-monitoring-push)

Is not about selling more watches and phones. And Aetna alone has 23 million members.

</comment><comment><USER42> It's also a power game, who gets the next number one spot. People want to have their shot at giving direction to such a big ship. So they make friends with the current boss, ensure loyalty by key employees to themselves, gain authority over important projects. Then you cannot just fire them or put someone else in front of them. I think it's also okay, that companies come and go. If you look at it more closely each company is simply a paper and a bank account. The ideas and people who made the disruptions possible will move on to other paper-account combinations and innovate there.

</comment><comment> sven-51 Applies to Pichai at Google too. Google was a search company that put the browser/mobile guy in charge. You are not going to see stuff like this

[http://aurelieherbelot.net/pears/](http://aurelieherbelot.net/pears/) [http://aurelieherbelot.net/how-small-is-the-world-wide- web-r...](http://aurelieherbelot.net/how-small-is-the-world-wide-web-really/)

come out of Google for the simple reason they are busy playing empire defense all the while the need for a centralized search engine reduces.

<comment><USER43> Isn't that the whole point of Alphabet? Google can play empire defense while Larry & Sergey make bets by creating subsidiaries and funding them with Google's free cash flow. I think Google's board recognized this phenomenon of large companies becoming risk averse and restructured in this way to try to avoid it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> That's a dreadful comparison and makes no sense.

</comment><comment><USER45> The article mentions Mark Zuckerberg only in passing but it is worth noting that Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg are another visionary-CEO + world- class-executor "dynamic duo" in Silicon Valley. Who will replace Mark Zuckerberg after his departure? If it's Sheryl Sandberg, the same Steve Ballmer / Tim Cook scenario will repeat itself and we can look forward to future articles like "Why Sheryl Sandberg is the next Tim Cook and why she still has her job at Facebook".

</comment><comment><USER46> Funny that the article fails to mention Jony Ive as the obvious successor to Cook. Doesn't it look like Apple has its next "creative CEO" all prepped up?

<comment><USER47> I'm curious you think it is "obvious"? I've never heard anyone say this of Ive until now with your comment.

Jobs did make sure Apple has no power to ever get rid of Ive for any reason, ensuring him an unbreakable tenure. However, to me, it's far more obvious that he will never take on the CEO role because I think he's prepping to retire from Apple in the next few years as there's a reason we've been seeing less and less of him over the past few years, with his strong desire to move back to England with his family and so on.

The only two people that's more obvious to me is Williams and Schiller but I don't think Cook is going to be gone for another decade.

<comment><USER48> Next CEO will be an outsider.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Their bet is wrong. Ai is definitely the future, but people dont want Ai driving everything they do, people want control, they feel liberated when they can control something so much from ones hands, this is half the reason adoption of smart watches is so small. Its not held in the hand, but worn. The steering and control of a powerful vehicle, boat, car etc, we dont want these things automated. Apple is on the wrong track, I agree with that but dont believe the reason to be a lack of adoption in the Ai arena. Apple's design choices since Jobs checked out have been inferior to its previous conceptions, that will be their downfall, and that has no comparison to Balmer. Another point the author fails to see is that Apple is not so much an innovator as much as they are a good perfectionist. They didnt create the OS, the Smartphone, the Mobile OS, etc. They simply waited for these things to pickup mass user adoption, they looked closed at refining the points that users complained about, then they created their own version of said product, should they choose to go into Ai, this is how it will be done, after the world has spoken its gripes on the current Ai offerings.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Now that we have Nadella, it's kind of scary for Tim Cook to be compared to Ballmer...

<comment><USER50> How so? To an outsider who knows very little, Nadella seems to be doing great.

<comment><USER51> Exactly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> It is worth noting that the author has a background in startups and entrepreneurship. Apple however is several magnitudes larger and running new initiatives on startup level requires isolation from the main business and a portfolio approach. Some companies show their their cards, some hint they have a list and Apple is traditionally very secretive.

The question is not whether Tim is the right guy for innovation but whether he has put the right guy into the place. John Ivy certainly continues to play a big role but has/is/will there be another internal leader emerging?

> About Steve (Blank)

> After 21 years in 8 high technology companies, I retired in 1999. I co- > founded my last company, E.piphany, in my living room in 1996. My other > startups include two semiconductor companies, Zilog and MIPS Computers, a > workstation company Convergent Technologies, a consulting stint for a > graphics hardware/software spinout Pixar, a supercomputer firm, Ardent, a > computer peripheral supplier, SuperMac, a military intelligence systems > supplier, ESL and a video game company, Rocket Science Games.

> Total score: two large craters (Rocket Science and Ardent), one dot.com > bubble home run (E.piphany) and several base hits.

</comment><comment><USER53> Interesting read.

Though, there's something fabulously pretentious about writing an opinion piece and then concluding it with a "Lessons Learned" section.

</comment><comment><USER54> Hasn't Microsoft done the right thing here though as a company for the long- term: visionary CEO leaves meaning potential for great risk to the company > put someone in place who shores up the finances > once finances are in a great position bring a visionary in and change things around again. It reads to me like Microsoft's long-term strategy as a company is actually really good. They must have known they could not continue their dominance but they could continue to be relevant if they had the finances to back it up. Swapping one visionary CEO for another could is a risk because big ideas don't always work (if executed poorly).

For any company, a charismatic dominant CEO leaving causes instability a board would be foolish not to try and stabilise things at the company before moving on again. A CEO does not act in isolation even though this article paints it like that and takes guidance from their board.

</comment><comment> alex- Their is a feeling that CEOs of these large companies are completely responsible for the direction a company takes. I have never served as a CEO, but I can't help but imagine that large share holders are also very dominant figures.

One of the attributes that Steve Jobs and Bill Gates appeared to share (I have never met either) was a massive amount of trust/faith to run their respective companies (eventually).

I imagine that this must translate to the board room where they were provided the freedom to pursue avenues that a newly promoted CEO would just not be allowed to do.

The author praises Steve Ballmer and Tim Cook for their ability to drive short term growth, but had they failed to do so they may have been replaced by someone more willing to focus on these returns. Eventually as disruption occurs the share holders start to prioritize facing these new challenges.

<comment><USER55> > I imagine that this must translate to the board room where they were > provided the freedom to pursue avenues that a newly promoted CEO would just > not be allowed to do.

The author also mentions Disney, which is a company that was sliding into obscurity until Bob Iger took over. As a newly promoted CEO he executed his vision and put Disney right back on top. I can't imagine Disney's board was particularly forward thinking back then.

<comment> alex- You are right, it must be possible to execute on a vision while keeping shareholders, who don't share your vision happy.

But I still feel that it must be harder than having carte blanche with the organisation. Maybe I over estimate the different levels of freedom provided to different CEOs.

Or maybe the ability to generate this freedom/trust/faith is one of the skills that ultimately helps define a successful CEO.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> "got a major release of Windows out without the usual trauma"? Did he already release Windows8? If Steve Blank talks about Windows 10 he must have missed something, or the usual trauma he experiences is way worse than what I would even think possible as an extreme case.

</comment><comment><USER56> I can sort of see the analogy but it does disservice to the way Ballmer led Microsoft to become anti-customer in their promotion of DRM technologies, among other strategic errors. Tim Cook seems genuinely pro-user in his emphasis on privacy.

</comment><comment><USER57> Website-idea: Make a list of previous articles that predict the future of Apple. ;)

<comment><USER13> You could call it "Claim Chowder" and put this linked list up on a domain like, i dunno, daringfireball.net :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> These hyped "conversational interfaces" and augmented reality remind me of Clippy and Microsoft Bob. And IoT is real disaster, not innovation. So good that they're not jumping onto these bandwagons.

<comment><USER59> A non-disastrous IoT ecosystem would be real innovation. I'm still waiting for it!

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Well, it seems Apple are actually increasing R&D in AI:

[http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/10/17/apples-new- japan-r...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/10/17/apples-new-japan-rd- center-to-build-very-different-artificial-intelligence-tech-tim-cook-says)

</comment><comment><USER61> There are two kinds of people, those who dont understand Apple, and those who Thinks they understand Apple but they dont.

</comment><comment><USER62> Hey I may be wrong one day and this comment might not age well but I believe what Apple _is_ doing with AI is crucial. Baking privacy into AI and ML is really necessary and I'm happy someone is thinking about it. I think Apple has a lot of AI stuff going on behind closed doors.

</comment><comment><USER63> Ballmer led Microsoft through years of sales and profits increases. Maybe MS isn't "cool" but he certainly left a very solid and profitable company.

Being compared to Ballmer is a compliment in my view.

</comment><comment><USER64> Jesus.

Ballmer and Cook have made extreme amounts of money for their shareholders. Major super truckloads of money. That's what businesses do.

The meta narrative of disruption is marketing, but somehow everyone keeps talking about it like its real.

Even weirder is the emotional responses from some of the other commenters about cloud providers? It's like they are sports teams or something. Just like sports teams they have nothing to do with you, really. It's just a brand that somehow you identify with.

(You could carry the sports team metaphor a lot further...tax abatements to build datacenters/arenas...but let's leave it there...)

</comment><comment><USER65> This is one of the best articles I've read in awhile.

</comment><comment><USER13> This title really rubs me the wrong way. To say one person "is" someone quite different seems like a reductive and clickbaity way to say that they are alike in one or two small ways. Better title: "Cook, Ballmer, and the Problem with Naming Successors Who Are Good at Execution"

</comment><comment><USER66> No.

</comment><comment><USER67> It's a little weird for me that a company supposedly in "maintenance mode" has been ignoring the Mac for so long. Even a 5th rate computer company can manage to come out with a new model once in a while. How did Apple get to the point where a company in "maintenance mode" ignores a big product line like this for so long? Is Apple not capable of executing on more than 1 project at once?

<comment><USER68> _> a big product line_

There's your mistake - next to i-devices, the Mac is simply not a big product line. It's something they need to have around for ecosystem developers, and something of a brand exercise in other sectors. Nothing more.

<comment><USER69> True, but why is that so? Apple wants the high end consumer. Gamers are high end consumers, and yet Apple doesn't sell them high end desktop or laptop machines with gaming capable GPUs. Also no VR/AR gear. This seems like quite a strange omission from their product line.

<comment><USER70> _Gamers are high end consumers_

They really aren't. PC gamers hang out on Reddit and other forums trading info about how to build a PC from commodity parts in order to get the absolute best price/performance ratio. It's not hard at all to put together a machine for less than a thousand dollars that would be competitive with the machines Apple sells for three thousand.

There's no margin for Apple in this space.

<comment><USER31> > "It's not hard at all to put together a machine for less than a thousand > dollars that would be competitive with the machines Apple sells for three > thousand."

That's a complete BS, I want you to give me an example of that. Less than a thousand dollar desktop vs 3000$ mac.

Now re laptops. My PC friends keep telling me that MacBooks are overpriced And that you can get a faster PC laptop for half the price, but as soon as they start giving me examples like razor blade or some msi laptops, they quickly starting to see that base models of those cost > 1500$ and to get decent specs for gaming you have to shell out upward of 2000$, so in the end you are paying the same money you pay for MacBook.

<comment><USER70> Laptops are irrelevant to this discussion since nobody builds a laptop from off-the-shelf parts.

The issue I'm talking about is gaming performance. Apple sells Mac Pros starting at $3000. These machines use workstation class Xeon processors with ECC memory and workstation class graphics cards designed for double precision floating point computation. These features are irrelevant to gamers. It is not hard at all to build a cheap machine that can beat one of these workstations in all your favourite games, especially when you consider the abysmal state of OpenGL drivers on macOS.

<comment><USER31> If you read my comment i was referring to mac desktops, laptops were a separate point in a discussion. Nevertheless you are comparing 3 year old Mac Pro with current PCs, at the time when Mac Pro was released it was on par with PC systems that costed around 3000$ as well.

<comment><USER70> I'm comparing brand new Mac Pros that Apple is selling right now, today. The fact that Apple hasn't updated this product in 3 years is not my problem. I can't believe you'd think that would not be a point in my favour.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> Apple bought Siri, and then largely did nothing with it. The founders left, and started another AI startup: Viv.

[https://techcrunch.com/2016/05/09/siri-creator-shows-off- fir...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/05/09/siri-creator-shows-off-first-public- demo-of-viv-the-intelligent-interface-for-everything/)

That AI capability _could_ have been Apples.

Instead of concentrating on user experience as a _whole_ , they concentrated on "look and feel" of devices, along with UI.

Those are all good things. But having an iPhone with a _useful_ AI would be a killer.

Instead, Google is pushing hard in this area. And will likely do well. Because they're a data analysis company. Not a "pretty picture" company.

</comment><comment><USER72> I'm never impressed with the opinions of people who insist that Microsoft is some sort of failure. The utter lack of incorporating basic observation of reality into these theories is good for people who hate Microsoft, but little else.</comment>


How To: Create an inexpensive hourly remote backup - <AUTHOR> http://www.niden.net/2010/08/how-to-create-an-inexpensive-hourly-remote-backup/

<comment><USER2> I used to do stuff like that, until I found it was a lot easier just to work directly out of my Dropbox directory. It's tough to argue with real-time offsite backups.</comment>


Why One Secure Platform Passed on Two-Factor Authentication - <AUTHOR> https://www.wired.com/story/keybase-two-factor-authentication/#intcid=recommendations_wired-bottom-recirc-similar_c3b84bf9-3332-46fe-a949-26c130fa760b_cral-top2-2 <comment><USER2> Well, isn't every keybase installation a second factor basically?

You start with one device, and have to link each following device using the cryptographic key of an already-linked device.</comment>


Show HN: Using Docker for containing a PHP development environment - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/DFilipeS/docker-php-dev <comment><USER2> Why default to 5.6 when we are on 7.1 now?</comment>


FuzzBench: Fuzzer Benchmarking as a Service - <AUTHOR> https://security.googleblog.com/2020/03/fuzzbench-fuzzer-benchmarking-as-service.html <comment><AUTHOR> They measure unique edge throughput AFAICT. I wonder if there's a fair way to evaluating fuzzers by throughput of unique failing test cases instead.

I hadn't heard of most of these fuzzers. MOpt [1, I think] seems like it has the performance crown (based on [2]).

> Inspired by the well-known optimization algorithm Particle Swarm > Optimization (PSO), MOPT dynamically evaluates the efficiency of candidate > mutation operators, and adjusts their selection probability towards the > optimum distribution.

This is a great idea. Intuitively, each program could respond differently to different test case mutation.

[1] [https://www.usenix.org/system/files/sec19-lyu.pdf](https://www.usenix.org/system/files/sec19-lyu.pdf)

[2] [https://www.fuzzbench.com/reports/sample/bloaty_fuzz_target_...](https://www.fuzzbench.com/reports/sample/bloaty_fuzz_target_coverage_growth.svg)</comment>