Microsoft Offers Office Online apps via Chrome Web Store - <AUTHOR> http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9247681/Microsoft_concedes_Chromebooks_are_work_worthy?taxonomyId=89 <comment><USER3> This is Microsoft realizing that Windows desktop monopoly, while mighty, doesn't necessarily translate to other markets, especially cloud services, all that well because the monopoly is based on compatibility and compatibility means leaving those holes that allow for third-parties to hijack the platform to deliver their services. Also in a world that kept needing new desktop operating systems, OS monopoly was far more valuable than app monopoly but in a world where a 10-year old operating system is hard to kill, app monopoly is more important, because OS has already been commoditized.

In this sense, their Office monopoly, which is not as reliant on third-party add-ins or platform openness, and is far more based on product superiority, is more important for them to preserve. Office gives them a strong chance at dominance in business cloud services. Since they are far ahead of competitors at this point, they want to win it as quickly as possible before competitors catch up. This has nothing to do with Microsoft conceding anything - it's simply that Office is far too important to be tied to Windows.

</comment><comment><USER4> Actually a pretty impressive about-face from Microsoft. I know some people are all-too-ready to see the demise of Microsoft, but I'm glad to see them try their best to be nimble. The more they fight for eyeballs, the more we win.

<comment><USER5> how is this nimble? the chrome web store has been around for years and so has office online. this is microsoft being forced to compete on ground they don't want to compete on. you see how by listing their apps on this web store, they have validated chrome os as a platform? whereas google still refuses to release native apps for microsoft's mobile platform, and that certainly hasn't helped microsoft. this is microsoft losing.

<comment><USER6> This guy has never released software.

<comment><USER7> ah but i have. and these are web apps. deploying them on the chrome web store is a cinch.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Chromebooks (with either Google Drive or Office Online) are as work-worthy as Windows RT devices. Both are perfectly capable if your work only entails answering emails, browsing the web, and light word processing. If you need to do anything that isn't possible in a web-app, you'll quickly find yourself turning to a different device.

<comment><USER9> For developers, installing Crouton turns the Chromebook into a fantastic portable machine. My Acer c720 has been able to handle everything I've thrown at it, and generally lasts a full day (10-12 hours) between charges.

<comment><USER10> I keep seeing this meme, and it persuaded me to buy a Samsung Chromebook, specifically with the intent of putting Linux on it.

It's awful. Forget about accelerated graphics from that nice chip - <USER2> drivers are proprietary. Oh, and so are the DSP drivers, so no HD decoding. Enjoy pressing Ctl-D every boot; don't mis-type or you'll wipe the drive. The keyboard lacks essentials such as "home", "end", and "delete". The Crouton OS and ChromeOS get into fights sometimes. HDMI is a crapshoot. I never did get VLC to stream the webcam. The finish is about as durable as whitewash. And so on.

If you're a developer reading this thread and considering buying a Chromebook because it looks like a nice machine for the price, PLEASE don't. Do yourself a favor and buy a used thin 'n' light business-class laptop from 2006-8. You'll take a medium hit on battery life and weight, but you will get a comfortable, well-designed, durable, powerful machine for your money.

<comment><USER11> I use mine to take notes and do a little programming at the command line. I use vim so I don't need those "keyboard essentials." I'm doing nothing with graphics or video. I'm writing text and code.

That stuff is what "work" means to me, so my (Acer) chromebook is a pretty decent work machine. For bigger stuff I break out the 17" System76 but for travel I take the chromebook.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The "real" title is the subtitle:

 _Offers Office Online apps via Chrome Web Store to Chrome and Chrome OS_

With the further qualification:

 _The move was largely symbolic: The Office Online apps have long been able to run within virtually any browser, including Chrome, the foundation of Chrome OS.

But by packaging the apps in .crx format and submitting them to the automated review run by Google, and thus publishing them to the Chrome Web Store, Microsoft put its Office Online in front of Chrome and Chrome OS users and in a place they've been trained to look for Web apps._

</comment><comment><USER13> While getting Office listed in the Chrome app store is a refreshing thing for MS to do, it seems like quite a stretch to conclude that MS has conceded anything, or that this is related to how MS perceives Chromebooks. If anything, this kind of press might make MS less likely to do things like this in the future, which sucks.

<comment><USER14> > it seems like quite a stretch to conclude that MS has conceded anything

I think its fair to conclude that Microsoft has conceded something -- but not necessarily about Chromebooks' "worthiness", per se.

I think its fair to conclude that Microsoft has conceded that tieing the rest of the company to live and die based on the strength of the Windows OS and brand isn't good long-term strategy -- and this is just one of many signs (rebranding Azure from "Windows Azure" to "Microsoft Azure" is another.)

<comment><USER13> Very good point. New Microsoft (assuming there is a new Microsoft) seems like it's remembering to be a software company and not just a Windows company. I really like this approach and hope they keep at it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The headline is pure linkbait. The Chrome Web Store is not a ChromeOS store, it is for Chrome on all platforms. I would bet that most people using the CWS use it on Chrome on a desktop machine, not on ChromeOS.

<comment><USER16> Yes. I rewrote it to use the less baity subtitle.

The HN guidelines call for not rewriting titles _except_ when they are misleading or linkbait.

Edit: the article is pretty lame too. Is this a significant announcement? If it is, can someone suggest a better url? If it isn't, we may tag it as fluff.

<comment><USER17> I wouldn't really say it's a significant announcement. It takes up about two sentences at the end of Microsoft's announcement of new Office Online features:

[http://blogs.office.com/2014/04/14/more-office-online- commen...](http://blogs.office.com/2014/04/14/more-office-online-commenting- printing-tell-me-and-more/)

<comment><USER16> Ok. We tagged it as fluff. This is a penalty assigned to articles that aren't intellectually substantive. Usually we apply it to obviously sensational pieces. The current one is a borderline case, so I'll take the penalty off if more people object.

The tech press is good at camouflaging fluff, though, and this is one thing dragging down the quality of the front page. I believe a solution may be for HN to focus more on primary sources. We're going to be asking the community for help with this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I posted this earlier, but it's relevant for a repost.

My brother got a chrome pixel at Google I/O and he loves it. The hardware is beautiful. The interface is simple. The speed and ease of use is really unparalleled. The downside is by far the most important - the functionality is very limited due to the limited App space.

<comment><USER4> The hardware of the pixel looks great. If Windows had a proper touchscreen driver, I'd probably buy one and load it up with Windows (or, if I could get OSX running on it...)

<comment><USER19> I thought about it a while ago, but then why not just buy a Macbook? Same price, comparable hardware looks, much better specs, much better capabilities. You can run Chrome and do all the same stuff you could do on a Chomebook, plus a ton of other stuff too.

<comment><USER20> If you can find a Macbook with the same specs for anything close to the price of the Chromebook then please do link it.

<comment><USER21> The posts above you are talking about the Chromebook Pixel, which had a release price of $1299 (similar to MacBooks) but inferior specs.

<comment><USER4> The pixel is very similar to a Macbook Air, (IIRC, thiner/lighter) except has a HD-touch screen. If they refreshed the processor, all that would be missing is a decent harddrive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> It's wonderful to see everyone playing so nicely these days. Even if it is only on the surface...

</comment><comment><USER23> I can't seem to get this to install/load/whatever_the_jargon_is in the Chrome Web Store tied to a Google Apps (for domains) account. Anybody have any idea what magic incantation I need to mutter/mutter/invoke?

</comment><comment><USER24> Similar to ChromeOS, a Firefox OS release for notebooks would be great.

</comment><comment><USER25> Has anyone tried it?</comment>


How to avoid submit button URL parameters - <AUTHOR> http://squeejee.com/blog/2009/11/02/how-to-avoid-submit-button-url-parameters/ <comment><USER2> Isn't this rather elementary?

</comment><comment><USER3> The commit parameter is a pain in the backside when it comes to rails but I would have thought most people would know how to fix this anyway. It's a simple HTML issue, not really a Rails issue.

<comment><USER4> He's not saying it's a Rails issue, he's saying he learned the technique via a Rails-specific talk.</comment></comment>


Electricomics: Open source comics creation toolkit - <AUTHOR> http://electricomics.net/

<comment><AUTHOR> Github repo's rather bare right now though. Still waiting for the release

[https://github.com/Electricomics/electricomics](https://github.com/Electricomics/electricomics)</comment>


Quickly review changed methods and functions in your pull requests - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/blog/2407-quickly-review-changed-methods-and-functions-in-your-pull-requests <comment><USER2> This sounds like a step in a good direction.

IMHO diff-based code review creates distorted incentives. Moving large pieces of code around feels harder to review, and adding an extra line or two feels easier to review. In the long term, this drives codebases in the wrong direction. (That 900-line method got there through hundreds of innocuous- looking PRs.)

I hope eventually we get tools that make refactorings easy to review. I don't know what that would look like, or how well this can be done in today's languages, but there's room for improvement.

<comment><USER3> Having talked to both Microsoft and GitHub, I get the impression that intelligent code reviews, is an area of great interest for both companies. In the near future (~2 years), I can see us starting to review code in both the traditional way (line diffs) and in a more intelligent way (semantically and by code change impact).

For example, if you moved a function 50 lines down and changed a string variable in that function, you'll be able to review and discuss the code changes like so:

Semantic changes

        - Moved function FOO with public scope 50 lines down
        - Updated string variable FOO with public scope in function FOO

Change impact

        - Moving function FOO 50 lines down does not change its scope.
        - Lines 56 and 30 in files X and Y in repositories Q and Z, reference the BAR variable.
        - Open pull request #35, contains FOO function changes as well.
        - Active releases 1.x and 2.x do not have these changes.

The basic idea is, instead of only being able to review and comment on the lines changed, I fully expect us to be able to discuss their impact as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I hope Github introduces this to the main code browser as well, not just PRs.

I very often clone repos just so that I can open the code in an IDE, CTRL+Click a method and jump to its definition. It would be neat if Github had IDE-like features (but without becoming a platform for editing--just viewing!)

<comment><USER5> sourcegraph.com is your friend, at least for some languages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Tangentially related, my number one feature request for GitHub would be support for cross-referencing (a la Opengrok) in the code browser. Browsing through project code without a local checkout is one of the main things I do on GitHub, but it's not very ergonomic without cross-referencing. (I also realize that this is much to ask for, considering how much time Opengrok takes to index large codebases.)

<comment><USER7> Sourcegraph[0] has a Chrome extension which provides a version of this feature.

[0] [https://sourcegraph.com](https://sourcegraph.com)

<comment><USER8> Sourcegraph founder here. The Chrome extension direct link is [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/sourcegraph-for- gi...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/sourcegraph-for- github/dgjhfomjieaadpoljlnidmbgkdffpack?hl=en). Thanks for the mention!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Searching the file finder for a method or function in a Go, JavaScript, > Ruby, or TypeScript file will provide you with a timeline-style view of the > results, so you can skip to the most impactful parts of a pull request.

It would be awesome to hear a timeline for rolling this out to more languages, especially Python.

</comment><comment><USER10> I wonder how the Souregraph guys feel about Github getting into their territory..

<comment><USER8> Sourcegraph founder here. We love it. The more developers who are using code intelligence in their tools, the better the language support will be for all the various languages and repositories out there. That's good for developers everywhere, and we (Sourcegraph) could never build it all alone.

Our master plan at [https://sourcegraph.com/plan](https://sourcegraph.com/plan) describes what we're building on top of these basic "code intelligence" primitives, to help developers in all of their dev tools (not just GitHub), in all of their workflow, and in companies that have lots of code. And just like GitHub, we let people use these things for free on open-source so they can see how useful they are.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Nice addition!

If anyone at GitHub is reading this, the dropdown cannot be keyboard navigated because the dropdown doesn't scroll with the focus.

</comment><comment><USER12> Can magit do this for code outside of github?

<comment><USER13> Actually not sure how to do this with magit, but I just tried `vc-region- history' while highlighting an R method signature and body and got a pretty slick view of all the relevant commits. Would definitely prefer magit for jumping to commits, might take a few lines of elisp.

EDIT: Actually, [0] mentions =L, which seems to work flawlessly. Hacking on an option to take the selected region instead of manually specifying file and lines is easy. Alternatively, magit-blame lets you look at a specific change's commit.

[0] [https://github.com/magit/magit/issues/1717](https://github.com/magit/magit/issues/1717)</comment></comment>


Where to Be an Entrepreneur  - <AUTHOR> http://www.entrepreneur.com/magazine/entrepreneur/2009/august/202666.html

<comment><USER2> The all-on-one-page version: <http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/printthis/202666.html>

<comment><USER3> Wow, the original is 10 pages... really? This is getting out of hand.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have no complaints about doing things here in Pittsburgh. We have our own incubator (AlphaLab) and a solid Open Coffee Club. Everybody seems helpful, and everyone knows everyone else. It's a small town.</comment>


Can algorithms help improve hiring? - <AUTHOR> For example, came across this recently: http://higherteams.com/
Curious what HN thinks about whether this would add to the hiring process, if companies would actually use it, how results would be weighed in making a decision vs. other factors, etc.
On one hand, hiring seems like far too human of a process to let algorithms decide... but then again, we've said that about a lot of processes that have since been replaced by technology. <comment><USER2> that is an interesting example, I looked at the about section an d all I found was a broken link : [http://higherteams.com/about-us- bedford](http://higherteams.com/about-us-bedford)</comment>


How I, a woman in tech, benefited from sexism in Silicon Valley - <AUTHOR> http://huyenchip.com/2017/08/09/sexism-in-silicon-valley.html <comment><USER4> "I have the feeling that we've been only addressing one side of the story. It's the side where women are victims. I'm here to tell the story of how I, as a woman in tech, benefited from sexism and that men can be victims too."

Something that keeps bugging me - and this is in no way limited to tech - <USER2> being a victim has become an identity to many, which is almost worn as a badge. While I do what I can to emphasize with every individual who has been exposed to discrimination, harassment (and while as a white man I experienced most likely much less of this, although not nothing), a scenario in which everyone walks around all day long feeling as the victim (followed by the inevitable selective perception and confirmation bias) cannot function.

I recently listened to a philosophy podcast which started with a line which has since been stuck in my head "In a time in which being a victim offers so much social capital...". (edit: I recalled the quote slightly inaccurately, but the point was the same: "In a culture in which there is so much social currency connected to being a victim..." In case you are curious, it's episode #105 of philosophizethis.org)

I don't know what to do about it and I in no way want to diminish the harm that those who feel like victims experienced. But whenever victimhood is becoming an identity, things are getting out of hand.

(the feeling of being a systemic/structural victim can be found on all sides of the political/ideological/gender spectrum of course).

<comment><USER5> > things are getting out of hand

I think this is interesting because we have to ask ourselves: what is it that we're worried about? What do we imagine will happen when everybody thinks of themselves as being victimised? Some kind of cultural apocalypse? I doubt it. Our culture will be "weakened" in some ill-defined way and we'll be "beaten" or "taken over" by some other, more confident culture? I don't buy it.

Being a victim is not a purely objective matter. It is part subjective assessment and part social consensus. Social consensus actually determines most of how we react to it. I think at the moment the consensus is undergoing a major change and that feels uncomfortable for those who felt the balance was OK.

When the consensus stabilizes then people who claim victimhood that is without merit will be ignored. Sadly, some legitimate grievances will also be ignored. And the cycle will doubtless continue.

In the meantime probably the great majority of people will continue to NOT think of themselves as victims.

<comment><USER6> > Some kind of cultural apocalypse? I doubt it.

I don't believe there will be a cultural apocalypse necessarily, but I am afraid there will be a gradual degradation of our culture. I'm afraid we will move away from a society that tries to be meritocratic towards one that accepts all sorts of norms so nobody gets offended. That lack of social continuity would lead to everyone walking on egg shells all the time to avoid offending everyone, thus destroying any chance of a sense of community forming.

I'm also afraid of historical wrongs committed by my grandparents being used to further legitimize racism against whites and sexism against men, simply because of "white privilege". I'm afraid of a culture forming that says they're for "diversity," "equality," and "multiculturalism" while completely suppressing any person who varies culturally in the wrong way, or who questions diversity systems that were designed in a different time when blatant racism and sexism was much more commonplace.

> Social consensus actually determines most of how we react to it.

At one time, it was a social consensus that blacks and whites were segregated. At another time, perceived socialists were pushed out of the labor pool just because of their viewpoints on what a society should be. Social consensus is a terrible metric on whether or not something is right or wrong, and people who raise legitimate questions on the current social consensus(that only seems to reflect the cultures of the east and west coasts of America, btw) shouldn't be fired or forced out of the labor pool for discussing those norms in a polite, rational manner.

<comment><USER7> >At one time, it was a social consensus that blacks and whites were segregated. At another time, perceived socialists were pushed out of the labor pool just because of their viewpoints on what a society should be. Social consensus is a terrible metric on whether or not something is right or wrong, and people who raise legitimate questions on the current social consensus(that only seems to reflect the cultures of the east and west coasts of America, btw) shouldn't be fired or forced out of the labor pool for discussing those norms in a polite, rational manner.

This. Society changes fast relative to a human lifetime. Creating a society where PCness becomes the target metric is an invitation to return to the practices of casting people out based on hearsay and rumors like was done in the McCarthy days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This text is the anecdotal version of this [1] paper

> The underrepresentation of women in academic science is typically > attributed, both in scientific literature and in the media, to sexist hiring

> Here we report five hiring experiments in which faculty evaluated > hypothetical female and male applicants, using systematically varied > profiles disguising identical scholarship, for assistant professorships in > biology, engineering, economics, and psychology.

> Contrary to prevailing assumptions, men and women faculty members from all > four fields _preferred female applicants 2:1 over identically qualified > males_ with matching lifestyles (single, married, divorced), with the > exception of male economists, who showed no gender preference.

> Comparing different lifestyles revealed that women preferred divorced > mothers to married fathers and that men preferred mothers who took parental > leaves to mothers who did not. Our findings, supported by real-world > academic hiring data, suggest advantages for women launching academic > science careers.

[1] [http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.abstract](http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.abstract)

<comment> semi-extrinsic > The underrepresentation of women in academic science is typically > attributed, both in scientific literature and in the media, to sexist hiring

If anyone seriously thinks sexist hiring is the main reason, they can't have thought about this for a very long time.

The horrible work-life balance in early phase academia, at the exact point when you are usually trying to start a family, is a much bigger issue. Especially since women in academia are often in relationships with men in academia, the question of "whose career do we down-prioritize" is answered as much by biology as by the wishes of the couple in question.

Another one that is also a much bigger issue than sexist hiring is that many of the "gender affirmative actions" that universities usually have are actually quite damaging to women scientists. E.g. we have one at my local university that says all PhD defense committees must include one woman. Typically what happens is that the easiest way to achieve this is to ask a local female professor to be the committee administrator.

That is just one example of how female scientists get handed a lot more non- research tasks, in the name of "gender equality", than their male counterparts. Other examples include project management and outreach activities, where departments are typically falling head-over-heels with an implicit but unintended "Look, we actually have a woman working here! Doing actual real work!" vibe.

<comment><USER9> > The horrible work-life balance in early phase academia, at the exact point > when you are usually trying to start a family, is a much bigger issue.

It is unpleasant for both genders. As a male this horrible phase was a factor in me not keeping on the academic track, though not the only one.

> Especially since women in academia are often in relationships with men in > academia, the question of "whose career do we down-prioritize" is answered > as much by biology as by the wishes of the couple in question.

That sounds like a trade-off made by two intelligent adults working in tandem to better their family's place in the world.

I watched my wife perform with a professional ballet company 3 months after giving birth to our older child.

If the couple wants to prioritize the woman's career, certainly post partum lecturing, research, and mentoring can be resumed with full gusto in a similar time frame.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> As a women in tech i'm starting to see another of these posts and thing _URG_ Another*

Give some some more interesting tech posts dammit!

I've suffered sexism everywhere - not just in tech. Maybe i'm different because I enjoy writing code on my weekends, enjoy looking up the latest machine learning tools - that I really just ignore the sexism, because I want to make more things.

As long as you're not explicitly stopping me writing interesting things, say what you like about me. Stop me from writing stuff I want, and i'll just leave with my hefty portfolio of diverse projects.

I was the kid in school who would play football with other guys who would try and stop me, I just learnt to play better than them, because I loved playing, more than I cared about their sexism.

(note, not trying to belittle anyone, I understand these are real issues and each story is different! Mine is in no way representitive).

But I hate the rhetoric even coming from women's posts - that seems to put us down ourselves.

Even if there's sexism, as i've encountered from a kid, I'm staying because I love to code and make new things and it's a natural part of where the world is at the moment. I can change it, by staying and breaking people's perceptions.

<comment><USER11> So this probably isn't a legitimate concern on my part, apologies in advance if this comes out sounding offensive or just plain dumb. But it's an honest thought that I've had as a male in tech...

One of the things that scares me about all of the outreach programs, networking events, mentoring programs, etc. is that I worry it's going to bring in a lot of people into the industry who don't really enjoy programming but are in it for the prestige, money, etc. Computer programming is the only productive thing that I've ever enjoyed doing in my life. I taught myself to program as a teenager, studied CS in college and loved it, and have been working in industry ever since. I don't ever want to manage people, or meet with customers, or do anything else - I only want to write code.

Say what you will about the "frat boy monoculture" \- for all of its shittiness at least it's mostly made up of people who are passionate about code, largely self-taught and self-motivated, and enjoy what they do. And almost all of the women programmers that I've worked with (and it sounds like the parent poster as well) have been the same... maybe even more so since they have had to deal with so much more shit along the way and are still here. And I don't want that to change (the part about working with passionate, fun people.. The discrimination and bias part needs to stop).

<comment><USER12> >Say what you will about the "frat boy monoculture" \- for all of its shittiness at least it's mostly made up of people who are passionate about code, largely self-taught and self-motivated, and enjoy what they do.

Having worked at companies that employ tons of recent grads, I haven't found this to be the case at all. Pretty much everyone I've worked with who has a college degree (so almost everyone) is more "brogrammer" than "hacker" and didn't write code until they went to school. Many don't know their way around a UNIX environment and have never written code outside IntelliJ on a fancy macbook. They'll tell you lisp is scary because it has too many parens, and call software "apps". They don't use or are actively hostile to Free Software and uncritically consume marketing. This is the "frat boy monoculture", I find little redeeming about it, to say nothing of the _bigotry_.

I find the opposite is true of the weirdos, slackers and dropouts, who taught themselves for fun and were working when their better educated but less cultured peers were in school, but that is a small cohort.

<comment><USER13> >Many don't know their way around a UNIX environment and have never written code outside IntelliJ on a fancy macbook

i'm pretty sure you mean Windows. Developing on Windows is mostly driven by Wizards, IDEs, and other GUIs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The focus on individuals, of either gender, is short sighted. I've worked as an engineer in a male dominated environment, and a lawyer in gender balanced ones. When I think of what I'd want my daughter to do, I can't help but think she'd have an easier time maximizing her potential in the latter field, where she doesn't have to deal with the awkwardness of being the only woman on her team, or working only for men team leaders. Today, much of the pipeline in law is both gender balanced and gender blind. There are no programs to encourage girls to take the LSAT, no gnashing of teeth about not enough women graduating with JDs or applying to law firms. It's not perfect (only a third of new partners are women, versus half of new associates) but we're light years ahead of tech.

It wasn't always that way. Fifty years ago, only 5% of women were lawyers (long after they were legally permitted to join the bar). People rolled out the same tropes--the work was too detail oriented and analytical for women, who preferred to work with people and children. They wouldn't want to deal with the stress and long hours. Etc. That turned out to be bunk. Now, people who want to maintain the idea that women are predisposed to not going into tech have to resort to distinguishing what were archetypally "male" fields like law by redefining those fields to be women-friendly ones.

The legal profession fixed the problem of historic discrimination in the field by not being gender blind. Schools and law firms gnashed teeth about their gender ratios, like tech schools and companies are doing now. And while that may have been "unfair" to certain individuals at certain moments in time, it was the only way to fix society's earlier sins.

A skewed gender ratio that is the product of past discrimination is itself a form of discrimination. If you want to claim to have leveled the playing field, then you have to actually level it and see if it stays level on its own. In law and medicine, that turned out to be the case. I don't expect the situation will be different in tech.

<comment><USER15> > A skewed gender ratio that is the product of past discrimination is itself a > form of discrimination.

I don't agree. What is your definition of discrimination? My definition is that it is giving different preference to individuals based on some prejudice - that is, believed (regardless whether true or not) average attribute of the group they come from.

But if someone has a different preference, it's not a discrimination, even if the preference is "I don't want to go to a field where there is too few women". In other words, I don't believe "self-discrimination" is a form of discrimination.

> If you want to claim to have leveled the playing field, then you have to > actually level it and see if it stays level on its own.

But didn't this already happened in tech? In the 80s U.S., there were more women in tech (computing) than today. Since then, the numbers have decreased.

<comment><USER16> The "preference" of wanting to fit in isn't unique for women, especially not in your teens. I've read a number of stories about how geeks, maybe primarily in the US, felt ostracized in high school. But even though I was a geek in high school that didn't matter much for what you did. Since playing sports, socializing and other actives were not heavily associated with school. I seem to hear plenty of stories online like "I didn't think exercise was for me, but now I've started biking, weightlifting, climbing etc". Would you say that geeks who don't do certain things in high school in the US were "self- discriminating"?

<comment><USER15> > Would you say that geeks who don't do certain things in high school in the > US were "self-discriminating"?

You can say that, but I don't see how it's harmful, unlike a discrimination against a different person. If someone has a preference based on incorrect world-view (in your example, association with school) and only later corrects this, that's OK. Trying to fix this by ignoring the earlier preference would be to succumb to a hindsight bias. Just because today you think your preferences were wrong in the past doesn't mean that they were wrong at the time.

In other words, preferences cannot be wrong, because there is no objective function to evaluate them against other than how your mind feels about them. The decisions based on those preferences can be wrong, but you won't know until you make them.

Anecdotally, I have read quite a lot of articles where women explained why they don't want to work in IT. Often, I get a feeling that the real reason why is a different one than what they say (they for example mention sexism or communication problems, where I think the real reason is that they just don't enjoy computers that much). But regardless what the truth is, it is their preference and it should be respected.

<comment><USER16> You seem to assume that preference is one sided. I can understand that you might not think it is a problem. What I can't understand how you think (if that is what you think) that the condition are the same. Even in your scenario men don't have to overcome "self-discrimination" to become interested in computers, women do. And they have to do so at a time in their lives where most people, maybe geeks especially, are insecure about themselves. And even if we assume that it is only women, and not men, who suffered from this "self- discrimination" we don't really do a good job of letting them correct it later. Instead people insist on focusing on "hacker culture", "having coded since you were young" and "being the right kind of computer geek" long after finishing high school.

<comment><USER15> I am sorry, I don't understand your point. You're using the word "self- discriminate" as it would be a thing - even though my whole point was that it isn't a thing.

I mean high school jocks (men) also "self-discriminate" against using computers. I don't see where I am one-sided. Everybody makes some choices, sometimes they are misinformed, and sometimes they change the choice later, and sometimes they regret.

Also you shouldn't forget that many men (lot more than women) tend to risk and make some really bad choices in their youth (like driving motorcycles, participating in crime..).

> Instead people insist on focusing on "hacker culture", "having coded since > you were young" and "being the right kind of computer geek" long after > finishing high school.

I don't think they are, particularly. I think if you feel that way, you just need to go out more. In any field, many people who are really good at it started at the early age.

Although you could perhaps claim that this feeling of wrong choices in youth affects women more, because they tend to self-doubt more. But, it's a feeling, it won't return you the time. Society can try to make people avoid bad choices, but only so much.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> IMHO the very idea of forcefully pulling women into the tech field is the root of evil here. This philosophy gives birth to the stereotype that women are "worse" than men in engineering and science, because someone who is employed based on their sex, orientation, color, etc. rather than actual skills and competences makes life miserable for their team members who then start thinking that some particular group is generally worse than the other. Stop shoving tech down their throat and absurd stereotypes and sexism will disappear on their own without the need of silencing someone's view by force.

<comment><USER18> I'm of the opinion that the very act of trying to artificially create equal outcome, _is itself sexism_. Currently we have both biased opportunity and biased outcome aimed at artificially drawing more women into tech.

I cringe every time I see a tech woman's award. "Applaud X for her achievement in creating Y, that wasn't good enough for the main award but it's the best women can do".

Society is sick, somehow (almost) everybody fell asleep at the wheel and forgot that equal opportunity trumps equal outcome. It drives people from all backgrounds to work harder and means we don't end up presenting "okay" as the best that's out there. We don't artificially add 10% to men's Olympic times, why should be being doing the equivalent in employment? Can't we just hire the best person for the job, not for quotas?

And lastly, where are the people complaining about unfair treatment of Asians in the US, or women only companies? These shouts of discrimination are extremely polarized.

<comment><USER19> > _I 'm of the opinion that the very act of trying to artificially create > equal outcome, is itself sexism._

The predominant view (with enough dominance to get someone fired from Google for challenging it) is that there are no differences between the sexes that can be considered legitimate at all (cultural, in preferences, evolutionary tendencies, etc.), and thus any non-equal outcome much inevitably be the result of suppression.

I don't doubt oppression against women existed and exists (in various forms).

I doubt:

a) that it is an one way street (women have immense power over their children, including male children, and a particular role later in sexual selection, which is hardly a male-dominated "sport") that are not questioned at all in modern societies (e.g. not in the era of arranged marriages). It's assumed that "patriarchy" is bad, but not that "matriarchy" can be bad as well.

b) that there are no legitimate, at least in the context of evolution and culture, differences in preferences between sexes that are not attributable to downright oppression or some "anti-woman" notion.

Women are men, in essence, that just happen to lack penises, and men are women, in essence, that just happen to lack vaginas. Differences in development, body types, capabilities, evolutionary roles, hormonal content, etc., are not to be considered beyond this a priori fact.

<comment><USER20> No, the predominant view is that there is no evidence that women are genetically predisposed to be worse at programming (on average) than men.

The idea that women might be worse at programming for biological reasons is an entirely post-hoc hypothesis deriving from the current gender distribution in the field. As lots of other STEM fields have seen a sharp increase in the number of women over the past decades, while computer science and software engineering have not, the grounds for thinking that biological differences between men and women are relevant are extremely shaky, and really are nothing more than pseudoscientific rationalizations of the status quo.

Please lets not have any more of this absurd straw man argument that men and women must be equally good at programming because men and women are exactly the same. No-one thinks this.

<comment><USER21> I have no real knowledge on this, but what if women just don't, as a generalistic point of view, find programming as interesting? There are plenty of things I don't find that interesting, or enthralling enough to pursue a career in. Midwifery, primary-school teaching, gardening.

Now, I'm not sure if that's just society having pushed me in that direction, or if I, as a human, just don't enjoy those. If it's the former, maybe it needs some work. If it's the latter, does 'equal outcome' really work?

I don't see as big a push to equal out the playing fields in things such as janitorial work. This may be due to the fact that it's not as cognitive, which I understand. I think we need _more_ women in tech to expand our (currently male) viewpoint. But I'm not sure that aggressively targetting people who may not be as interested, from either gender, is the way to do it.

<comment><USER20> >I have no real knowledge on this, but what if women just don't, as a generalistic point of view, find programming as interesting?

If you have no reason to think that this is true, what is the point of speculating about it?

<comment><USER19> The same goes for the opposite notion.

<comment><USER20> Not really. Men and women are both human, and you'd expect them to be the same in any given respect absent evidence to the contrary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> >I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower. They are useless and detrimental to health.

These are almost exclusively for kids in school or just out of school. Like camping - those that hate them, really hate them, and for others it's a lot fun. If you hate them, don't do them, they aren't necessary. You can be a perfectly good engineer without them.

>I don't like the representation of female engineers on TV, always nerdy, unattractive, and without much of a social life.

Female engineers? Oh man. She must have missed the generic Scientist-guy and Engineer-guy of the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s. Rick Moranis made a career playing those guys. The engineer bro-culture and a certain social status that is assigned to software or computer engineers and geekdom in general is a new phenomena. It was not cool to want to be a computer engineer or a geek for the vast majority of the last half century. It sort of reminds me of the praise the Wonder Woman movie got for being a breakthrough moment for women. I couldn't help but think, where were all these people in the 80s when nerds and geeks were made fun of for reading Wonder Woman and other comic books. My sister and her friends made fun of me and my friends for that! Nobody hid or put up walls to these comics from anybody.

>I've read Megan McArdle's essay and relate with her feeling of isolation as I'm often the only woman in an environment dominated by men.

That wasn't quite the point of the essay though it is an interesting interpretation.

>What we need to do is to make it easier for women to stay in tech...I don't know how we can make it more fun to women in tech.

That's kind of the crux of the problem. Nobody knows how to fix the undetectable, secret societal pressures that steer women away from STEM and into Humanities.

Also, it's a job. It won't be fun for the vast majority of people. Why do jobs have to be fun? My father worked on the line at a factory all his life - <USER3> wasn't fun.

<comment><USER23> > Also, it's a job. It won't be fun for the vast majority of people. Why do > jobs have to be fun? My father worked on the line at a factory all his life > - it wasn't fun.

Thank you. I thought I was the only one exasperated by this (relatively new, as far as I can tell) idea. I don't know anyone of my parents' age who thought jobs were fun.

<comment><USER24> My father also didn't have fun at his job. Back in his days, people said that automation would have us all working 2 hours a day by 2000. That didn't happen.

However, there are now an increasing amount of people who have the luxury to be able to choose their career, choose a job they'll enjoy and not have to slave their life away to be allowed to pay for their food and shelter.

So, mdpopescu, _is that so god damn wrong_?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I just recently left a tech start-up where the "look at how awesome and diverse we are" rhetoric was so bad that I couldn't take it anymore. When I first joined the company, I didn't even bat an eye that every single employee was a white guy (Hispanic male here). It was only later after their recruiter who, I befriended, told me I was their first "diversity hire". I laughed and took it tongue in cheek.

However, over time, they formed a "diversity team" to emphasize in making the company more diverse. Later on, I came to find out that this company did not care about the individuals joining the company, but rather the "diversity quota" they set to meet. Instead of hearing "we hired a great engineer who is great in xyz", we would instead hear the likes of "Susan accepted our offer letter, we finally have a female engineer on our team"; "Tim will be joining our Product team. Hooray for gay!" (Yes, this was actually posted on a slack channel one of the founders).

It became clear that this company was more worried about having mascots rather than seeking talented diverse individuals. I pissed me off so much at how condescending the founders would be when communicating with "non-traditional" employees and how they thought they were such great, progressive leaders.

<comment><USER26> This is disgusting, I am sure you are no different from your peers in skills (and probably even better than the average developers around you) and it's just not fair that you have to go through this.

People should be totally confident that they got the job because they did a good job and the employer liked them for who they are but this whole diversity system makes people doubt themselves, consciously or subconsciously.

I hope you're now working at a place where there's no such bullshit, and wish you all the best.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I usually avoid commenting on these sort of posts because frankly I don't believe I have a lot I can add to the discussion, but this is an interesting read, and I think the final paragraph is probably correct in how it frames the current situation - neither "side" will be happy until both are happy. The question isn't "should we be doing something?", it's "how do we do it?" and how do we have that discussion without it turning into something else?

At the same time, we've also got to remember that this isn't just an issue in tech, it's an issue across the whole of society, and as an industry we should be looking at the broader picture, because this isn't an issue that technology can face alone, but it is one that affects tech more than many other industries.

I really hope this is something we, as a society and industry, can improve upon. I'm lucky enough to work with a lot of people from a lot of different backgrounds and cultures, and they're all great at what they do, but very very few of them are female. I'd love to think that I was above any bias (both positive and negative) that this introduces, but the fact is, I'm probably not because I'm only human. Until we can make tech more balanced, it's a bias that I will have to consider and try to overcome.

</comment><comment><USER28> Reading _The Myth of Male Power_ led to situations like these make a lot more sense. It offers a different perspective than the predominant view that I find more consistent with experience.

I read it because I thought for sure the author was misguided and I would find flaws and problems. Instead I found myself learning and growing.

[https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer- listing/0425181448/ref=sr_1_...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer- listing/0425181448/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1486666400&sr=8-1&keywords=amazon+myth+of+male+power)

<comment><USER29> On that same note, there's a recent documentary called "The Red Pill" about men's rights.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> A company I used to work at has a 25% female target that was informally backed up by fewer promotion points for the hiring manager if not met. That means, if you are a woman (as I am), and you're one of the four applicants then you'll be hired. Even worse, we had intern slots that were female only. They weren't advertised as such, but male applicants were ignored. Is this how we get "diversity"?

<comment><USER31> I work at a company who set a similar target for gender diversity. They met it. However, I get the feeling they were doing it in a way that temporarily discriminated.

In our product department I would say the split is 60/40 men to women. Racially it's mostly Caucasian but with a decent proportion of Asians. We recently started our internship program for the summer and I noticed something odd. Out of the 20 or so internship all but 3 were women, and almost all of them were Asian.

Perhaps to correct discrimination and lack of diversity you have to discriminate in the other direction. It's a sad state of affairs and I feel it's going to be this way for a while longer. However, this whole thing has left me with a bad taste in my mouth in regard to tech. After graduating years ago I never thought that my company, industry, etc would turn into a political clusterfuck.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> > I don't like the representation of female engineers on TV, always nerdy, > unattractive, and without much of a social life.

Seriously? I agree with the lack of social life. But how come most of the tech people on TV (especially SF) are women? And it's not a new trend (Stargate, X-Files etc.). Maybe the author does not think they are attractive because she does not use the same criteria most male use.

> I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower.

I let you on a little secret: most male programmers hate those too.

If you want to make tech attractive to women you have to improve its work/life balance: less hours. So 9/5 jobs which are already available in lot of huge corporations. But yes that's less glamorous or rewarding than the startup scene.

And about the chicken and egg problem? Just start your own company.

<comment><USER33> I also didn't really get the author's point about all the unattractive female engineers on TV. I actually think the opposite is the problem, for both men and women, that the engineers or scientists you see on TV tend to be ridiculously good looking people, only now they're wearing thick framed glasses.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I always look at affirmative action in the US with the perspective of someone looking at the reservations given to the "lower castes" in India to make up for the oppression of the past. If a "general category" (upper caste) guy and a "lower caste" guy with the same financial history appear for an examination to get into a Law College, Engineering College, Medical, etc then they lower caste person needs to achieve much less scores to get in. They have seats reserved for them which can never be transferred to a general category person even if no reservation caste person decides to appear for the exam.

You can't blame people if they are apprehensive about going to a doctor who comes from the lower caste, you'll always doubt his skills because he had it easier.

<comment><USER35> The thinking is long term. You have a large segment of your population that is economically underutilized. Getting more of them educated in this generation will help even more get educated in the next generation until eventually, you don't have this drain on your economic output caused by hundreds of years of discrimination.

The problem of undereducated doctors has always existed because only an already wealthy and historically advantaged few could go through the process of medical education without their family starving. After a few generations, doctors will be drawn from a much larger pool, and the ones who make it will be of higher quality.

<comment><USER34> That sounds good in theory but there are a plethora of jobs that the general category people can't get now, there's no way this is equality. I didn't do a good job explaining the situation it was just an overview, I'd be okay with this but in practise this is really harmful and will go on because they hold the votes.

<comment><USER35> Who said anything about equality? The goal is to become a developed country with broad access to healthcare and economic access, which will lead to faster scientific development that benefits everybody. The fastest way to get that is not to help the already wealthy a little but to help the people disadvantaged merely due to accident of birth a lot. More equality is a relatively inconsequential side benefit.

You could either make yourself slightly wealthier now and die with all the other wealthy people with today's life expectancy, or you could live significantly longer by increasing the number of people who participate in economic and scientific development.

There might be problems in the implementation of those programs, and that's what you should focus on fixing; however, the general idea is obviously correct to any logical long term thinker.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> > Lowering your hiring standards for women can give people like me the > lingering self doubt that maybe I wasn't good enough. Worse, it gives many > techbros reasons to believe that his female colleagues aren't as good as > his, and act accordingly.

As a male, this has always been my main argument against affirmative action.

Too many SV white-knights feel they are helping simply because they are well intentioned. But good intentions do not always lead to the best outcomes.

And the costs are these "lingering self doubts", and teams being suspicious of "diversity hires".

Self-respect is very hard to quantify, but there is a distinct need for humans to be respected and authentically appreciated, and the extreme advocacy for females is sapping away this motivating force that is essential to work and life.

<comment><USER37> Personally I feel that its bad idea for the fact that affirmative action is sexist / racist. You end up selecting people based on their skin color / sex rather than their ability.

<comment><USER38> The bit that leaves out is that this already happens without affirmative action.

<comment><USER36> Affirmative action is _definitely_ racist and sexist. Without it, _maybe_ it is in some cases.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Every time this subject gets brought up, I keep wondering why it seems to be nearly exclusive to the US; East Europe and Asia in particular, for example: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164600](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164600)

I while ago, visited a Chinese software/hardware company and half if not more of the employees I saw were female. To my knowledge, there is essentially no explicit "we need more girls in tech" movement there.

<comment><USER36> Yeh, US is pretty intense for social justice. I'd love to see a timeline and some kind of justification as to why it became such a strong force. I remember not even knowing what "social justice" mean't.

Like all the people's time and energy invested in social justice today...what would these same people have been investing their energy in before 2010s?

What I see is that people love being outraged, purpose-driven, and procrastination. And with social justice, while you're procrastinating, you can be outraged, and you can join a movement and gain a purpose.

Social media is probably to blame.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> About the Selection Leader story, it may not be that we have a different scale for men and women, but just that, since people are aware of a potential negative bias towards women, they unconsciously try to avoid the error of giving a worse score to the woman, so they ended boosting the score as a "protection" mechanism. Since we are human it is very hard to avoid this kind of mistakes, especially given that the whole discrimination problem is handled with such a tension that people over-react in all the directions at this point.

<comment><USER8> > since people are aware of a potential negative bias towards women

Except reality seems to be the opposite[1]

> Contrary to prevailing assumptions, men and women faculty members from all > four fields preferred female applicants 2:1 over identically qualified males > with matching lifestyles (single, married, divorced), with the exception of > male economists, who showed no gender preference.

> Our findings, supported by real-world academic hiring data, suggest > advantages for women launching academic science careers.

[1] [http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.abstract](http://www.pnas.org/content/112/17/5360.abstract)

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> When I was 16, I was in a horrible car accident. I was out of school for something like 6 weeks. During that time, I built a project that got me into Forbes a few months later, and into my first real job. I benefited greatly from that car accident. Would I like to thank the responsible parties? No.

This justification is ridiculous. Just because sexism makes things easier for some doesn't make the statement "Sexism isn't making it harder for women to enter tech." any less ridiculous.

Sexism makes the entire industry worse. It holds down some talented people (e.g. the vast majority of women with an interest in security, the men in her examples, and likely any unattractive women in similar situations to her examples (as they're judged far more harshly, again subconsciously)), while lifting up others who are less talented.

</comment><comment><USER42> I have similar view to her. Its kinda harder for me to say it because im a man.

There is also a story behind my view. It goes like this: Im a runner. Not very good, not very fast, just average. Most of the time, im in the middle of my category. All local races are like 80% man and 20% woman. So while im in the middle, my female colleague running same pace is almost always on the podium. It works in her favor. IT DOES NOT MEAN THAT SHES BETTER/WORSE OR FAVORED/DISCRIMINATED. It just doesn't mean anything, So why we have that kinda ridiculous talk in IT? Who benefits from dividing communities?

<comment><USER43> Yes, but biologically men are faster runners. We can measure this by comparing times from various athletes/general population. It is very difficult to quantify skill at creating software. I don't know if these two things are comparable, I think you might be implying that men are biologically better at creating software. Maybe they are, but I'd like to see the study, as I don't believe that to be the case.

<comment><USER26> The problem with this whole conversation is people add their worst cast assumptions and value judge that.

When Damore said people have different traits, he meant it in a statistical way [https://video- images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1502146696203-S...](https://video- images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1502146696203-Screen- Shot-2017-08-07-at-65310-PM.png)

And he definitely didn't say men are better. That was the assumption added by people who propagated the message. If you haven't read the original, please try to read it, and I mean really, read it, not skim over it and make judgment.

And please try to be open minded and don't add your own assumptions about what other people meant such as:

"I think you might be implying that men are biologically better at creating software."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Someone here mentioned that women are being pressured to join STEM, and that this is "evil." A bit strong but I agree that this may backfire on us. Who doesn't want a more open environment where everyone can feel comfortable in. But lately, I'm sensing the diversity discussion shifting from "we are the victims" (IMO while true, not very useful) to "we are better than you." That does no service to anyone at all; suddenly we see each other in gender camps and there's a battle line drawn in between. Hey I also don't want to be identified by my gender only thanks.

It's a difficult subject because the issue _is_ actually real. I've experienced it myself, and wish that things are different. I fully support incentives to get more women into tech, but the way we're going about it now is perhaps too much in the face. Let's not forget that diversity means inclusion of _all_ groups, so that the majority and the many minorities are considered for. It may seem messy but IMO the best we can do is to be compassionate to one another, which yes, may mean some (acceptable) give-and- take from everyone.

</comment><comment><USER45> One thing that surprises me is how often society does not actively seek out candidates from underrepresented groups across all aspects of life. Often candidates from such groups are superior to candidates from the majority groups. Probably because they've had to work harder to acheive. Two anecdotal examples:

1\. My work often enters into the world of super yachts. There are very few female yacht captains. Yet nearly all that i've met have been the best of the best. I suspect that in such a male dominated career path, the female captain had to work twice as hard as their male counterparts to get there. If I had a super yacht, I actively seek a female captain as i'd want the best of the best for my yacht. Yet of the largest, most expensive yachts none have a female captain. And female captains have a hard time finding good positions.

2\. At my company we get significantly more male applicants than female applicants for our tech positions. As a whole though I'd say that average female applicant we get is better than the average male applicant and we've offer jobs to a significantly higher percentage of female applicants than male applicants. Sadly we get very few female applicants. Again I suspect it's because they had to work twice as hard as the their male counterparts to get to where they are. We didn't offer them positions because they were female. We offered them positions because they were the best candidate.

Please note I'm not saying that it is a good thing that they have experienced sexism along their career paths.

</comment><comment><USER46> The industry is legally forbidden from discussing this subject, so all discussions here or elsewhere will inevitably miss the point. And as members of the public, Google will tell us whatever mitigates their risk the best. You want freedom of speech and the ability to make arguments, you don't work for a public company. And trying to debate it, is like trying to debate Galileo while the inquisition is in the room.

Corporations are required to save all electronic records for SOX auditing, and the State of California might decide to help themselves to those records when their Attorney General is trying to make a name for himself by bringing a gender discrimination lawsuit. That's why you fire people who make a habit of saying incriminating things in easily-searchable electronic format.

For a similar reason, they should probably fire every Google employee who talked about it on the public internet. Very high chance of being troublemakers who draw attention from the government.

</comment><comment><USER47> Who wants to play an Arguman game with me? Not specifically about the diversity memo but about positive discrimination in general.

[http://en.arguman.org/positive-discrimination-at-work-is- imm...](http://en.arguman.org/positive-discrimination-at-work-is- immoral/26988)

</comment><comment><USER48> > _Sexism isn't making it harder for women to enter tech. From my personal > experiences, sexism makes it even easier for women to enter tech, though I > understand that my experiences don't generalize to that of other women._

The OP may have personally benefited from sexism. I don't understand why that leads to the assertion of "Sexism isn't making it harder for women to enter tech" when her experience seems to better support, "Sexism doesn't necessarily make it harder for women to enter tech"

Edit: Not being pedantic for pedantic' sake. The OP's assertion inherently contradicts the assertions of women who do believe that they were hindered by sexism. So I'm genuinely confused if the OP believes that assertion as it is written, or if it's a case of imprecise wording.

</comment><comment><USER49> I want to point out this passage:

"But I was accepted, while all of my friends weren't. I just thought that it was because I prepped a lot for the interviews and my preparation paid off."

It's likely that the preparation did pay off and possible that the author was as smart as her friends but not confident enough to believe it.

I've always been a snarky know-it-all, and honestly when I don't have the answers I tend to extrapolate (read bs). It was only after talking to a long time friend who identified as having impostor syndrome I realised that this behaviour could be harmful.

She is a software engineer, beat me in school and should be running rings around me.

Take it from a snark, confidence doesn't always mean smarter.

</comment><comment><USER50> Can be off-topic but this piece must resonate more.

"I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower. They are useless and detrimental to health. I don't like techbros' hangouts, with beers, playing pool, and occasional jerking off jokes. I don't like feeling like a piece of furniture to add to the company's diversity. I don't like my male teammates to think that I got to where they are only because I'm female. I don't like the representation of female engineers on TV, always nerdy, unattractive, and without much of a social life."

</comment><comment><USER51> I think I have seen a similar pattern in interviews where men actually give women higher scores for the same performance as men but women would have no compunction giving the same women the actual lower score they deserve. The reason is that the men don't want to appear sexist. The same goes for promotions.

On the flip side, there is discrimination against women too with less pay for equal work. Prettier women would also get more 'attention' from coworkers which could be especially an issue if it were from a higher up.

</comment><comment><USER15> This kind of reminds me of this episode: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Opportunities_(Yes_Minis...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Opportunities_\(Yes_Minister\))

I think the authors have nailed it. There is a lot of posturing, but at the end of the day, most people for whom it is all done, ostensibly, do not want quotas or special favors.

</comment><comment><USER52> _I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower. They are useless and detrimental to health. I don't like techbros' hangouts, with beers, playing pool, and occasional jerking off jokes._

Thanks for saying this. I feel the exact same way, and I'm male.

</comment><comment><USER53> As I said in another comment: in addition to people in favor of affirmative action and people opposed to affirmative action, there's the large class of people who are in favor of affirmative action, but against the political correctness pressure of having to act like they believe this in for the benefit of all instead of the explicit benefit of the affected minority.

I am for affirmative action (as originally intended), and I treat coworkers whom I assume (in my flawed prejudiced manner) to have gotten here through AA with the same respect as if I did not assume that they were hired because of AA (and stop respecting them if they don't prove themselves as suitable for the job, as I would do with non AA coworkers), but I refuse to sign the "any kind of diversity magically improves everything" manifesto.

</comment><comment><USER54> > I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower.

Every time I think I might be working too much, I hear that it's ordinary to work _way_ more than I ever do, and I am reassured...

<comment><USER22> hackathons aren't work. They're supposed to be fun (though not everyone will enjoy them) and are attended by the younger crowd. You won't see many 40-year old engineers with kids and a spouse going there.

<comment><USER31> I'm 40 without kids and I still agree. I completely avoid hackathons at work because I hate the idea of being forced to be "creative" and doing optional work. I'd rather focus on my hobbies. I do applaud the youngins for being naive and enthusiastic though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> >I don't like those 48 hour coding hackathons without sleep or shower. They are useless and detrimental to health. I don't like techbros' hangouts, with beers, playing pool, and occasional jerking off jokes.

I think that's a very small section of the tech world, though. I've never seen or heard about that kind of behaviour outside of SV startup scene. Admittedly I'm a dull corporate developer, working in decidedly untrendy technologies in London.

</comment><comment><USER56> I genuinely wonder how much of this experience can be attributed to being in Stanford CS instead of Random State U CS.

</comment><comment><USER57> > I don't like feeling like a piece of furniture to add to the company's > diversity.

This is a great point. Companies are still sexist when there's a 2:1 chance a female will be hired over males with equivalent skills.

I'm happy there's some discourse around these topics right now.

</comment><comment><USER13> >"She's good for a woman, so even though she doesn't do as well as that guy, she still gets the same scores because she's in the women's league."

But it would still be viewed as sexist if the interviewers gave her lower scores. The only way not to be sexist is if you absolutely assess it right. Not too high and not too low.

(not saying the author is calling them sexist)

</comment><comment><USER58> "You are a sexist" is the new weapon for women these days. Just say that and every common sense argument loses and everyone just shuts their mouth.

<comment><USER59> That's not the common insult.

However on twitter; "Mansplaining" is a quick way to shut down conversation leading to sometimes funny[0] dialog between my girlfriend and folks on twitter.

[0]: [https://twitter.com/libsecure/status/833457782275833857](https://twitter.com/libsecure/status/833457782275833857)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> >I think this whole claiming that being a victim as a self-fulfilling prophecy is flawed. It's hard to say a trans woman who's been murdered or raped had it coming.

wow, looks like things have escalated fast.

We've gone from Google employees who earn 100k+ salaries as software engineers to rape...

<comment> norea-armozel That's the thing. You can't arbitrarily say that the line stops at one thing in terms of saying people are to blame for their misfortune when the same can be said for anyone that becomes a victim in any other circumstance. Either victims legitimately exist as a consequence of unfairness and injustice or they don't exist at all. It's really something that has to be said because it's the thing that I see too often stated in fluffier terms by New Agers (aka The Secret). One's attitude can no more stop the power of a bullet any more than one's attitude can stop the one who set that bullet in motion. Ultimately, we always have victims and we always have a choice to accept that they deserve justice when they are harmed.

<comment><USER13> >You can't arbitrarily say that the line stops at one thing

I never said that or implied that. You misinterpreted. It makes zero sense to bring up rape when talking about this Google manifesto. I do think sexism and racism occur in the tech industry. However, not comparable in extremity to rape. This trivializes the experiences that rape victims actually do face. I'm not a moderator of course, so say what you want. But it makes your talking points looking appear ridiculous and nonsensical. Perhaps, your comments would be more relevant in the Binary Capital case.

<comment> norea-armozel My comment was in reply to another comment which wasn't directly related to the letter that Damore wrote. I think you really need to read the comment I'm replying to before asserting anything else because I think you're confused. Try from the beginning and read.

<comment><USER60> i did read that person's comment. Nobody else mentioned rape until you did.

<comment> norea-armozel Yet my comment was about blaming victims. So can you admit you're an intellectually dishonest hack that should bow out now and get a job as a CNN contrarian talking head? I heard there's been some vacancies made.

<comment><USER13> okay. stop throwing a tantrum because you were wrong

<comment> norea-armozel Can you actually prove that I'm wrong or are you going to admit you're a liar? Because there's a big problem with your non-argument so far since you assume that the discussion isn't about victim blaming when the grandparent comment was victim blaming. So yeah, you need to really get your argument out and not latch onto the inconsequential things in my argument you don't like (like the tone or whatever). Either stand up and deliver an argument or go away.

Edit: Also down voting me won't make your argument correct.

<comment><USER13> i'm actually not down voting you. However, other people are.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> equal opportunity is like being given better equipment at the start of a videogame where everyone else has to learn the game's mechanics. at some point you never learned some of those early game skills to get past a certain point.</comment>


Ask HN: Would it be useful to see directed graphs of user journeys? - <AUTHOR> Im building an analytics tool that aggregates and plots user journeys through an app or website. They are visualized as a directed graph of a user moving between pages/screens.
Im doing this because its quite difficult with traditional tools to get a simple view of how users are using an app, and how this changes over time and by type of user.
Aggregating these graphs to show the paths "most users" take is relatively complex, before I embark on it I was wondering if anyone else would find this useful?
If so I may consider building a more versatile version for others. <comment><USER2> My advice is to keep in mind the idea of building it for others, but just build it for yourself first. Then you'll have some screenshots to show people to see if they want it.

Others may _say_ they want it, but until you have something to show them, they won't really know. If you want it, build a minimal version, use it, then show it off. Keeping the eventual possible goal in mind may help you avoid dead- ends, and let you extend more easily, avoiding the "full re-implemention" hassle.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks Colin, sound advice. Its in production for a relatively large app at the moment, but there is no easy way to share access.

Ill take a look at building a small showcase demo.</comment></comment>


Test - <AUTHOR>

just a test
http://google.com
Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.
In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.
For example, I just noticed that Twitter, transparently to me and presumably all other Twitter users, switched to an encrypted web connection by default. You can tell because most modern browsers show the address bar in green when the connection is encrypted. Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.
In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.
For example, I just noticed that Twitter, transparently to me and presumably all other Twitter users, switched to an encrypted web connection by default. You can tell because most modern browsers show the address bar in green when the connection is encrypted. Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.
In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.
For example, I just noticed that Twitter, transparently to me and presumably all other Twitter users, switched to an encrypted web connection by default. You can tell because most modern browsers show the address bar in green when the connection is encrypted. <comment><AUTHOR> test reply: ust a test <http://google.com> Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.

In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.

For example, I just noticed that Twitter, transparently to me and presumably all other Twitter users, switched to an encrypted web connection by default. You can tell because most modern browsers show the address bar in green when the connection is encrypted. Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.

In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.

For example, I just noticed that Twitter, transparently to me and presumably all other Twitter users, switched to an encrypted web connection by default. You can tell because most modern browsers show the address bar in green when the connection is encrypted. Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted? The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making major changes to the web's infrastructure.

In the year since I wrote that, a number of major websites have "solved" the WiFi eavesdropping problem by either making encrypted HTTPS web traffic an account option or mandatory for all logged in users.</comment>


What is a good way to encrypt or purge hard drive of laptop - <AUTHOR> As everyone knows, simply recycling stuff does not delete files.
Furthermore, files can still reside in temp and other directories.
Bitlock is not an option because I don't have enterprise or pro edition of windows.
I don't want to have to burn an ISO or make a boot backup. Veracrpt is complicated because it requires these steps. <comment><USER2> For Non-SSD drive: [https://dban.org/](https://dban.org/)

Veracrypt for encryption. It's not complicated at all. You will have little to no other options except creating an ISO on a USB drive (or burning?).</comment>


Ask HN: is it about the product or the founders? - <AUTHOR>

I saw one of paul grahams videos and he says the most important thing in a startup is the product, but on the application and the essays it claims that the founders are the most important thing, so which one is it when applying for YC? <comment><USER2> The founders are the foundation of the house. The product is the house. While the product (in the broader sense, including e.g. customer support) is ultimately what's going to make money, you won't get a good product without good founders.

Since we see startups so early, it's rarely a choice for us of founders vs products, but rather founders vs _ideas_ for products. Between those two, founders are the more important.

<comment><USER3> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0w3ctErsxog> \- If you want to hear PG discuss exactly this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There's a video by founder of Sequoia Capital, saying that market is even more important than both the founders and the product, i.e. best product + best team will still fail if there isn't a market</comment>


Ideology Is the Original Augmented Reality - <AUTHOR> http://mitp.nautil.us/feature/271/ideology-is-the-original-augmented-reality <comment><USER2> My theory here is really sloppy, but in this topic I think there are two concepts worth examining:

* Baudrillard's ideas on the _hyperreality_ , which is basically a simulation that doesn't actually relate to any underlying reality. He argued that a lot of the signs and symbols in our postmodern society have become hyperreal, purely manufactured artifacts.

* Deleuze's concept of _virtuality_ which he defines as something isn't actual, but is nevertheless real.

Is a virtual reality any less real than physicality? If sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, then sufficiently advanced artificial reality might be indistinguishable from reality.

<comment><USER3> Virtuality is arguably only less real in terms of its very dependence on the Real, in that you cannot you have virtual worlds without the physical worlds that generate and power them.

I think as we go along, a lot of Baudrilliard's ideas that seemed radical in the 1980s are becoming inert, as they are so ingrained in our everyday experience (eg, hyper-reality, the simulacra, etc). At least in this iteration of the technology. Moving into mass-scale mixed reality environments will be an entirely different proposition.

<comment><USER2> I think this is true for a lot of poststructuralist thought, the most popular which have generally been subsumed into the cultural consciousness (e.g. Deleuze's rhizome becomes what we know as the distributed network). But I think it's still useful to draw upon those concepts to codify what we live and breathe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I found this article worthless, pretentiously worthless at that (WMDs? Really?). Stories augment the human experience of reality, as do social constructs, as does language, but I am too dumb to understand why that's news. What is the point he is trying to argue? That there are seven AR Pikachus dancing in the head of every philosopher?

<comment> brian-armstrong Sounds like this might be your first Slavoj Zizek article.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the truth is simpler. Ideology and games both present people with an escape from their lives. Life terrible? Play some WoW, and you'll at least be guaranteed slow and steady progress instead of an ongoing backwards slide into poverty. Ideology (particular racist ideologies, as the article and to focus on) offers a similar alternative game to play. Failing at life? Start competing against a minority team that's even worse off, either economically or physically.

</comment><comment><USER6> Very interesting but I don't think AR is a perfect analogy because as far as I can tell there does not seem to be any such thing as an unbiased non- ideological human viewpoint (overlayed onto). _Everyone_ has a set of foundational nodes in their cognitive perceptual framework (an ideology) that are a core aspect of any view they have of the world. This is a pretty fundamental problem for politics.

<comment><USER7> I think you're talking about _humans_ , whereas the article was talking about reality.

Amount of CO2 in the air. Number of Rohingya killed. Amount of crude in Cantarell at this moment. Etc etc etc ad infinitum.

What are the answers to those questions? What are the physical implications? (ie-what will the Earth physically do with all the CO2? There is definitely an answer to that question which is non-ideological and unbiased, and, unfortunately, only really known for certain by Mother Nature.) All such questions, in fact, have answers that are, very much, non-ideological, and unbiased. Unfortunately, they are not really perceptible by humans without help. Sometimes our science can help, sometimes our knowledge of psychology can help, etc. But that's where our ideologies will come in. Only human perception of these very physical states, and their implications, are ideological. Because the ideology is augmenting the base reality with something we can understand. Something comfortable and intuitive for us.

Sorry for rambling. I think someone else might be able to explain it better. But it's my best shot at explaining why I think AR is a pretty good analogy for ideology.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> It looks to me that this is basically the same concept as what Scott Adams calls "filters" on reality.

</comment><comment><USER9> Understanding how modern philosophy understands ideology is important. I bemoan hearing american-liberals discuss how people don't, " _share common truth_ " anymore. In reality this is a decoupling of the DNC, and RNC's ideology. They are no longer one and the same, so what is considered " _true_ " by either has changed, irreparably.

The problem is most Americans politics had a unified ideological understanding of the world for nearly 3 centuries (at least if we count the WASP america). This division is new, and America's distaste of any post 1850's western continental philosophy (as it was mostly dominated by Marxists) means they lack the vocabulary to discuss these concepts, or understand their long tail implications.

<comment><USER7> > _I bemoan hearing american-liberals discuss how people don 't..._

I think the point is that "bemoaning" that is an ideology in itself. So your own reality is "augmented" with a belief set that is, likely, not terribly representative of reality. You've simply filled in the gaps in everyday experiences with something that you can, at once, understand, _and_ is comfortable to you.

<comment><USER9> I bemoan the ideology of others, and you bemoan mine. Perchance we've more in common then you would think.

<comment><USER7> Actually, I don't bemoan your ideology. (In fact I suspect I hold the exact same ideology.) I'm just pointing out that we are ideologues. And like all ideologues, our ideology allows us to coexist comfortably with the actual reality we live in. Even though it's highly unlikely that the underlying reality is consistent with our ideology.

This would be true of _ALL_ ideologues. That's my point. In my opinion, nearly every human on Earth, is likely an ideologue. And this model, or analogy, of AR as ideology, is a pretty good representation of that state of affairs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> /extremely nautil.us voice

</comment><comment><USER11> Zizek!? Time for some memes.

<comment><USER12> That whole article was really straightforward for zizek, I love hearing him talk because he's never boring but his train of thought veers all over the place when he speaks live.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Maybe _religion_ is the original augmented reality. Interesting way to think about it, anyway.

<comment><USER9> religion is a facet, or component of ideology.

<comment><USER14> I would not describe the defining parts of buddhism as ideological so much as philosophical and sensuous. I'm not sure a good definition of religion exists. You're being hugey reductive.

<comment><USER15> Sure it's not a western religion but it's a religion.

If you remove all the cosmology and mysticism from Buddhism, you are left with something other than the original practice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> How to be a philosopher in the past 20 years: Scan technology magazine headlines - pick up the latest buzzwords, add some aristotle, hume , st. augustine and baudrillard. Mix well

To save you even more work:

"The internet of things is fundamental to free will"

"The unexamined life of Self driving cars"

"How seq2seq networks are marxist"

<comment><USER17> Sadly, I would still read and think on all three of those articles.

<comment><USER16> You can think without headlines.</comment></comment></comment>