Netflix teases desktops-as-a-service offering aimed at VFX creators - <AUTHOR> https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/20/netflix_netfx_desktop_as_a_service/ <comment><USER2> My partner works in VFX, and watching them work during quarantine, the experience was poor to say the least (aside from the speed from which they went from "remote work is not even an option", to it working).

This seems like a good step forward, but I think the real potential is in building the frontend software to be as lightweight as possible, to run on any computer, and just put the previews rendering on the cloud (so for example, instead of wasting bandwidth streaming ui elements / desktop interface you could just send actual useful data)

Edit: another good point of this model, is that for example, occasionally workstations turn off / stop responding / etc.. I don't have much IT experience and know how much you can mitigate that, but they had to often had someone still on premise to fix things. Going completely cloud based would be much more "quarantine" friendly in that regard...

<comment> dynamite-ready That's an interesting idea. I originally wanted to post about how cool the virtual CGI workstation concept was, but what might be better still, is a system / platform where an artist can do as much as they can on their local machine, and outsource requests for preview / final renders to cloud based machines, while streaming the result back to the enduser, with some amount of lag when moving cameras around a preview.

Wouldn't want any amount of lag in the modelling process though. Even disk pauses and garbage collection can prove distracting with that kind of work.

<comment><USER2> Yeah, for the 3d side of things it gets a bit trickier, vs 2d (compositing, grading, etc) where the interface itself could trivially run on anything, and you just need rendered video frames.

But even for 3d I would thing a "streaming based" 3d protocol or something would be much better than just an RDP connection

<comment> Const-me RDP connection already does all that. Essentially, it connects client PC's GPU to server's CPU. The software running on the server ain't aware, it calls regular D3D11 APIs and they just work, except for rare edge cases when it doesn't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Netflix is famous for putting as much on AWS as possible. AWS has a desktop as a service offering, so is this competing with AWS, or is it a slightly more complete product built on top of the AWS option?

Edit: in the original blog post linked to from The Register article it seems this is not public. This would lead me to assume that it is in fact running on AWS like most of the rest of Netflix's infrastructure, and that Netflix are providing a useful distribution/configuration/potentially free layer on top. Not to down-play the importance of this, I can see this being really useful for creators.

<comment><USER4> You didn't read the article. This is a service for VFX artists who are working on Netflix titles. It's a competitive advantage for Netflix if their VFX artists can work faster than others while working remotely. These desktops won't try to compete with Amazon or the general market.

<comment><USER5> I read the article. There is nothing to suggest this is not a public offering, nor any mention of it being specifically for people working on Netflix titles.

Did you read a different article?

\--

Edit: turns out they did read a different article, which is here[0] and does strongly imply it's not intended to be a public offering.

[0] [https://netflixtechblog.com/empowering-the-visual-effects- co...](https://netflixtechblog.com/empowering-the-visual-effects-community- with-the-netfx-platform-35fdf604909c)

<comment><USER4> > Netflix says the service offers "virtual workstations, integrated storage > and full access to secure rendering in a connected environment" and is > intended to "provide collaborators frictionless access to infrastructure to > meet Netflix's demand for VFX services around the world as our library of > original content continues to grow."

<comment><USER5> So, firstly: there are two articles. The linked HN article, and the original Netflix blogpost (which is not linked here on HN, but is linked by The Register).

From the Netflix blogpost, it seems you are correct. The author of The Register article seems to have misinterpreted and is _definitely_ discussing a prospective public offering.

\--

The 2nd sentence you quoted implies that people working on Netflix titles will use it, but does not imply exclusivity.

The 1st sentence I don't really understand what you're reading from it... sounds like a public offering to me.

In addition to those sentences, The Register article is chock full of direct references to it being a public offering, not an internal vendor offering.

Perhaps dang or another mod can change to the source article which is less misleading: [https://netflixtechblog.com/empowering-the-visual-effects- co...](https://netflixtechblog.com/empowering-the-visual-effects-community- with-the-netfx-platform-35fdf604909c)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> An interesting goal to aim for, but not completely a new concept to us. It feels like a sibling-evolution to what Foundry Athera was aiming for, except in this case geared to Netflix's needs, rather than attempting to be an scaling commodity. The interesting part is going full-cloud for everything, that's the big kicker. It'll let them deploy across DC's globally so that artists in different regions can have a more optimized experience. I'm very curious about how they're handling storage, though. We push massive amounts of volatile data everyday, so they're going to have to have a central source and likely some kind of caching mechanism between DC's, otherwise there's going to be a non-trivial bottleneck with storage.

As an industry, there's been a shift to VDI (through Teradici PCoIP and similar systems) over the past several years and it is _amazing_ from an admin perspective. In studio, an artist can't tell the difference between a local physical workstation and a virtual one in the studio's datacenter. And now all of the workstations have central management consoles if needed and are located in the same spot for physical maintenance. And for remote work, there's a tad more latency and you're at the whims of ISPs, but it's very workable. In terms of bandwidth, it's not a whole lot. We're primarily supporting dual-monitor 1920x1200 and after a small handful of optimizations that maxes out at ~50-60Mbps needed by the end users, often less with the way PCoIP works.

</comment><comment><USER7> Given that Netflix has a vested interest in trying to pump out a high volume of content. Can this be a play to help comoditize the post-production costs associated?

</comment><comment><USER8> What is the value added over connecting remotely to the office workstation? In my experience, video over RDP is terrible. Are they using a better protocol?

<comment> jon-wood RDP is indeed terrible for anything involving video or 3D, but there are companies out there that specialise in much lower latency desktop streaming. As an example Parsec started out focused on allowing people to run AWS instances for gaming rather than having a beefy desktop at home, but appear to be pivoting into remote desktop access for creatives: [https://parsecgaming.com/teams/](https://parsecgaming.com/teams/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> IMO: for cooperate computers desktop-as-a-service is the way to go. Of course that means maintaining two machines (possibly one in a VM.)

<comment><USER10> It's just annoyingly expensive for Windows boxes, with all of the licensing and stuff. Microsoft includes licenses for running VDI in Azure with Microsoft 365 now, but it still requires a full on-prem Active Directory setup (which you probably don't have if you are using Microsoft 365). And then on top of those licenses, you also have to get Citrix/VMWare licenses if you don't want to use Azure. It becomes more expensive than hiring a IT person to just manage all of the laptops you deploy everywhere (except in certain scenarios like healthcare).

I want to live in a world where we all have SunRays and I just plug in a card and show my session running in the cloud, but it's too darn expensive still (and everyone in enterprise is too scared to try and build one themselves since the big vendors have Microsoft's blessing when building their solutions). That one time I had a VDI at an internship, boy was it magical. Being able to walk into a conference room, type my password and show people something was extremely powerful.</comment></comment>


CNN reporter arrested live on air while covering Minneapolis protests [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIClA57jWmQ <comment><USER2> Note that Minneapolis state police have claimed that the reporters were released from jail the following morning after confirming themselves as media, which CNN responded by saying they had identified themselves before their arrest and it was only through the Goverers interference that their reporters were released the following morning.

<comment><USER3> I mean, it happened live on air, they were clearly identified as CNN and willing to comply with police orders - making the police's claim laughable.

I wonder what those officers were thinking, arresting a reporter on live camera.

<comment><USER4> (I'm a resident of the Minneapolis suburbs)

At this point, from some of my friends in the city, it sounds like there just isn't much oversight at all---they've now been caught on video taking guns from people with valid licenses and now arresting the press. I don't think that we can effectively apply logic when the police system seems so disorganized.

<comment><USER5> These seem like flagrant violations of constitutional rights; I would be interested to hear from a lawyer what kind of legal liability the police (as a department and as individual bad-apple officers) are opening themselves up to by behaving this way. Hopefully justice is served and constitutional rights are protected.

<comment><USER6> I don't believe they are opening themselves up to any legal liability. See [1] and links for a disturbing list of recent examples of police receiving qualified immunity. One example from the article:

> On May 18, the court turned away three of these appeals, including a jaw- > dropping case in which police were granted qualified immunity after > literally stealing $225,000. (There is no clearly established right not to > be robbed by cops, the court held.)

[1] [https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/george-floyd- sup...](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/george-floyd-supreme- court-police-qualified-immunity.html)

<comment><USER5> There's not enough liability, perhaps, but there's certainly some. Here[0] is a list of police department settlements and another[1] of individual police officers being tried and/or convicted for recent high-profile killings. Note that media coverage is inherently sensational and therefore not reflective of reality--just because the media gives much more attention to killings than to the legal repercussions doesn't mean that the latter doesn't exist.

In this particular instance, surely CNN has a strong case against the Minneapolis police department?

[0]: [https://www.themarshallproject.org/records/1712-police- settl...](https://www.themarshallproject.org/records/1712-police-settlements)

[1]: [https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/cases-police-officers- ch...](https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/cases-police-officers-charged- shootings-66017791)

<comment><USER6> Good point, I retract my blanket statement of "no legal liability." I should have said that they are not _criminally_ liable.

Your link [1] shows how rarely police officers are found _criminally_ liable for murder even in the most egregious of circumstances (only the most egregious ones are prosecuted at all and even most of those result in acquittals).

On the other hand you are right that link [0] shows that it is much more common that the police are found to have _civil_ liability. Not personally, of course, the payments will come out of liability insurance (and, therefore, taxpayer coffers).

<comment><USER5> I agree. There needs to be more accountability for police.

> Not personally, of course, the payments will come out of liability insurance > (and, therefore, taxpayer coffers).

I think this might actually be eminently desirable that the taxpayer is on the hook. We shoulder a lot of responsibility for our police (not the actions of any given officer, but the system that either fails to weed out 'bad apple' officers or fails to adequately train them or whatever other systemic failure is responsible) and it's right that we shoulder the cost for our lack of will to enact police reform or take it seriously. Of course, I don't think the liability--criminal or civil--is adequate in magnitude, and I would like to see more of both.

<comment><USER7> Your argument for the taxpayer being on the hook is that it gives us an incentive to do police reform?

Just put the officers on the hook instead, reform done.

Doctors are on the hook for medical malpractice, works quite well and we still have doctors.

<comment><USER5> How do you suppose you increase accountability for police officers (or any other police reform) without public support? And how does increasing accountability give police officers the special skills that they increasingly need, for example, to for interacting with mentally unwell members of the community? "Figure out how to be a mental health professional or face jail time"? To use your "doctors" analogy, we also have a system that adequately trains doctors and filters out the unfit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Isn't this situational irony ? reporters covering the events that were a result of unreasonable police actions themselves were subject to the unreasonable actions of the police.

<comment><USER9> I wouldn't call it unreasonable. They were told to clear the streets. They didn't actually clear the street. They stayed on the street. Reporters not following directions.

<comment><USER10> According to CNN's timeline the police asked them to move at 5:09 AM, the reporter asked where they wanted them, at 5:11 AM the police arrested them. The reporter was not given the chance to follow directions.

[https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/george-floyd-protest- update...](https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/george-floyd-protest- updates-05-28-20/h_4d1cff5a7a7797c0dcf2ed4bd184552a)

<comment><USER11> I'm not commenting on this particular case, since we don't have all of the facts yet, but it should only take _seconds_ to comply with a lawful order, not _minutes_.

<comment><USER12> Just watch the video; it was a live broadcast of the whole encounter. They were told to move, asked where was OK to move, the cops didn't give an answer (ostensibly communicating with superiors over radio), and then they were simply arrested.

There's no additional facts here.

<comment><USER13> Edit because thread depth:

Y'all were right, the footage I saw earlier was clipped after the girl had ran.

That's enough of trying to see all sides for me today. This week is hell.

\</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>----- It was not a live broadcast of the "whole encounter" it was a live broadcast that started _in medias res_ after the reporters were clearly surrounded by multiple officers of the law.

Not to mention that for the hour preceding 05:00 CDT, the National Guard and Minnesota State Troopers were announcing over loudspeakers that anyone in the area was to disperse immediately or face arrest.

So, it begs the question - what happened in the minutes leading up to when the camera started rolling?

Is it possible the crew had already been told to leave or they would be subject to arrest, and the crew did not follow this?

<comment><USER12> They were released 30 minutes later, with the governor apologizing saying there was no reason for them to be arrested.

You're absolutely on the wrong side of this. On the wrong side of illegal arrests of the press. Of fucking CNN literally live broadcasting.

> That statement is what fng hurts me to read - it's a mentality that whatever > is presented is it, facts, reality, no questioning needed.

I watched it live.

<comment><USER14> > You're absolutely on the wrong side of this.

Are we counting being skeptical of a claim as taking the opposite side? Seems like the user is trying to understand the situation rather than advocate for a side.

<comment><USER15> It's not being skeptical, it's in fact the exact opposite of any form of skepticism: it's being so credulous to one "side" that you make up falsehoods to excuse bad behavior, instead of using that same time to look for actual facts.

I don't know how this style of thinking has in the past decade or so come to be thought of as "skepticism," it's just incredible bias against one side. A skeptical though process would be inventing equally fabulous motivations in all directions, not just one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> How is it legal for a police offer to arrest someone without any warning, without even telling them why they're being arrested, and without probable cause? What are the repercussions for these officers for falsely arresting people? Do they suffer any consequences, or do they suffer no punishment for this injustice?

This is extremely disturbing, and further evidence that the U.S. is a police state. I've never felt more ashamed of my country.

<comment><USER12> > How is it legal for a police offer to arrest someone without any warning, > without even telling them why they're being arrested, and without probable > cause?

Cops can hold you for some amount of time, generally around 24 hours without cause.

> What are the repercussions for these officers for falsely arresting people?

None

> Do they suffer any consequences, or do they suffer no punishment for this > injustice?

No punishment.

<comment><USER16> That's horrifying. Why don't we change the law?

<comment><USER17> Consider how one goes about changing a law. Generally it starts with citizens making a fuss to inform their elected representatives that they think the existing laws need to be changed.

Recently, in Minnesota, hundreds of people gathered in a protest on precisely this topic. They gathered to say (for their elected representatives and everyone else to hear) that they wanted a change to the laws and the system that permits police officers to kill people by kneeling on their neck when attempting to arrest them.

It was during this very protest that the CNN reporters were arrested.

So, as you can see, people are trying to solve that problem. They have been protesting loudly about it for the past decade (much longer, in truth, but there has been a renewed focus by the media within the past decade). And so far... well, you tell me whether you think it's working.

<comment><USER16> Seems like our political system is broken then.

If the public so adamantly wants laws that elected representatives refuse to pass, then it seems that enabling direct democracy would be one solution to getting these laws passed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> A follow up video from the reporter who was arrested [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gsXevAjNbw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gsXevAjNbw)

</comment><comment><USER19> I've spent half an hour watching various videos, this in the link and the video where mr Floyd is murdered. Then I watched some more videos of the kind.

As an european... Jesus f-ing christ, this is absolutely messed up.

</comment><comment><USER20> Add reporting while black to suspicious activities.

<comment><USER11> Then we should also add filming while latino and producing while white.

<comment><USER21> The most insightful part of the video is where the start handing all the shit to the non-black film crew, then realize how bad it'll look if they only arrest the black guy.

You can attempt to whitewash it but we all saw what happened. Sorry, but you can't will away racism

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Why was this post flagged?

<comment><USER23> Because it's not on topic. It is almost definitely crime or politics. From FAQ:

What to Submit On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off- topic.

<comment><USER24> Hackers should be interested in this. It's clear that social media has a hand in the current state of society, however you feel about it. I have a sense that people that don't want violence are going to win politically, and soon. When they do, there will be repercussions for all social media and commenting style systems. HN won't escape this.

If people who want violence win the next set of elections, then that should also be of concern to hackers of websites. Take a look at the actions of the US president, after being called to task for breaking TOS.

With the geopolitical changes that will come about due to the coronavirus and upheaval that is beginning in the United States, it seems that social/web technology is central to geopolitics. It really stuns me that our conscientiousness to society, or lack thereof, isn't discussed far more often.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> While this is terrible, the special protections that journalists enjoy should apply to all citizens. If these weren't journalists but some poor random persons we wouldnt even know. Everyone can be a reporter nowadays thanks to technology, and there shouldn't be a class of officially recognized, untouchable arbiters of facts

</comment><comment><USER26> China's installing surveillance to spy on citizens. We need surveillance to spy on the government because without it, we are dead ducks.

<comment><USER27> That would be a pretty good idea. Just need to come up with some way to limit access to only the own citizens for sensitive information. Maybe if only certain trusted people had access, and they would do it as their job, and then they would report their findings, and investigate wrongdoings they found, and then we would give them money to be able to read those reports about government wrongdoings... hm, how could we call those people?

<comment><USER28> Internal Affairs? While I'd like to believe the IA exists to stop the police from doing wrong, it's more like an HR for the police.

<comment><USER27> I was going for "Journalists".

Interesting that people don't even seem to remember that those once existed

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Gradual militarisation of US police is one significant development since 9/11.

</comment><comment><USER30> So you have multiple crews, and bring out each one as they each get arrested?

<comment><USER31> Actually they did have multiple crews. The other CNN crew was positioned in a similar way didn't have any Black people in it and the police didn't arrest them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> American police showing their true colors on live National TV.

</comment><comment><USER33> Context is huge in cases like this, and I still haven't seen a video showing the beginning of the reporters' confrontation[1]. Does anyone have a link to a video that shows what happened prior to the videos that are being widely publicized?

[1] This one shows a bit more at the beginning, making it look like the crew had already been asked at least a few times to move: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvbXWAHad-4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvbXWAHad-4)

<comment><USER34> You're right, context is huge. The area had already been cleared of protesters. There was no imminent threat of any kind. The crew of a national news organization showed their valid credentials.

There is absolutely no excuse for this.

<comment><USER33> > You're right, context is huge. The area had already been cleared of > protesters. There was no imminent threat of any kind.

I'm asking if you or anyone else has video proof of that. Are national news organizations exempt from an order like this to move (I know in some cases they are, but again, the lack of contextual proof here makes me question what they were told _prior_ to what we've seen).

<comment><USER33> I know this is meta, but... seriously people, what's with all the downvotes? How could more information/context around a current event be a bad thing?

I've been watching what happens, at they always come almost exactly 2 minutes after I post something - on this _and_ another account I use. It's pretty clear that there's some downvote bot activity going on (in addition to the usual "haters").

<comment><USER35> I get that more context is always better, but the notion of "context" is infinitely expandable.

What were these reporters doing in the hour prior to the arrest? Oh, nothing? Well, where were they at the start of the riots? Just getting to the scene? Hmm well, what's the police officer's story; has he had bad experiences with the press in the past? And so on...

Most people have seen enough coverage of police officers doing unreasonable things in order to make a judgement call based off the provided context here. By asking for even more context, it comes across as though you're trying to cast doubt on this situation and undermine what's honestly a national issue at this point - hence the downvotes.

<comment><USER33> > Most people have seen enough coverage of police officers doing unreasonable > things in order to make a judgement call

Bingo! That's the problem. People are making "judgement calls" based on highly publicized, recent cases of police officers doing "unreasonable things". Those cases represent < 0.1% of the police officers in the country. Making judgement calls based on what others have done is called _prejudice_ , and last I checked, people are still innocent until proven guilty in this country. That goes for the reporters _and_ the officers involved.

As for the amount of context we have relative to the video that's been published, I think any reasonable judge would conclude that (1) the person operating the camera was almost certainly recording before what we've seen published, (2) the events on published video obviously seem to refer to events that happened _before_ what we see, and (3) those events that happened before are not just circumstantial details - they could easily swing the case in either direction. So yes, more context in this situation is absolutely necessary. Make no confusion - I'm not asking about what they ate for breakfast.

<comment><USER35> > People are making "judgement calls" based on highly publicized, recent cases > of police officers doing "unreasonable things".

Define recent? Uneven application of force from the police based off of race is a known issue, and has been one for quite some time. In the past decade or so we have been able to witness more of these incidents due to the ubiquity of smartphones, but look no further than policies like stop and frisk as examples that illustrate the unjust policing of minorities [1].

In business, we have a philosophy of building goodwill. We do things to establish trust with our users so that when we inevitably screw up, they will give us a pass. But it's important to remember that goodwill is a finite commodity. Screw up one too many times without making concessions, and you will no longer get the benefit of the doubt.

No one is debating that there are plenty of good officers in the US, the issue is with the bad ones, and the lack of repercussions/changes in policy to address them.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and- frisk_in_New_York_Cit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop-and- frisk_in_New_York_City)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Why is this flagged?

<comment><USER37> From the posting guidelines:

"What to Submit

On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off- topic. "

<comment><USER38> This is worthy of discussion here, though. This is a confusing and excessive use of authority—the implications of which are significant and alarming.

To that point, how does this situation get fixed? Personally, this seems like a total failure of local governments. This should have been a relatively easy situation to mitigate (arrest the officer involved with the murder, even if just for show to calm folks down).

Now that it's spiraled, we're seeing signs of a police state which is very ominous. The question, though, is how calculated is this? My rational mind tells me that this level of force isn't something planned or trained for; just a reaction to the current events.

But it does set a precedent and as a country, we should be absolutely on guard and discussing this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> No, this is not Russia, North Korea, China. This is the US, 2020.

<comment><USER40> Have you ever had an encounter with the police in China, North Korea, or Russia as a black person?

way way worse.

<comment><USER41> Why should US even be compared to those countries. It is a functional and mature democracy. Going through the thread I find it shocking that police brutality and unaccountablity is a common thing in USA.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Not an argument for this site I guess. But this is what happens when you have political leaders picking sides in violence. Trump literally tweeted "when the looting starts the shooting starts" (not before this event, of course -- it's an example). You think rhetoric like that doesn't have the effect of empowering police to abuse their power against people they don't like?

<comment><USER9> Police abuse their power when leaders pick sides? And what about the Mayor? Has he not chosen sides? He lambasted the riots, but has allowed it to continue. Actions and words.

<comment><USER22> The mayor doesn't have authority over the police.

<comment><USER43> Who does?

<comment><USER22> It will depend on the type of police force. In the case of a state police, it would be a combination of the state legislature and state judiciary. The real answer is surely lengthy and complicated, but suffice to say the mayor (thankfully) does not control the police... just as thankfully the president does not control the military.

<comment><USER44> I'd like to know exactly when the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces doesn't control the military.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> from the description of the YouTube video

> Black correspondent Omar Jimenez had just shown a protester being arrested > when about half a dozen white police officers surrounded him.

Is there any reason to assume racism? it looks like two other people in the camera crew got arrested and they don't look black. It looks to me like CNN is trying to play the race card to stir controversy when there are millions of other more likely explanations

<comment><USER12> The other team a block away was white and didn't get arrested.

<comment><USER23> If it was because the reporters here were 'too close' then that does kind of fit the narrative the cops gave, except they should have told them where they should go instead of arresting them of course.

Still, does not make it racism. Plenty of cops make bad decisions, it doesn't make them all racist.

<comment><USER12> > If it was because the reporters here were 'too close' then that does kind of > fit the narrative the cops gave

They were live on TV, so you can tell the cop's explanation was BS. When told they had to move, the reporter asked where was OK, at which point he was arrested. The crew was given no chance to comply with the orders.

<comment><USER23> Cutting off my post right before I say "except they should have told them where they should go instead of arresting them of course." is incredibly misleading.

<comment><USER12> Not really, because that clause does nothing to excuse the first clause.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Technological solution: Attach a laser to a gimbal camera. use YOLOv3 or similar to target the eyes of cops or armed persons within 100foot radius. Set up a few gimbal with mutually reinforcing fields of fire. If they can't see, they can't shoot. Everyone is safe with no killing.

<comment><USER47> If they can't see, and do shoot, no one is safe.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> What happened to Floyd is horrible and police abuse is a real thing. I never understood why police officers in the US have no common sense. I recall many incidents where they shoot and kill people trying to escape (so no threat to them). I'm happy the public is doing something about it.

However, I'm also annoyed by the stupidity of many people who blindly yell racism. Not so long ago there was a naked black male (Harvard student) walking down the streets of Cambridge, MA. Police came and arrested him. He refused arrest so they have to use force, but it was reasonable force required to arrest someone who is refusing arrest. People filmed the incident and next day many accused the police for racism. WTF!? I watched the film and there was nothing out of the ordinary. We should support good police officers and not assume all are bad and racist. They risk their life to defend us and our communities (white and black and everyone else).

<comment><USER49> Fun Fact: A court determined it was legal for the NYPD to discriminate against hiring police officers that had IQs too high.

[https://abcnews.go.com/US/court-oks-barring-high-iqs- cops/st...](https://abcnews.go.com/US/court-oks-barring-high-iqs- cops/story?id=95836)

<comment> non-entity Anecdotal of course, but I was discussing this with someone who told me their cousin, despite being bipolar (although currently treated) and a raging racist online was being recruited by local police offices.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> So, state police -- on a loudspeaker -- are "ordering" people to "leave the street immediately."

The reporter admits he was told "to clear the area."

The loudspeaker -- again -- explicitly states to "go back in the direction you came from."

The reporter admits on air that they were "requested to move back."

The cameraman also admits on air that "We were just out here reporting the CLOSURE OF THE STREETS."

The dumbasses -- despite all this -- refused to get off the street, instead saying things like "we COULD move back to where you'd like..."

Being a reporter does not give you special permission to violate a direct order by state police in the middle of a riot (with a burning building in the background.)

If you're told to get off the street, get off the street... IMMEDIATELY. If you don't, you'll get arrested.

<comment><USER12> He was released 30 minutes later with the governor admitting it was a bad arrest.

<comment><USER50> Whether they are charged with a crime is up to the governor, ultimately.

But, the state police -- if they order a street closed -- are well within their rights to CLEAR the street. If the person won't budge, they can forcibly remove them. Which they did. That is being 'arrested.' There are no exceptions for reporters.

<comment><USER12> The reporter was complying; he was asking which direction they should go when he was arrested.

<comment><USER50> How much time should the police give him to decide whether to walk 10 feet to the left, or 10 feet to the right?

Three minutes?

Five minutes?

An hour?

The cameraman was literally STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STREET while stating that they were there to report on the CLOSURE OF THE STREET.

<comment><USER51> The cameraman was literally standing where directed to stand by the police.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> I don't have an issue with this.

Both the police and the reporters were calm and polite. The police told them they had to clear the street and instead of obeying the order they asked to let them know when they were going to actually walk down the street. Since they refused to obey the order they were detained and escorted out of the way.

Being a reporter does not give you a free pass to disobey orders, specially during situations like that. Being a police offer also does not give you the right to mistreat people of course, but in this video everyone actually behaved very well.

<comment><USER53> On some level the people involved here were civil, but it seems like a pretty dire problem when the police want to get rid of journalists.

It would be great if the police could figure out how to serve the public in a way where they could be proud of their work and want the journalists to help the world see the good work they're doing.

<comment><USER52> Of course I agree, but it reminds me of a situation many years back where I live.

There was a big protest and people started throwing rocks at the police, and the media were in the middle of the police at that moment. It actually made the police's response much slower and dangerous because they first protected the media and escorted them out from the protesters range, before charging and arresting people.

I'm sure they have trained some protocol to how to control mobs, and throwing innocent civilians in the mix wrecks the whole thing.</comment></comment></comment>


Emblr, the Ember.js Resources Tumblr - <AUTHOR> http://emberjs.tumblr.com/

<comment><USER2> Brilliant. There don't appear to be a ton of resources available for Ember despite being a fairly awesome framework.

I've found the best resource for me is to blog about my own misadventures and wait for people to correct me. In the process, I'm (hopefully) helping populate resources for the fledgeling developers while advancing my own skills.

Another good meta resource is the Code 418 dashboard, found here: <http://code418.com/ember.js-dashboard/> (Also, its source code was pretty good reading too).

<comment><USER3> I've found hanging around on StackOverflow and the #emberjs IRC channel to be very useful, if only just to try and answer every question I see as an opportunity to learn.

I didn't know about the dashboard so I've just added it to the Tumblr, thanks!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Will Covid encourage a once in a lifetime creativity surge from WFH? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> For somebody, somewhere, yes.

I do know some organizations that have been forced to hire remote have found that lifting geographic restrictions can take the stress and difficulty out of hiring. Some of those organizations won't go back, particularly if there are "ratchets" in place such as being in an area with expensive office space and housing.

</comment><comment><USER3> It will encourage lots of things, many good and probably many bad as well. It's certainly going to shake things up. I just wish I knew what direction it would go in.

</comment><comment><USER4> Only for so long. I think people are going to burn out after a while. This isn't a decades-long-tested means of running a society. Hopefully we will continually adapt.</comment>


Advice for Non-Technical Founders: Stop Learning To Code - <AUTHOR> http://www.zackyap.com/post/30576428363/advice-for-non-technical-founders-stop-learning-to

<comment><USER2> Great advice! As a tech founder, I can build anything but I can't market for crap. Not only can't I do it, but I hate doing it. Don't get in my way and I won't get in yours, my non-tech partner. We'll go to some great places!</comment>


When to Mock - <AUTHOR> http://blog.8thlight.com/uncle-bob/2014/05/10/WhenToMock.html <comment><USER2> This was a great read. I find this approach to be the path of least resistance with languages like C#, but for Python or Ruby, I always find myself using a mock framework. That overhead in structure (classes, interfaces etc.) feels like it adds very little in dynamic languages and generally the mock syntax can be quite readable (notably RSpec mocks).

<comment><AUTHOR> I must admit I work in C# and with the static experience, but I'd be nervous to use mocks when the implementation might not match the api of the mock anymore, because you don't get errors if the thing your mocking changes.</comment></comment>


Why-did-you-update – Warnings about unnecessary React updates - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/garbles/why-did-you-update <comment><USER2> This is a pretty useful utility. I have a number of other similar "why did this component re-render" tools listed in the "DevTools" section [0] of my Redux addons list [1]. I also have a large section of articles on React (and Redux) performance [2] in my React/Redux links list [3], which includes articles on measuring perf using various tools, optimizing re-renders, and more.

[0] [https://github.com/markerikson/redux-ecosystem- links/blob/ma...](https://github.com/markerikson/redux-ecosystem- links/blob/master/devtools.md#component-update-monitoring) .

[1] [https://github.com/markerikson/redux-ecosystem- links](https://github.com/markerikson/redux-ecosystem-links)

[2] [https://github.com/markerikson/react-redux- links/blob/master...](https://github.com/markerikson/react-redux- links/blob/master/react-performance.md)

[3] [https://github.com/markerikson/react-redux- links](https://github.com/markerikson/react-redux-links)

</comment><comment><USER3> Alternatively: Make all data immutable, then make all components pure. Finally, look for and fix breaking components, since those will point to code smells and anti-patterns (using context incorrectly, mutating data, non- unidirectional data flow).

Not only do you get a big performance boost, but your code is greatly improved.

<comment><USER4> > Not only do you get a big performance boost,

Depends on the size of your data. AFAIK handling immutable data has a performance penalty on smaller datasets. Before I go immutable I first assess whether I really need it.

<comment><USER2> It's important to note that there's a difference between "handling data immutably" and "using the Immutable.js library". It's completely possible to handle plain JS data immutably _without_ using Immutable.js.

There's a few different reasons why handling data immutably in a React app is a good thing. The main one is that it allows straightforward implementation of `shouldComponentUpdate` by simply doing shallow equality checks against props and state to see if anything has changed. (I wrote a Reddit comment yesterday explaining why that works well, at [https://www.reddit.com/r/reactjs/comments/666uin/can_someone...](https://www.reddit.com/r/reactjs/comments/666uin/can_someone_explain_to_me_what_are_the_advantages/) ).

<comment><USER5> You don't need to write shallow equality checks on each component if you're treating props/state as immutable. You can use React's PureComponent which automatically does this for you: [https://facebook.github.io/react/docs/react- api.html#react.p...](https://facebook.github.io/react/docs/react- api.html#react.purecomponent)

<comment><USER2> Which does the exact kind of shallow equality checks I was just describing :) The point is that for shallow equality checks to work properly, you do have to handle data immutably - such as using `someArray.concat(item)` instead of `someArray.push(item)`, because otherwise passing in the same references is interpreted as "nothing as changed".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Unfortunately, this package hasn't been updated for a long time, which makes is almost useless today. For instance, it doesn't know how to track functional components - that's really a pity.

For alternative re-rendering troubleshooting, read [https://medium.com/dailyjs/react-is-slow-react-is-fast- optim...](https://medium.com/dailyjs/react-is-slow-react-is-fast-optimizing- react-apps-in-practice-394176a11fba)

<comment><USER7> Won't functional components update on any change to props?

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Not a front-end dev here, but I thought the whole point of a virtual DOM was to allow you to refresh the whole interface all the time and allow the library to only render the differences. Wouldn't this tool negate that purpose?

<comment><USER9> Here's how React works, in very broad strokes:

You have some data (props and state) that defines the current state of your program. This data is passed to a rendering function, which creates a virtual DOM representation of the component based on the data. After this has happened, the virtual DOM is diffed against the previously built virtual DOM to see if we should tell the browser to render the real DOM based on the new virtual one.

So the general cycle works like this:

Data was updated -> virtual render -> diff new virtual DOM vs old virtual DOM -> real render if necessary.

However, both constructing the virtual DOM as well as diffing the DOMs takes considerable amounts of time. That's why React offers a short-cut to avoid it, if necessary: shouldComponentUpdate. This lifecycle method is called after your data updates and before the virtual render takes place, allowing you to short-circuit the process if you already know that your data didn't change in a way that changes the resulting DOM.

So with the short-circuit, there are two general pathways. If you know the data didn't affect the DOM:

Data was updated -> return false in shouldComponentUpdate -> nothing more happens.

If you know the data affects the DOM or you're not sure:

Data was updated -> return true in shouldComponentUpdate -> virtual render -> diff new virtual DOM vs old virtual DOM -> real render if necessary.

The value of the tool is that it monkey-patches some React internals to notify you when you have missed a chance to use shouldComponentUpdate properly.

<comment><USER2> Good explanation, with one nitpick: the diff is done between the _old_ virtual DOM tree and the _new_ virtual DOM tree, not between the virtual DOM tree and the real DOM. That's why you can have a component that renders a single div, and then get the reference to the real DOM node and use jQuery or some other DOM-manipulating library to attach non-React-based DOM elements to the div. As far as React knows, you're just telling it to keep rendering that same div, so nothing needs to change.

<comment><USER9> Thanks for pointing that out, I've updated my comment to fix the mistake.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Author of the Benchling mixin / blog post, here. Thanks for including the credit and for making this technique more easily usable!

I'm quite happy that this is being utilized by so many people :-)

</comment><comment><USER11> Another kit along these lines is [https://github.com/leoasis/redux-immutable- state-invariant](https://github.com/leoasis/redux-immutable-state-invariant)

While in development mode it warns of changes to the Redux state, without having to commit to something like Immutable.js.

</comment><comment><USER12> Words like "bruh" and "gainz" send a signal that is probably better off un- sent.

<comment><USER13> It's probably a better indicator of their audience, the in-group. I don't know how old you are, but this is what it's like to become a square.

The thing is, if you don't like it and get stuck on lingo, there's a good chance you're going to be left behind by the future. Your complaint is a symptom of falling into the out-group of the cutting edge, into becoming part of The Previous Generation.

<comment><USER14> Disagree.

Professionals push back towards professionalism, which should be free from micro-culture in jokes. The profession is international, and there are many indulging in this who do not have the perspective to recognize the actual cost of insularity.

More to the point bro-grammer crap is explicitly barrier-raising. Clique-based behavior, however graced with knowing winks, led directly to the current crisis of culture in the Valley in general, and start-up culture in particular.

As such it is most definitely at best in the category of funny-once.

And the joke played out long ago.

<comment><USER15> Says who? Who determines what professionalism means?

Because I have a definition that states you use the best tool for the job at hand, rather than choosing (yes, _choosing_ ) to complain loudly about poorly- described-and-argued ancillary matters which don't directly impact the operation of said tool.

I reject the idea that "professionalism" means that the cheeky, mischevious humor that has basically defined the hacker spirit for decades must be stamped out or suppressed.

<comment><USER16> So where do we draw the line when that "cheeky, mischievous humor" actually excludes people from our community?

Words _matter_. There are plenty of studies that show e.g. certain language in job listings discourages women from applying: [https://qz.com/797559/gender- bias-job-listings-language/](https://qz.com/797559/gender-bias-job-listings- language/)

<comment><USER15> _So where do we draw the line when that "cheeky, mischievous humor" actually excludes people from our community?_

When it can be reasonably proven that this is _actually happening_ in _this case_. A reasonable start would be finding a real (as opposed to straw) person who feels "excluded".

If "bruh" is legitimately "excluding people from the community" _in this context_ (And let's be honest here: a job posting is not equivalent in any way to a readme on a git repo), then by all means, let's have the conversation.

If it isn't? This is all just noise. Worse, actively harmful and distracting noise.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Oh. I thought it would question your unneccessary update of dependencies that didn't close any bugs or introduce new features but require you 3 days to change code according to a new API.

<comment><USER18> If it took you 3 days to update React then you should definitely look at jscodeshift. It should have taken you a few hours at most regardless of the size of your codebase.

<comment><USER17> Everything I know about React I know from HN. Guilty, criticizing tech I've never used - but it's more about the whole constant update mentality than React in particular.

<comment><USER19> I worked with Node all the time and have not really found this to be a problem unless the package maintainer fails to publish a change log or fails to follow semvar correctly.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Bad Interview Experience. Was I at fault here? - <AUTHOR> I had an interview recently with a YC company which left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not going to name names here but here's what went down.
After a couple missed appointments from the CEO and multiple reminders from me, I finally managed to get on a call with them. I sometimes have spotty reception in my house so the call got disconnected the first time. I called back, explained the network issues, but they hung up in middle of the conversation. I called back but I wasn't able to reach them. So, I sent a text and waited for a callback. They did call back again, hung up while I was speaking. I called back again to no avail. I felt pretty bad at this rudeness. I gave up and sent an email to say that they could email me if they wanted to continue while apologizing for spotty reception. I tweeted at their twitter account and complained about the rude interview.
I got an email from CTO a few days later, which resulted in a couple more rounds of seamless and painless interviewing. The CEO emails me after and let me know that they wanted to fly me into their office at very short notice(3-4 days), and booked tickets after my approval. I get a phone call the next day from their employee, who noticed the tweet I'd made earlier and asked to take it down. I took it down as requestedand asked them who I could talk to to know more about the upcoming interciew. I was asked to call the CEO, who picked up and let me know they'd call me back. I got an email a couple hours later that said: "We had some internal discussion about you and decided you aren't a good cultural fit, and therefore, won't be moving forward with the process. We will be canceling the flight tickets as well." I posted here because I'd like to know if I was in the red here for tweeting at them about the rude interview experience. So, what could I have done better here and how can I avoid such situations in the future? <comment><USER2> There's not enough details here to give a fair analysis, or useful response, I think.

Seems to me that you assume a few things; (1) that the CEO is not insanely busy, (2) that they hung up on you a few times, when it could be any number of technical issues, (3) that they are not human, and able to maintain optimism and momentum through multiple disconnects without giving up.

Also seems to me that you wrote that tweet out of frustration, while if you had waited a day and let yourself cool down, you probably would have worded it differently, or not written it at all.

Of course, I have no idea what the tweet said, so this is just pure speculation.

As for what you could do differently, I'd say: be somewhere with better reception while doing phone interviews, and if the other party misses lots of appointments, assume that they're (a) new to their job/role, and/or (b) very busy - but they've still indicated that they want to talk to you, so actively remember that each time you feel let down.

<comment><AUTHOR> I don't have screenshots of the tweet but it said: "Just had the rudest interview with @company. No. 1 rule in tech: Don't be a dick"

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It sounds to me like you're leaving out some context. That said, you should've known better than to tweet about your interview process.

Also, if you know you have bad reception at home, why on Earth would you take a scheduled call there? Go somewhere with better reception in advance. Sit in your car and take the call if you have to.

<comment><AUTHOR> There's nothing left here that's between the lines. I made . the description concise cause there's a 2000 character limit. The network issues happen quite rarely and honestly, are not even a thing most of the time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> An angry public tweet would be enough reason for most companies to stop hard - even if they had already interviewed you and you'd passed with flying colors.</comment>


Ask HN: How to ask companies about problems they are facing? - <AUTHOR> I have a hypothesis about broad problems companies are facing which I am planning to solve. In order to validate it, I need to ask many companies about if they are facing similar problems and if they are willing to discuss it. I have already reached out to my network and got responses. Apart from that, I am mostly cold emailing companies hiring for positions to solve these problems but haven't got significant responses to cold emails. What would be good way to ask about it? <comment><USER2> If you want to ask companies about problems they're facing you'll need to learn sales. I've been a freelancer for 12 years and these books changed my life...

* How to Become a Rainmaker: The Rules for Getting and Keeping Customers and Clients by Jeffrey J. Fox

* The Dollarization Discipline: How Smart Companies Create Customer Value...and Profit from It by Jeffrey J. Fox

* The Brain Audit: Why Customers Buy (And Why They Don't) by Sean D'Souza

* The Ultimate Sales Letter: Attract New Customers. Boost your Sales by Dan S. Kennedy

* The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation by Mathew Dixon and Brent Adamson

Also watch a few Gary Vaynerchuck Keynotes and you'll get ideas on how to add value first, specifically read this blog post [https://www.garyvaynerchuk.com/working-for-free-the- debate/](https://www.garyvaynerchuk.com/working-for-free-the-debate/)

<comment><USER3> Which broad problems did this enable you to understand or solve better?

<comment><USER2> First: Don't talk about yourself they don't care.

Second: Talk about business to them. For example talk about how many more products they're going to sell because of your solution. I always ask, "So how is business going?"

I also do my homework on the business. I look them up on the Linkedin, twitter etc. (and I read up on them seriously) and see what their office looks like on Google Maps. If they're successful then I want to work with them. If they're struggling I don't work with them. I used to work with a ton of clients who didn't even make one sale. Once I targeted the right customers all I had to prove was that I can increase their business and make an impact.

Last: Be different. Make sure that everything you say to them is the first time they've ever heard it. This is critical because if you sound like every other person sending cold emails or cold calling etc. you'll get sent to the spam folder.

Reading those books teach you lessons you'll never learn unless you've been in the author's shoes. So by reading these books you get to look over the shoulder of giants and use their knowledge in your business.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> First off, you can't talk 'to a company', but will need a specific idea on who's the person / function you want to get feedback from. Companies aren't people ;)

Cold email / LinkedIn should actually work fairly well for this. If it doesn't, your approach might not be specific enough, the person you're targeting might not be the right person OR your problem hypothesis is flawed.

Re: general approach, I've seen great response rates with a template like this one below.

Hi <NAME>

It looks like you're an expert on <SPECIFIC FIELD YOU'RE SOLVING A PROBLEM FOR> \- I would love to get your opinion on something I've been working on.

<ONE SENTENCE TEASER>

I'm not looking to sell anything at this point, but would love to understand if something like this would actually help you with your job. I don't want to build the wrong thing!

Would you be willing to hop on a brief call with me sometime in the next week? This would only take a few minutes and if we're onto something, you'd be the first to know about it.

Best, X

<comment><AUTHOR> Well we are thinking of some specific problems related to data science. Developers, Product managers, marketing folks would benefit immensely from this and naturally all of them could give feedback from their own perspectives. Decision makers might be VP, Founders. Currently I am writing to founders of startups.

This email looks great. Will try it out and tweak based on who I am getting feedback from. Thanks !!

<comment><USER5> Don't sell to someone who doesn't feel the pain. If the developers feel the pain but a VP has to be on board, get the developer to be a fanatical user of yours then advocate on your behalf. They'll have more sway than you.

See: Github, Slack

<comment><AUTHOR> Well little hard in my case since service I am offering, developer himself cant approve to use it (as it involves company data). Agree about enterprise- consumer approach for products like github, slack. We might think of some variation of this approach after we validate problem. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> __I am mostly cold emailing companies hiring for position __

One very large mistake you 're making is assuming that companies make any decisions. They don't. People at companies make decisions. So here are some steps to follow.

Step 1. Find "right company".

Step 2. Find "right person" @ "right company". This person should personally gain something by your product. i.e. spend less time doing something they hate, look good to their boss. Linkedin can be super helpful for this.

Step 3. Figure out how to get "right person" on the phone. This could be shmoozing the secretary(called gatekeeper in sales), or e-mailing someone higher in the organization and asking for a downward referral. "Hey CEO, we want to save you lots of money via data science. Who is the best person in your org to talk about this opportunity?"(It's always easier to get a downward referral. Your boss is usually much more willing to waste your time with a sales call then you are to waste his.)

<comment><USER7> This is great advice, I want to add to this:

> This person should personally gain something by your product. i.e. spend > less time doing something they hate, look good to their boss. Linkedin can > be super helpful for this.

to include "This person should be someone who might be the _purchaser_ of your product" (e.g. the person who can buy it, since they're the person you need to convince)

<comment><AUTHOR> In a lot of cases two are not the same. User of your product (person who is going to benefit the most) might not be same as purchaser (VP or founder)

<comment><USER6> This means you're going to have a really hard time selling this product until you figure out how your product can benefit the purchaser.

Ever wonders why it seems like a bunch of products spend so much time and effort on useless reporting that only one dude looks at on a dashboard once a month for 5 minutes? This is why :).

Also think about how the benefits to your target audience role up to purchaser. Is that through reduced turnover, increased sales, enhanced developer productivity?

Basically instead of pitching the data science guy and saying "Hey you know this thing you do, that you hate that takes a lot of time. Well use my product and do less of that!!" Pitch the owner and say "Hey you know those expensive data science guys you write big checks to every month to solve data science problems, well they're wasting a bunch of their time and your money doing this "thing". Well our product means they spend less time doing that "thing" and more time solving data science problems that makes you money. If we could show that we free up 33% of your data scientists time to work on your "business problem" would you be willing to pay $1000 for that?"

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Two reactions:

1) Companies can rarely articulate the problems they're facing. They know the _pain_ they're feeling, but not necessarily why. If they know the problem, they're either a) working on a solution, b) thinking about it in a different way than you might be, and/or c) wrong.

So get to the _symptoms_ of the problem you're trying to solve, and see if those are big enough pain points. This also helps you focus on your _value_. If the pain point you're solving is low on my priority list or low-ROI, I'm not going to pay you to solve it.

2) You're not talking about sales, you're talking about _market research_. So the sales comments here are good, but the question I'll ask you is: _" What value are you creating for your contacts?"_

You're asking people for their precious time and not offering anything in return. A hypothetical solution to their problem at some point in the future is not value. The only reason I take that call is the goodness of my heart (e.g., my friend introduced you and asked if I could help you... I'm doing _them_ a favor, not you).

What's their feedback worth? And what's the value of their time? You might have some success with a "paid" survey (Starbucks gift card, swag, etc.): your question then becomes right-sizing the benefit to the individual. A CEO doesn't care about your T-shirt.

<comment><AUTHOR> Would it help if I offer my expertise into solving their problem in the beginning? I would love to get early customers and chance to work with them closely go get more learning, so can also assume its kind of sale email

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm gonna go ahead and give the saltiest response you can imagine.

You can't ask companies about what problems they are facing. You can only ask individuals, and their responses will be colored by their perspective.

If you talk to the people that have the power to fix the problems, you're going to get the perspective of ladder climbers that can only ever tell you what problems should be solved in order to further _their_ career.

If you want to solve problems that the _company_ is facing, you will only find the problems by asking the people that are powerless to solve them. Mostly people on the ground floor that work in the trenches solving massive problems on an ad hoc but daily basis, but occasionally people that are higher up but marooned and destined to be fired at some point.

An example from my past: A VP tasked with improving operations performance saw some bottlenecks in warehouse employee productivity, and a potential solution in a robotics product. He ended up betting his career on outright buying the robotics _company_ , without even testing out the _product_ in the company's warehouses. As it turned out, integrating the product was extremely difficult...it involved tradeoffs that forced re-arranging how products were stored, what product mixes could be stored in which warehouses, how inventory was modeled and managed, and how inventory was surfaced to the customer. Basically, the product improved worker productivity by small margins, and increased inventory, software, and most of all logistics costs dramatically. BTW, those logistics cost increases overshadowed the productivity gains by a 5:1 margin. But he accomplished his goal, and any criticism of how he accomplished it is just a detail to manage. If you ask someone in Ops, they will say they need to make a few major software improvements. If you ask someone in software, they will say they need better QA and access to the robotics engineers, and to simplify their logistics for easier modeling. If you ask someone in inventory management, you'll need bigger warehouses and major re-organization of warehouse inventory design. If you ask someone in logistics, they will say they need to re-arrange the warehouses better. If you ask the VP, you'll need incremental improvements in robot speed. If you ask the VP's boss, he'll say he doesn't care, as long as he gets improvement.

But funnily enough, if you ask the guy who was the technical architect at the acquired robotics company, he'll say you need to cut your losses, revert course until you can recover your logistics costs, and either invest massive development in a different technology with a better fit to the application, or buy a different company that already had it developed. He got fired for saying this, by the way. No way the VP could ever be made to admit to his mistake. To this day, the VP talks to the press about how much money they're saving due to this thingamajigger that he bought. He'll take it to his grave.

<comment><USER10> I couldn't up vote this enough. I recently had an interesting encountered with a Senior Director who argued that his quarter million pound project was never supposed to reduce any of the work required to actually delivered the final product.

Since he was cornering us to take the blame, I showed him the mirror and proved him wrong with evidence. Conversation immediately shifted to our contract renewal which is due shortly :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> What if you mentioned those problems you're trying to solve here? Your target is likely reading this thread.

</comment><comment><USER12> You might ask about their daily routine. (I'm assuming you want to create a software to solve these problems. ) "What are the first two tasks you perform everyday?" "What are the most repetitive tasks you find yourself performing during your day?" "How do you use Microsoft Excel/Number/Google Sheets/...?" "By looking at your inbox, what are the most compelling task you need to perform today?"

Pain is often found in repetitive and reoccuring task. Asking them about how they use excel might opena whole new scenario about how they're struggling to solve some tasks that could be easily solved by a software

</comment><comment><USER13> The best approach for me is finding a shared connection that will do an intro:

* It validates you * It puts the other person "on the hook". Not good form to completely ignore an introduction.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah even for me priority is if someone from network has connections. Cold emails to get more reach on feedback where I could not find any shared connections :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I think it depends a lot on the kind of problem(s) you are imagining solving. Saving money? Talk to the CFO. Making money? CEO, VP/sales, etc.

<comment><USER15> It's a very HN view of "companies" that one can simply "Talk to the CFO ... CEO, VP/sales, etc.".

<comment><USER16> With good reason - those people _are_ accessible if you go about things the right way. In this particular case I don't you'd get very far because "What problems do you have?" is far too open a question. If you ask something specific and you make it straightforward to reply then you'll often get something back.

<comment><AUTHOR> Would they be willing to spare their precious time to talk for some time? They might not be directly aware of gravity of problem if people who face it directly are engineers, PM's. In that case, would it be wise to ask them to point to correct person to talk to?

<comment><USER11> In this case start with the employee who sees the issue daily. If it's a real pain and your solution is good it will move up the chain of command

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> You can't ask what problem they are facing (I'm assuming that you are going to sell something). You have to identify what problems are you solving with your product/s, then research about the company (As much as Possible) and learn what problem they might face. Now approach them (Any person who might be a decision maker of that company) with your solution.

</comment><comment><USER18> I've used this for a basic market research survey:

[https://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/home](https://www.google.com/insights/consumersurveys/home)

If your not interested in the leads you can run one of these surveys and get basic answers. There is a small business filter now.

</comment><comment><USER19> Instead of asking these questions, observe their behavior when you share a "solution" to the problem with them. Even if nothing is built, you can see if they bite. If they do, you can interpret the level of signal.

</comment><comment><USER20> get a job at the companies having problems.

</comment><comment><USER21> Sounds like a product.</comment>


Ask HN: Should I leave my investment banking job to join Palantir? - dolev-yao

I have recently been approached by a recruiter from Palantir. I have spent a year and a half doing technology M&A for a notorious investment bank (studied CompSci in uni, went into banking primarily to pay off student debt and for the learning curve).
I feel like I'm at a crossroads. My peers are gunning for the usual private equity/ hedge fund jobs, which pay handsomely. On the other hand, I find Palantir's tech and work incredibly interesting.
I've been offered a Deployment Strategist position in Europe or the UAE. Though there is very little information out there on what exactly the job entails, on promotion/ responsibility policies and compensation.
Is there anyone who could offer some advice? <comment><AUTHOR> You don't mention anything about what drives you or what you'd like to be doing. So I will just pose a few questions:

Is "interesting" worth a six figure opportunity cost per year by foregoing PE or hedge funds? Why do you think it is interesting? Are there other missions that may excite you more? Doesn't it seem a little quick to start evaluating solely based on this external actor (recruiter) contacting you? Maybe Google or Pinterest or Reddit or Watsi would also be interesting?

Are you happy with your lifestyle right now?

How does this tie to your larger aspirations? If 3 years of banking gets you a ticket to an MBA, or the right amount of capital for you to start a business, maybe it is worth staying.

More specific to Palantir: Do you have any ethical issues with Palantir's work? The company seems like it is doing a fair bit of soul searching about how its tools are used, and what its responsibility to the public is. I am not trying to answer this question nor prompt that discussion, but this may be an aspect of the work you should evaluate.

If you look around, you'll find Palantir has a hard salary cap, so your mention of compensation is likely to be a relatively underwhelming value compared to tech M&A work. Palantir isn't competing there.

Hope that helps.

</comment><comment><USER2> Last Sunday's New York Times has an article that contains a detailed analysis of the soul-searching that Palantir is undergoing as it expands. The article has interviews with the founder of Palantir and its recruiter. It also has photos of the office.

[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/business/unlocking- secrets...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/business/unlocking-secrets-if- not-its-own-value.html)

The article mentions a cap of $450,000 a year in compensation ($137,000 salary + bonus $15,000 + $300,000 stock).

My 2 cents worth of advice would be to take the job and see how it works out for a year. After that, you are free to decide to go or stay, but with much better information at hand to make your decision.

<comment><USER3> For the record, I'm not a recruiter (and was sad to see myself labeled as such). I've worked on the recruiting problem pretty extensively for Palantir, but I'm actually a software engineer. These days, my work tends towards writing about our technology and occasionally speaking in public but I'd hate to go down in history as a recruiter. (Not that there's anything wrong with recruiters).

<comment><USER2> Oh there's plenty wrong with recruiters. :-)

If you feel that your work has been wrongly portrayed, you can contact the New York Times, who will ensure that the article is corrected and updated accordingly.

[http://www.nytimes.com/pages/corrections/](http://www.nytimes.com/pages/corrections/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I worked for an investment bank (think MS, GS, JPM) in their tech department, building apps used by traders, so I think I was as close to "front office" as tech worker can get. Some found it hectic, but for me it was pretty fun answering traders' phone calls and complaints about why a certain column is in the red and why this and that number is fucked up, trying to calm this guys down and figuring out what the problem is at the same time. The coworkers were also encouraging too, so if one got upset at a trader, others would cheer the one up.

Having said that.... I now work for a tech company in west coast (think FB, Google), and I have to say I like it a lot better here. The reason being that you are treated as an employee that generates value for the company, as opposed to someone helping the important people (in my case, traders) generate value for the company. Now you have all these staff working to accommodate your needs, and at the same time the work is a natural extension to some of the CS theories you learn back in school.

</comment><comment><USER5> The way you phrase it makes it sound as if the choice is between a finance- domain path ("My peers are gunning for the usual private equity/ hedge fund jobs, which pay handsomely") vs. a technology-industry path. I have absolutely no doubt that you should stick to your job with Goldman / JPM and pursue advancement along that path; maybe do a CFA or MBA if that makes sense towards applying for roles that apply to your interest in finance.

Palantir is probably a pretty awesome and innovative tech company but unless you have a game plan to be someone special in tech or tech sales, the sheer amount of "flow" in the finance industry assures you that even the lemmings receive a good salary. If you're good, the sky is the limit.

One reason you may consider leaving Wall Street is if you are working on something that is obviously ethically wrong. In that case, it's not just a matter of pure money.

</comment><comment><USER6> Just wanted to chime in that your options are not limited to staying at your current job or Palantir. If you are a successful technologist in a bank, and you have a standing offer from Palantir, then you are clearly in demand. The industry standard for engineers right now is actually to get pings from recruiters every few days, and to have many opportunities available (at least in major cities and tech centers).

So do some soul-searching about what industry you want to be in, what sort of company you'd like to work for, and where you'd like your career to go, and then decide whether to stay, leave, or look around.

</comment><comment><USER7> If there's no information on what the job entails or even compensation it's probably a bit premature to move halfway across the world and take a pay cut in the hope the work will be as interesting (and not _at all_ related to the military-industrial complex) as the PR suggests...

</comment><comment><USER8> Executing interesting work is its own reward. While handsome pay is often the trade-off for dealing with days and years of drudgery and despair.

You have more options-- besides Palantir, who else is doing important/interesting work? The more players you dialog with, the better chance you'll make an informed decision.

</comment><comment><USER9> Former recruiter for hedge funds here. Switch banks, roles or cities but stay in finance. Its difficult to get back in once you are out, and while I agree Palantir has incredibly cool products, its a better long term career move to find a way to work with the software from within an investment bank or fund than as a consultant. Others may disagree, and be right.

<comment> dolev-yao Thanks for the advice. The problem is that I can't say I'm that interested in finance per se, I'm a tech nerd at heart and see myself more setting up a startup down the road rather than playing out the traditional finance career. Venture capital could be a good compromise, though, and am looking into some options.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Always always always go for the role that offers more challenge. Life is always about the risk not taken.</comment>


How I Got A Job Fourteen Days After My Coding Bootcamp - <AUTHOR> https://www.freecodecamp.org/news/how-i-got-a-job-two-weeks-after-my-coding-bootcamp-2/ <comment><USER2> You too can achieve your goals and dreams with this easy two step process.

1\. Be Attractive.

2\. Don't be unattractive.</comment>


Show HN: Netflix, Prime, Twitch, etc. video speed controller extension - <AUTHOR> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/speedify-video-speed-cont/pldkddbkbcedophgedaeofceedjcaehl?authuser=1 <comment><AUTHOR> This works on all websites, no exception. We do not track user's data.

Improvements: Include in-app speed control buttons and quality control buttons. Suggest if any more should be included.</comment>


Ask HN: Share Your Linkedin Profiles - <AUTHOR>

I've never really been a huge fan of linkedin. Mainly due to the fact that i'd never given it the time of day.
After playing around with it a little bit this weekend though, i see how it could be useful.
I'd like to connect with fellow hn'ers who are on it and present the opportunity for anyone else who'd like to share their profiles to do so.
So.. Let's Connect!
Here's mine: http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tapha
Cheers!
Tapha
EDIT: Please make your link clickable. <comment><USER2> <http://www.linkedin.com/in/kirpekar>

Open networker, will accept all invitations

</comment><comment><USER3> <http://linkedin.com/in/michaelfryedeveloper>

</comment><comment><USER4> <http://www.linkedin.com/in/philliprhodes>

</comment><comment><USER5> <http://www.linkedin.com/in/urrutia>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Clickable: <http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tapha>

</comment><comment><USER6> <http://ca.linkedin.com/in/gobhi>

</comment><comment><USER7> <http://nz.linkedin.com/in/mikeeem></comment>


Governments Haven't Shown Location Surveillance Would Help Contain Covid-19 - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/03/governments-havent-shown-location-surveillance-would-help-contain-covid-19 <comment><USER2> > those measures must be scientifically rigorous, and based on the expertise > of public health professionals.

This claim ("must be scientifically rigorous") isn't backed up by any further argument in the article, and I think that it's required to take the rest of the piece seriously. How could anybody make a scientific statement about the efficacy of mass surveillance? It's not possible to do a randomised control trial, and as far as I know the only data point we have is China.

<comment><USER3> You could trial it in a smaller community before rolling it out nationwide, is what I can think of off the top of my head.

<comment><USER2> I think that's a reasonable thing to do under normal circumstances. There are currently 27k confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the USA, and I expect that to double or more in the next 5 days (increase in infected, wider testing), so I don't think a small pilot is a reasonable thing to do under current circumstances.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> seeing as how the pandemic started and spread disastrously in one of the most authoritarian and highly surveilled states on the planet, it's hard to see these measures as anything other than attempt to further whittle away at the bill of rights while everyone is looking in the other direction. are we willing to give up habeas corpus and any semblance of a private life indefinitely if this turns into a seasonal illness?

</comment><comment><USER5> The Israelis recently passed an emergency law for tracking everyone with even suspected covid-19 infection:

[https://www.npr.org/2020/03/19/818327945/israel-begins- track...](https://www.npr.org/2020/03/19/818327945/israel-begins-tracking-and- texting-those-possibly-exposed-to-the-coronavirus)

We'll see how it works out. Imagine trying this in the US?

</comment><comment><USER6> So it makes sense to have these systems sunset in a year.</comment>


MongoHQ (YC S11) Raises $417K From Lerer And SV Angel - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/06/24/mongohq-raises-417k-from-y-combinator-lehrer-and-sv-angel/

<comment><USER2> Awesome work guys, congratulations!

Anyone who wants to leverage MongoDB without the massive headache of learning all the intricacies yourself (in addition to actually running and developing your startup) should check them out, we've been using them for a long time for all of our player data like leaderboards and user created levels, can't recommend them enough.

<comment><USER3> Off topic, but I some how knew I'd find a comment from you here. It sounds like you're still happy with their service. That's good to hear. :)

<comment><USER2> Yup, still loving them. The gigabytes keep coming in too, our main database there is ~20 gig now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Oh nice. I've been super happy using MongoHQ for bunches of apps. Everything from big Ars projects to crazy little side experiments.

</comment><comment><USER5> General question: these reports often state that YC took part in the funding. Does this refer to small investment as part of YCombinator, or some follow-on money?

</comment><comment><USER6> Congrats to MongoHQ.

I often wonder why the hosted Mongo services aren't offering dedicated servers yet. It seems like an easy opportunity to provide service, automation, and monitoring value add at a high price point. Is the thinking that most customers who would opt for the dedicated instance would just run it themselves to save money?

<comment><USER7> MonogoHQ is already doing this, not yet at scale. We're using one of those systems right now and have been nothing but pleased with MongoHQ - we've had occasional technical issues, but their team seems to be learning fast from these.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Congrats MongoHQ!

Been using their service for my app and have been completely happy with them. Great support also.

</comment><comment><USER9> I use their heroku addon. I had an issue on a Sunday evening and was not expecting it to be fixed until Monday. I went to watch a TV programme and come back 15 minutes later (ad break) to find that they had already fixed it! Congrats guys, you are awesome.

</comment><comment><USER10> Congrats Jason & Ben. This is great for the MongoDB ecosystem.

</comment><comment><USER11> These guys are really on the ball, and have great empathy for their users/customers. I'd certainly bet money on them.

</comment><comment><USER12> Congrats guys! We switched over to you a couple of months back and the service has been great so far :)

</comment><comment><USER13> Congrats! Just signed up for the free plan to dabble. Looks great so far. Very easy to manage.

</comment><comment><USER14> These guys are awesome ... great service and nice people. Congrats!

</comment><comment><USER15> Congratulations Jason and Ben!

</comment><comment><USER16> Congrats, I'm a big fan! Careful on the 100% uptime though

<comment><USER17> Admittedly, I think that something was lost in translation during the conversation. We are working with the writer to update that phrasing.

<comment><USER16> I figured that might have happened :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Congrats guys!</comment>


Fighting Poverty with Code - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/the-backer-army/fighting-poverty-with-code-d1ed3ebd982d

<comment><USER2> I don't know Javascript but I'm learning it on my own, by reading books and writing code.

However I know a whole bunch of other languages, tools and platforms.

I have a Physics degree.

But I cannot get a job because I am 51 years old - my grey hair is plainly apparent - and because I am quite open about being mentally ill.

The reason I went public with my illness was to benefit other mentally ill people.

In the US, it it flatly illegal to discriminate for reasons of employment against the mentally ill, or those who are 40 years of age or older.

A close friend advised me to remove the links to my essays about my condition from my website. No doubt it would be easier to find a job if I did; but the reason I leave those links there is that I feel it is more important that others read my writing than that I get a job:

[http://www.warplife.com/mdc/books/schizoaffective- disorder/](http://www.warplife.com/mdc/books/schizoaffective-disorder/)

Even so, it sucks to be poor.

It is also a tremendous waste of my expertise that I am not permitted to contribute. There is so much that I could teach the young people, that I am eager to teach, were I only to get a job offer.

Michael David Crawford, Senior Software Engineer [http://www.warplife.com/mdc/resume/](http://www.warplife.com/mdc/resume/)</comment>


Given Tablets But No Teachers, Ethiopian Kids Teach Themselves - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2012/10/29/tablets-ethiopian-children/

<comment><USER2> Great question and project. As young teen, if I'd had to choose between the internet as it exists today and going to school to learn, there'd be no contest.

I'd like to see many more websites for self-directed learning arise. They'd let students see and explore the whole scope of a subject so that they know whether they're missing anything they'd want to know more about. That and access to people who can answer their questions, and they'd only be limited by their motivations.</comment>


Ask HN: Should techempower.com framework benchmarks be taken seriously - <AUTHOR>

Looking at the results for "Tornado" in the "Multiple queries" test of "Round 8", does this mean we have to ditch it in favour of "Flask" for example? Or should we take these results with a pinch of salt? <comment><USER2> The benchmarks optimize along one, or at least a very few, axis. There are many things of varying importance when developing your system/site, and they will most likely be different than anyone else's. For example, your design may scale well across multiple systems, and developer time is at a premium, so squeezing the most performance out of the given hardware may be much less important than increasing programmer productivity. In those cases, a higher level language with a reduced development time may be a better fit.

Since the implementations in each language/framework are all available, you can look into the few that seem the most interesting base don your own criteria and get a quick idea of whether you think they would be a good fit for your criteria.

In that respect, I think the benchmarks can be taken seriously, as long as you don't their rankings to be an indicator of what's best. That is, don't consider it a benchmark, consider it a very thorough survey of available frameworks.

</comment><comment><USER3> You should take any results anywhere with a pinch of salt.

However, it's not that benchmarks are meaningless -- review their methods. If you can think of a way to test that they're not following, or find some flaw in their testing methodology, then tell them about it, and have them fix it (or post what's wrong somewhere), but they are pretty up front about HOW they test, so results should not surprise you, given enough knowledge of the frameworks involved (if they test something that flask is great at and tornado is not, that will be obvious given knowledge of how the test was conducted)

</comment><comment><USER4> Why would you switch from something at the very bottom of the list to something in the middle of the list?

Why are you even using Python if you are worried about performance?

<comment><AUTHOR> Python, IMHO, has a great collection of modules/frameworks for web application development (WTForms, SQLAlchemy, Jinja2, etc) so I'd prefer to have the "rendering/logic part" of the web application written in it. The performance challenges can be overcome by hooking up Python to "workers" written in Go, for instance, using Zeromq.

However I would have liked to take advantage of Tornado's asynchronous requests handling thus my disappointment with its performance in the said benchmarks. I wanted to avoid using "uwsgi" with Flask because of an already complex technology stack i.e: Nginx + uwsgi + Flask + zeromq + Go + sql/nosql database(s)</comment></comment>


Show HN: Thinker App – Automate Your Information Intake - <AUTHOR> https://thinkerapp.com/ <comment><USER2> Waiting for the android version too. Maybe make the Android button clickable which opens a popup and asks people to enter email ID so they can get an email when you finally launch it on android.

</comment><comment><USER3> I feel like it's better described as 'Filter your information intake' because according to what it says on the website, it highlights and extracts the non-(advertisy, rambly, clickbaity, etc) information.

I can't try it yet because there's no android version out unfortunately

</comment><comment><USER4> Imho it needs to be native to feel nice to use. It feels 100% web view and doesn't look very slick. Ie. At minimum swipe back and forth in the article stream. Right now it reveals the side bar, which is painful.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Hey HN! I built this app that basically reads articles for you.

I found I was opening too many HN articles and then never getting around to reading them, so I wrote a little script to help. I had tried bookmarking apps but they actually enabled my procrastination. I got some interest from friends, so I fleshed out the script into a small service, added some convenience features, and this is where I'm at.

Please hit me with any questions or feedback! I'd love to hear what you think.

I also added HACKER1 as a promo code in-app so HNers can get a free month of service :)

<comment><USER5> I took a look at the example articles and I just want to say that for a 13" macbook retina display with default 2x scaling at 1280x800, I found the font size to be a bit too small and thin. I personally liked it a bit more at font- size of 1.2em with a font-weight of 400, but that could use some fine tuning perhaps. I think the main issue is that using pt can be a problem, em/rem would display more consistently across screens.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Interesting app, I see you've got an Android app planned too, just curious if you're going cross platform and if so what you've created it with?</comment>


Life: Each Month Is a Box - <AUTHOR> http://i.imgur.com/39U4k.png <comment><USER2> Ron Graham in interview once said something like:

        If I draw a grid, 100 x 100, and crossed off
        a square every day, I probably won't get to
        cross them all off.

I've made it a habit to remember that every day, and to try to make sure that I'm working on stuff that matters, one way or another. It's all too easy to get caught up in the challenge of the moment, and not to take a step back and question whether this is the right thing to be doing.

There are times I do things that make me happy, because being happy and healthy are critical components in being able to do stuff that makes the world better, even if just by the tiniest amount. I'll never be a major player, or a recognised "world changer", but I do what I can to make it a little better for the people I meet.

<comment><USER3> Thanks for these words.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Why they are empty?</comment>


The Worst Case Scenario for Hurricane Irma Looks Likely - <AUTHOR> https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/forecast-hurricane-irma/?ex_cid=story-twitter <comment><USER2> I know i may escaping into engineering to avoid handling emotional strain- but i was wondering- how could future housing look like, that is hurrican proof?

Underground shelters are prone to floding. Flats on stilts are attacked by the wind. Boats as carrier plattform of homes are not economically feasible.

<comment><USER3> A farmhouse in Kansas is hurricane proof.</comment></comment>


Keyboardio kickstarter launch - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/keyboardio/the-model-01-an-heirloom-grade-keyboard-for-seriou

<comment><USER2> I've been following along since Jesse's earliest builds and blogposts (HN from 2yrs ago: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6891893](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6891893) ) so it's been awesome to see it turn into a real-deal hardware startup (ran into them in Shenzen while they were doing the Highway1 incubator) and for the KS to finally launch. Can't wait to get mine.

</comment><comment><USER3> The crafts that I spend all my time on are about text, and for me that means that they flow through keyboards. I'm absolutely thrilled to see someone taking on the project of making a fundamental tool like the keyboard so much better; it reminds me of how programming concepts from the '70s and '80s took a very long time to reach the mainstream consensus of working coders.

</comment><comment><USER4> "We've scoured the globe, testing dozens of different keyswitches from companies including Cherry, Unicomp, Greetech, Kailh, Gateron and Razer before selecting what we believe to be some of the best keyswitches made today: the Matias Quiet Click mechanical keyswitches."

Has anyone here tried both the Cherry switches and the Matias ones? How does it feel to type on them? I currently use Cherry Browns.

<comment><USER5> In my personal opinion, Cherry Clears are a strictly better version of Cherry Browns on all axes, and the Matias Quiet Click switches are better still. I much prefer them.

<comment><USER6> I strongly agree with this. Cherry browns don't have very much tactility to them. Cherry clears add tactility, but IMO the springs are too heavy; the Matias ones sit right in between these two. Matias also has a higher actuation point, which I prefer.

The difference between Matias and Cherry isn't as pronounced with their clicky switches, but for the quiet ones I prefer Matias.

(Disclaimer: I sell keyboard kits for a living and am in the process of transitioning my product away from Cherry to Matias.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Well I was hoping they'd break 50k in the first 30 minutes, but 47k+ isn't bad!

</comment><comment><USER8> I love that someone is paying more attention to the keyboard space as switching to an Ergodox is the best thing I have ever done, but I don't like this one. I wish them the best of luck, but the lack of full open source ( hardware and sofware ) is really a limiter for me, I can't make changes or improvements I am just stuck with whatever they decided was best.

<comment><USER2> Err, what? Their open source policy is stated in the video and in the text. Every keyboard ships w/ a screwdriver and the firmware is on github. [https://github.com/obra/KeyboardioFirmware](https://github.com/obra/KeyboardioFirmware)

"We believe, quite strongly, that you own the things you buy from us. You are 100% welcome to open your keyboard up, flash its firmware, reflash its bootloader, solder weird connectors onto the circuit boards or flash our firmware onto something else. (Do note that we're not going to be able to help you out a lot after you do some of those things.) To make all of this as easy as possible for you, your Model 01 will ship with a screwdriver, firmware & bootloader source code, schematics, and all the CAD you need to design your own enclosure."

<comment><USER8> yeah but no mention of the schematics for the circuit boards, or the existing designs of the enclosure. If you look at the ergodox they ship the gerbers for the circuit board as well as STL files for the enclosure.

<comment><USER2> "schematics, and all the CAD you need to design your own enclosure" does not count as a mention of schematics?

If that's not enough for you, then it's not, but it sounds like you're just arguing to argue. (FWIW I've soldered my own ErgoDox. I've also backed the Model 01.)

Anyway, I'm going to back away from this thread now. Good luck, guy.</comment></comment></comment></comment>