Towards Better Online Dating - <AUTHOR> http://blog.adamsmith.cc/2011/02/towards-better-online-dating.html <comment><USER2> I agree with everything the author said save this:

> _"Then only allow people to access others they are likely to match > against."_

This only works if you are 100% confident that your matching algorithm is infallible. The odds of this being the case is about 0%.

I've thought about this problem some, and I think there are a few unacknowledged issues:

\- Who you _will_ get along with, and are a good match for, is often different from who _you think_ you will get along with. Dorky Dillon, taking from the author's example, doesn't want page after page of plain janes similar to himself - like all humans he wants to date upwards... even though it is against his long-term interests and reduces his "efficiency" in the system.

\- We have solid predictors of _long term_ relationship success. Similar politics? Check. Similar religious views? Check. Suffice it to say, the odds of a hardline Republican and a extreme Democrat working out in the long run is pretty low, but would they enjoy hanging out for 5 minutes? 10? A month? Part of the dating site's job is to find _dates_ , long term relationships build themselves out of that. IMHO there's a big difference between long-term compatibility (that the poor lovebirds will discover for themselves with or without your algorithm's help) and short-term compatibility (e.g. the ability to carry a conversation through dinner that won't put the other side to sleep). We have good predictors for the former, but IMHO not so much for the latter... and the latter is also much harder to infer.

So far dating sites - and even the vaunted OkCupid is guilty of this - conflating personality with opinion. Personality is what matters most in the initial stage, but none of the sites are collecting meaningful information on it.

I almost feel like matching people based on _relationship_ compatibility (i.e., mid to long term) is the wrong way to go. IMHO it's a far better bet to predict whether or not two people can get through dinner without trying to kill each other... and just send them on a date. If they click, great. If they don't, spin the wheel again. The modern dating website, with its hyper-focus on long-term compatibility seems to be optimizing prematurely.

<comment><USER3> > IMHO it's a far better bet to predict whether or not two people can get > through dinner without trying to kill each other... and just send them on a > date.

That's the thing. It's true that a similar world view is important for a long term relationship, problem is that there's well known sociological phenomenon where by people will not answer honestly about their actual world view (choosing one they consider to be more socially acceptable).

The very problem of course stems from the term "online dating". As I stated in my comment, it should really be about "online discovery of people you can go on a date with". The algorithms should not be about matching, but about discovery of people where interest may be mutual.

<comment><USER2> > _"it should really be about "online discovery of people you can go on a date > with""_

I agree completely. Right now our systems are (purportedly) remarkably good at finding good _long term_ matches, but fail disastrously at getting you first dates. One thing comes before the other - and let's be honest, compatibility is something you can discover for yourself.

I'd much rather use a service that can get me regular dates with people I'd enjoy spending time with, but may not be a good long-term match, than a system that almost never gets me dates, but on the off chance it does she may be my soulmate.

<comment><USER4> below is some of what i wrote on adam's blog post. btw - @potatolicious, with Luv@FirstTweet we're targeting this niche to help you "get regular dates with people I'd enjoy spending time with" as you say.

I co-founded and just launched Luv@FirstTweet a few weeks ago.

I've thought about many of the issues which Adam describes, although I've never written them as eloquently and clearly as he has. I'm going to address some of the issues described in the blog post (note the "you" i reference is adam obv)...

1\. spamming, hypergamy, and false advertising is a huge problem as you mention, and a big time sink. People want to use online dating because it is a huge pool of potential people and because it's an efficient use of time. However when you have to waste time it detracts from the value (more on this below).

2\. spamming - On Luv@FirstTweet you just respond to our Tweets which build your profile, so you're not browsing profiles or messaging random people. The only time you do message someone is after you've been matched with them, and at that point we show several things in common as well as their photo, so hopefully when you email them it can initiate a real dialogue about things you care about, not just "nice pic ur h0t" haha.

3\. hypergamy is covered pretty much in my comment above due to the nature of how you interact with the site.

4\. In terms of false advertising, I guess it could be done if you lie in responses to all of our questions, but this isn't a traditional dating site where people are browsing profiles and a deviant dude hopes his lies will ensnare an unsuspecting profile viewer…we're building a profile about you and then matching, so it wouldn't have the same impact and thus I doubt people would feel the urge to do it as much.

5\. network effects are the biggest challenge I see us facing, and it's something we're got to deal with and adapt to. The big players are pouring tons of money into advertising their self-destructive business models as you explain, so this makes things tricky.

6\. if there was a "like" button next to Zao Yang's quote I'd click it – nicely put

7\. "And to redefine the problem a little bit, I suspect there's more value and fun in helping people meet new friends generically, and only incidentally maybe a significant other." the nature of our platform could go this way, but currently we're sticking with matching for dating. Something cool to think about though.

8\. business models – looking into the future, there are many different avenues to monetize which aren't ad based, but thanks to some good advice from @schildkrout from HowAboutWe we're keeping the site free. We want to grow this bad boy after all and when looking at pt #5 above, can't add any friction to the model to prevent user growth

9\. the business model issue you bring up is one of the main reasons I had the idea for Luv@FirstTweet: "I sign up on the site, and buy a subscription. I find six or seven girls I like, and send them highly personalized messages. About 15% of people on Match are premium members, and therefore only one of those girls can even reply to my message. I get one reply, at most" – that right there is super super annoying. It is a huge time sink and a waste of money.

10\. I'm definitely going to read that OkCupid post, it looks terrific.

11\. backend – while we're not running computer vision algorithms to analyze smiles, skin showing, etc (which is interesting, but just very different than how we approached things), we are going to continually tweak our matching algorithm based on the responses we get and seeing "what kind of matches work and which don't" as you mention.

12\. frontend – this is where we hope to be simple and fun. You say a few points which I totally agree with: "Everyone knows that dating profiles suck to create and suck to consume (YES) Not only do they lack real signal, they also make for a horrible onboarding experience. (YES) You want me to fill eight huge text areas with witty banter, and check or uncheck 250 radio buttons? (YES…HAHA) Overall I'm not bullish on the trinity of people profiles, messaging, and people searches. I know that's how all sites are built today, but if I were in this space I'd keep an open mind on redefining the primitives."

This is the key here to Luv@FirstTweet....

We take a fresh approach and say, hey you're busy. We respect your lives. Go to work then go have fun with your friends. Oh and when you have 1 spare second when you're grabbing lunch, or walking down the street, or waiting on a friend…tweet a response to @luvatfirsttweet's latest question and we'll store it and build your profile. We have a web interface of course if you'd like to edit your questions and answer some previously asked questions, but the core nature of the site enables effortless and fun profile building.

I'd love to know anyone's thoughts on this. Thanks.

Jon Lehr co-founder, Luv@FirstTweet

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It would be interesting to see an online dating site which treated users like mailing service providers do: "We really _want_ you to succeed with this, but our priorities are to the ecosystem first and you a very distant second. You're guilty until proven innocent, we're going to invest a lot of effort into educating you in how to suck less, and if we catch a _whiff_ of you being a nuisance you are banned for life."

(It would take some _serious_ guts to say "Your presence in our community is a net negative. We wish you the best, as long as the best is found elsewhere.", particularly if you do that in a data-driven fashion. My intuition is that people's revealed preferences in dating are very, very, very far from socially acceptable.)

<comment><USER6> 'It would take some serious guts to say "Your presence in our community is a net negative. We wish you the best, as long as the best is found elsewhere."'

Didn't OKCupid do that with their "If you have any STDs, please go here [link to match.com]"?

<comment><USER7> Correction, it was [link to random competitor]. Needless to say, match.com is no longer on that list.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> How about: Instead of a static profile, a tumblog-style First Impression that contains a persons consumption habits (movies, music, tv, etc) as well as pictures, feelings and thoughts. They can update it incrementally to keep it fresh and relevant. You can follow another persons First Impression to get a passive view of them over time. Way better than canned answers to canned questions and filling out surveys.

The service automatically groups similar people (demographics, location) into groups of ~20. 10 guys, 10 girls. They are then led through a week-long online introduction process where each day they respond to a prompt about a different aspect of their life. By the end of the week, hopefully people have gotten a feel for one another and if they are interested, you help them plan further communication or a date.

You use the ratings gathered (+ other usage/interaction data) during the week to assemble the next groups based on similarity, etc.

Group setting = no spammers, no awkward immediate 1-on-1, incentive to behave, multiple partner options, attentive group-mates that arent off 'playing the field' w/ 100 other people.

Week long = interaction over time builds trust, more time to learn about other people, people like to be guided through awkward/ambiguous social situations.

Pay-per-play instead of monthly subscriptions ($10/week) so that a dater can come and go as they please. You know everyone in the group is currently active and is available for communication (vs. long dormant profiles, etc).

Etc, etc, etc.

I built this and launched it and it operated from 2007-2010. It was called FlowMingle.com and had ~25k members. But, I gave up and shut it down. Why? Because I got tired, didnt have any money, etc. I still think this is an amazing way to do online dating, and my users agreed. Our sign-up conversion rate was ~22% (!!), and this is with 0 marketing dollars ever spent.

But you know what I learned? Some people appreciate legitimate interactions and thoughtful conversation and fruitful behaviors, and some people just want to 'play the field' and take their chances at landing the big one. The online dating space is every bit as complicated as the online daters themselves.

I would be happy to share my experiences with anyone who is interested.

<comment><USER9> Thank you for sharing this. As I was reading this post last night and the comments here this morning, I had some ideas about how to potentially solve the problems. Some of the ideas I had you've outlined and tried. Glad to see I'm not alone in these thoughts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Wide-open online dating discussions devolve into the same mechanics of "Is College Worth It?" discussions.

It can be interesting to read, but most people will end up broadcasting their life experience masquerading as opinion.

Also, never hire anybody over 28 years old.

</comment><comment><USER11> It seems like there may be no way to make dating easier, due to evolutionary reasons. If some men find a way (resource) to get access to higher quality females, there will immediately be as much competition for this resource as possible. The only way to get access to it will inevitably be through costly (as costly as possible) displays of fitness.

For instance, paying large amounts of money for access, spending a lot of time working out to improve your pics, etc.

</comment><comment><USER3> There is a problem with attempts at making online dating work like "real world" dating. I'll state my reasons for this belief up front: I'm very happily in an almost two year relationship with somebody I've met online (OKCupid) whom I could have never met in person. Before, I've had a happy (even if not lasting) and amicably ending relationships with other women whom I could have never met in person.

I'll use my anecdote as one archetype ("geek of one type, seeking a geek of another") for whom online dating works very well. When I started dating, I was 23 and working full time while atteding graduate school, living in San Jose. Most of my fellow graduate students were already in relationships. The idea of work place romance seemed scary to a new comer both to dating _and_ the work force. I had a very small and limited friends circle.

My career, educational and financial situation meant that even if I had time for social activities (I didn't), I'd have no ability to relate to a (statistically) random person my age, irrespective of their gender. They didn't have a stable job or attend graduate school, they didn't live on their own.

The latter paragraph makes me sounds extremely shallow, but consider this: it's not a good idea to have a [1] long term relationship to somebody earning significantly less or significantly more than you. For example, simple things that involve a money/time trade-off can turn into cultural conflicts: for example, hunting 30 minutes for street parking when you could pay $10 to park in a public parking garage (or in a city, taking the bus instead of a cab). Dating somebody living with parents is difficult if you live alone; dating with somebody who expects you to go to happy hour when you're in class or working is also difficult.

([1] Another factor: I wanted a long term relationship at 23. Most men my age didn't, leading women who _were_ to almost automatically infer that I "just wanted to get laid").

Finally, I also wanted somebody who was intellectually inclined. While (for reasons I can't comprehend), most men are intimidated by intelligent women, I wanted somebody who could be a great conversation partner; who could discuss (non-computer) science, philosophy, music and literature. I just didn't want to hide my geekyness from my partner.

Online dating worked well in this way: I could meet women living in San Francisco and Berkeley (which have a higher concentration of single geek-o- phile women than San Jose), places where I wouldn't "just spontenously" make a trip (given the distance). I only had to send a few messages, as I could perform intelligent searches based on match percentage and then further narrow down the results by actually reading the profiles (something most men on dating sites don't quite do).

In some ways, you could argue I was engaging in what Adam Smith called "hypergammy". In many cases, I felt the women I met were "out of my league". However, that's completely silly: how can you know if you're out of somebody's league, if you don't know what sport they're playing? In fact, one woman whom I considered "out of my league" also told me she considered me "out of her league".

Are there problems with online dating? Yes, of course. If you're curious to what that problem is, ask a woman who actually used an online dating site about what is in her mailbox. Fortunately, even a simplistic ranking algorithm (TF/IDF on the message based with the keywords of the recipient's profile to burry the generic "YO GURL UR SO HOT" messages -- from men who never bothered to read the profile of women they messaged) can help greatly reduce this. Helping people discover relevant content is a problem of algorithms (ranking content and finding meaningful patterns in it), systems programming (building the systems that could store, modify, retrieve and process the content in _real time_ as opposed to in batch) and user interface (there's a whole discipline around this). OKCupid and EHarmony (I've never used it, but they happen to use an open source project I contribute to) are examples of at least getting some parts right. Problem is that they couldn't go outside of their niche (geeks in the case of OKCupid and -- in my perception, reality may be different - traditional, usually conservative/religious and heterosexual[2] people in the case of eHarmony).

([2]: I realize that this post is very"heteronormative", my apologies for this)

In short, online dating should really be called "online discovery of people you can date". Real dating happens in person and the same rules (e.g., "if you're a guy be nice, pay and open the door") apply. It's just that you're exposed to people you might not be exposed to otherwise (and you feel more confident when on a date with them: you know they're actually interested in you). Each side discovers something: I discovered that being a programmer (doing something I have a deep passion for, doing creative work) wasn't something I needed to hide and play down, while my dates discovered that programmers can also have an interest in music, neuroscience, philosophy and literature.

In short, making online dating based on offline social networks makes it nearly useless. Given the experience of Myspace and Friendster (as opposed non-dating based social networks like Facebook), it's a non starter from the get-go: male friends spamming your female friends ruin the "social network" part, the social network parts ruins the chance of any dating that wouldn't happen in real life happening due to the use of the site (why, then, use the site in the first place?)

<comment><USER12> "most men are intimidated by intelligent women"

While in theory a man's chances of finding a mate increase as his IQ increases, I'm not entirely convinced that women are attracted to raw intelligence either.

<comment><USER13> [http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/04/intercourse-and- intelligenc...](http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/04/intercourse-and- intelligence.php)

"Each additional point of IQ increased the odds of virginity by 2.7% for males and 1.7% for females."

<comment><USER12> I was talking about odds of marriage, not the age of losing ones virginity.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It's not the backend. Better matching isn't going to work when you're matching snowflakes.

People turn to online dating because they want more options. Put them through your fantastic matching algorithm and out of the 1 million members you supposedly have they are only going to see half a dozen.

So you loosen the matching to return more results. Now they see 15. Why not just skip to the chase and filter based on age, height and proximity? That will get you 90% of the way there.

And people like looking at pictures of potential dates/partners. Let them do the filtering themselves.

That leaves spam and scams, and they can both be reduced with a free-to-flirt, pay-to-contact model. If someone is not willing to spend $5 - $10 to contact you, then they can't be too interested in you. And vice versa.

(I've used online dating sites and I work in marketing for an online dating site)

<comment><USER15> This works only if you're close to the centre of gravity of the site's population.

I'm a Christian and politically centre-left - not actually very unusual over here, as it happens, I'm just in a small church so that option doesn't really work. Even OKC, with its much vaunted matching system, is pretty bad at finding people who don't cross a red line for me one way or the other. Even with a tuned profile I tend to find:

* People who match with me on general life outlook are relatively often nowhere near me on religion. I'm not trying to exist in a Christian ghetto but a regular churchgoer and a Darwin fish aren't good matches. I also tend to match quite strongly with Muslim women, which I can't see either side appreciating.

* People who match with me on religion are often politically enough to the right of me that experience says there'd be arguments.

OKC has _major_ advantages over many rivals because it's enormously easier to find red lines up front and save both parties a lot of time, but even then there are edge cases where matching can fail. The further away from the population centre you get the harder matching becomes (just as in the real world, frankly) and a crude 'local, age, height' filter will slow those people down considerably.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Honestly, I think that meetup.com ends up being a better "dating site" than most sites that actually position themselves as such. As the article says, it's better to just focus on helping people find other people they might be friends with. From there, the relationships just sort of happen. Also, the social distance problem is largely taken care of because of the focus on group activities, and also because group organizers get visibility into the behavior of the members and can, for example, boot the creeps who message every single woman in the group.

<comment><USER10> Very good point. meetup.com is another site/service ripe for replacement: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2188969>

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I really enjoyed reading this post, as I think Adam makes some excellent points. Whevener stuff like this gets to the frontpage of hackernews I get really excited, and make sure I carefully read each and every comment it gets. The reason for my enthusiasm for dating-related discussion can be easily explained: six years ago I cofounded a datingsite in the Netherlands which takes a completely different, and hopefully better, approach to online dating. And so far, the (dutch) online daters seem to agree with us: over the years we've consistently received very positive reviews (by members and the media in general), in stark contrast with what is generally being written about online dating. Since we have the ambition to move the concept to the US this year, I'm going to go ahead and actually start joining the discussion here by giving some details into how we've managed to address some of the issues Adam talks about in his post.

Our site, in a nutshell, basically doesn't allow members to seek out other members and message them to see if there's mutual interest. It's only possible to talk to people you've been matched to by our system. In order to increase the chances of interaction between the matched members we artifically limit the frequency at which one receives new matches. Also, we give very little information about the match. The system has good reasons to introduce the members to each other, they will have to find out for themselves what those reasons might be. This approach helps mitigate the issue of 'Hypergamy', as the matching system ensures the match works _both ways_. Furthermore it prevents spamming (it's just not possible) and deincentivizes fakers.

We can only get away with not allowing people to search for themselves because we have a great matching system. Adam talked about eHarmony's love-science- PhD's and noted a statistical approach would probably work better. That's exactly what we thought, and put into practice. By combining the information we have of our members (answers to questions, attractiveness scores, etc) with a feedback loop that tells us which matches actually work out (or don't), we can constantly improve our algorithm (think machine learning) to make better matches. We actually have spend years optimizing the crap out of this.

Now, for us to be able to have a fighting chance in the US, we need to also somehow solve the fabled chicken and egg problem. We managed to pull it off in the Netherlands (word-of-mouth mostly, a big plus of actually having a good product), but will have to do more to succesfully launch in a foreign market. If anyone here has thoughts about this and is willing to share, I would be very grateful.

</comment><comment><USER18> Perhaps encouraging people to unplug and go for a walk in the park?

</comment><comment><USER19> I strongly support the points this article makes about what the online dating space currently has to offer.

Ultimately, I believe that people are better matchmakers or judges of compatibility than a survey or a machine. Drawing from my own personal experience, I have played cupid and matched 4 of my friends that have ended up getting married. Seeing the lack of personal touch in online dating, I started SocialHack (socialhacks.me) as an attempt to bridge that gap between daily social interactions and the "social" interactions we have on the web.

Online dating has become a 1B/year business, and SocialHack compliments online dating by adding that personal touch. Individuals go to online dating sites to find a date, but don't know where to ask advice about what to wear, how to respond to a text, where to make reservations, etc. Ideally, I would like to build out this MVP into a peer-to-peer social advice platform, I believe that this sort of a platform would naturally disrupt online dating as it exists now because consultants will want to match their clients with friends from their own local network. Our female SocialHackers provide online and offline services ranging from fashion consulting/personal shopping, date planning/advising, in-field "wing-women" services, and providing feedback for online dating profiles.

I created SocialHack during the Lean Startup Machine weekend in SF, winning runner-up and making $100 (per our proof of concept on Skyara.com) via our MVP socialhacks.me all in less than 2 days. Our success in proving the concept convinced me that there is a true need for this sort of service. More interestingly, female enthusiasm for the concept suggests that a chicken and egg problem wouldn't exist here.

I'd love to hear feedback on the idea and would love to work with anyone interested in developing SocialHack further.

</comment><comment><USER20> I love the characterization of the current solutions in this space as "just too O(n)". A poignant, elegant, delightfully nerdy description.

<comment><USER21> Sorry, I'm nerdy but I guess not nerdy enough to be in on the joke. Could someone explain it to me? I'm "the business guy" in my startup, though I'm actually a girl.

<comment><USER22> It's big-O notation <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_O_notation>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've randomly thought about this and one thing i can say is that if you want to build a successful long-term dating site you HAVE to cater 90% towards the women haahha. that means making it easy for them to filter, having a safe place where they don't feel hit on by creepers, or provide an arena where they know that the men are "quality", etc.

You will always have enough male signups. So for the men it's about balancing the ratios somewhat so that it's not just completely ridiculous. Dating sites know this and probably don't care at all because they're getting revenue from any warm body.

While i agree that it just takes 5 minutes in person to do a quick BS/weirdo filter, that's not feasible online, _especially_ for women. Women are spammed much more and have a tough time filtering, let alone meeting many people.

The only way this will work is if the matching algorithm he's proposing is extremely accurate, otherwise all it'd take is like 3-4 weeks of failed group dinner meetings to write the site off.

<comment><USER24> _if you want to build a successful long-term dating site you HAVE to cater 90% towards the women_

Of course. Seems like one obvious way would be to limit the number of emails that men can send per day/week/whatever, so women don't get spammed quite so badly.

<comment><USER25> An obvious workaround: Multiple accounts can be created. It's that easy. Otherwise if you add hurdles, single account people would be put off from signing up.

<comment><USER26> Here's a possible system:

      - Free accounts exist.  They have mostly full privileges.
      - A given user can only receive so many requests per period
        of time.  A given user can only receive one request per
        user for a given period.  Others are informed that they
        will be put on a waiting list.  The site could play games
        with the waiting list, like purging inactive accounts or
        increasing the priority of requests similar to ones the
        user has already responded to.
      - Paid accounts exist.  There is at least one incentive to
        pay:  you may skip a waiting list every so often.  The
        cost should be enough to reduce the incentive for account
        cloning and keep the spammers out, as it exists only for
        that purpose.

Desirable demographics (really a euphemism for 'women') would pretty much not need to pay. On the other hand, the site is especially attractive to them because they are not bombarded with messages. Less-desirable demographics would still be able to use the site without paying, but they would be able to pay to not wait around as much.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I'm building a dating site. Contact me if you want in on the beta. NY for now, expanding later.

The first thing to understand is the dating world is fraught with mishaps and frustration. This is often misinterpreted as specific shortcomings to various approaches, "bars suck!" and whatnot. The real conclusion is that there is a lack of transparency in dating: signals must be interpreted; brutal honesty is simply not socially acceptable. Because there is so much confusion, everyone has an opinion.

Lots of people want to go beyond their social networks to meet people. There is no doubt about that. Subscription models are also proven successful at critical mass.

The challenges are building to critical mass, removing the stigma, encouraging best behavior, removing spam, keeping the most desirable members, among many others I'm forgetting.

Dating won't go away, the web isn't going away, and we have fun new social tools to play with. Lots of opportunity here to go beyond what the traditional dating sites have done.

</comment><comment><USER28> The best data is just hard to collect online. Photos of person in their social group to deduce personality type would probably fail since there are so many variables.

Lab scientists can measure biological or physical properties [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGfznq9OgdU&feature=playe...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGfznq9OgdU&feature=player_embedded) like sweat scent which reveals immune system compatibility. They're getting very good correlations for long term relationships from these simple physical metrics.

Some of these metrics can be collected online, high testosterone or estrogen is visible in the face. Has any dating site used them seriously? Because most approach the problem from a psychological perspective, with surveys, bios, chatting, etc.. But long term couples have a very high proportion of physical compatibility, which happens to be easier to measure.

<comment><USER29> > The best data is just hard to collect online. Photos of person in their > social group to deduce personality type would probably fail since there are > so many variables.

The fact that there's so many variables isn't the reason such an analysis would fail. The reason is that there's just not enough input to predict personality type with any statistical significance.

There's just so much that could be measured, but whether any of these metrics have any correlation with whether two people can, as the author describes, "just get through dinner" is a very tough question to answer.

<comment><USER18> >The fact that there's so many variables isn't the reason such an analysis would fail. The reason is that there's just not enough input to predict personality type with any statistical significance. Isn't this the whole idea of factor analysis/singular variable decomposition?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I wrote about a grubwith.us-esque dating site in an Ask HN submission a little over a year ago.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=878657>

The challenge with this model is that extracting money from users requires repeated action on their part. That subscription money is so much easier. With an average account life of six months, match.com gets about $180 per paid user.

If you went with a Groupon-like model for a site that revolved around sending people on dates, and assuming you could make about $10 on $20ish dates, each user would have to get out there 18 times in order for you to beat the subscription model.

I still think there could be a big opportunity in a site like this, but it's not hard to see why the incumbents hang onto their subscription models for dear life.

</comment><comment><USER31> A site that would help one make new friends would be very interesting. Right now (AFAIK) there are only two kinds of sites: those where you interact with your existing friends (Facebook) and those that help you find dates (OkCupid, Match.com, etc.)

But what about a site that would let you make NEW friends (but "just" friends)? Would that be awkward? Online dating used to seem a lot awkward and is now kind of mainstream.

Meeting new friends is incredibly difficult; one ends up seeing the people they met in school or at work, and that's it.

Or maybe such a thing already exists? Or it's kind of available through Facebook...?

<comment><USER32> meetup.com

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I actually think a dating site would do best if it connected people and then forced them to meet each other. One of the reasons that they aren't great is that girls get swamped with hundreds of messages and are afraid of meeting most of the guys in public without XY number of messages. By the time everybody has jumped through these hoops everybody is bored by the process.

And the thing is you can't really know what somebody is like without meeting them in person.

Why not organise 'fun' group events for people that are interested in each other online and want to meet?

</comment><comment><USER34> As soon as I deleted my OkCupid profile I started meeting more people in real life. At least for me, where I was putting my energy was a zero-sum choice.

<comment><USER35> I haven't deleted mine, but ignoring it in favor of real life activities whenever possible has served me well so far.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Here is the Iron Helmet Games dating website. In development soon. (Angels needed!)

An online dating site where you put your money where your mouth is.

Guys and Girls review each others profiles and rather than making contact and trading a few messages, suitors buy "First Date Packages" and offer them to the people they are interested in (the target of their affections).

Dinner and a movie? Paddle boating on the lake? Perhaps a picnic in the park? Why not even go totally crazy and go skydiving!

Other suitors can see the offers made to people they too are interested in and can "bid" against them by offering a more impressive or more romantic package. (You want to attract the whales who have thousands to spend of really special weekend. Charter a yacht for example.)

As soon as "the target" accepts the offer, the suitor's credit card is billed for 75% of the date package, and the target is billed the remaining 25%. (The target must contribute to the date package price to ensure they participate and are serious.)

Site earns revenue by taking a slice of the price of each package. Once the site takes off, 3rd parties pay to have their romantic packages on offer.

Its a crazy idea but I think its cool for a number of reasons.

Geeks will like it because you get a lot of help making sure that first date is going to be interesting. You'll have the package all organized for you.

Girls will like it because when they go on a date they know where they will be going and it will be exciting. Chances are they choose from a list of interesting packages.

Go get em people will like it because both parties are jumping with both feet and instead of trading countless emails only to discover the other party is just not that interested.

Start your relationship off with a bang!

<comment><USER37> > Dinner and a movie? Paddle boating on the lake? Perhaps a picnic in

> the park? Why not even go totally crazy and go skydiving!

Those are all terrible first-meet, first-date ideas. From experience, I can say that you want something extremely public, from which you can extricate yourself quickly with minimal embarrassment. "Want to get a cup of coffee?" has been a standard for a long time for good reason.

<comment><USER36> No, thats exactly the point. Coffee is the boring lame idea that everybody else does. Take the emphasis off the other person, put in on the fun activities you will be enjoying! Start things of by _actually doing something_ with your Saturday afternoon!

<comment><USER38> If you need to do _something else_ when you're meeting someone, that person can't be that important.

Having coffee is boring. The person across from you will make up for that if they are the one you are seeking. And if they're not, go sky dive - alone!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Dating (online and offline) in the UK is a totally different ball game.

If it wasn't for alcohol, i think all British people would die out.

</comment><comment><USER40> I was hoping there will be a lot of behavior analysis of the dating game, and ways to utilize that knowledge in some innovative way to make online dating work.

Without understanding the mechanisms of the game, a more successful dating site just means a better conversion technique.

</comment><comment><USER41> An example of meeting friends-of-friends is soshi.com. They recently launched at Stanford and leverage your facebook network to display eligible friends of friends, it two people express interest in one another, it matches you up.

</comment><comment><USER42> Funny thing about OkCupid is they had a lot of their data in the front end code (until they caught on). You could see how many messages someone was getting in the last day/week and their reply percentage (which is then used to calculate their selectivity indicator). Stumbled across this on Reddit: [http://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/etej8/tilyou_can_se...](http://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/etej8/tilyou_can_see_how_many_messages_one_receives_and/)

</comment><comment><USER43> Seems like there really are plenty of wonderful creative ideas to improve these sites, but the problems alluded too seem to have simple solutions.

People who have not paid can't respond? Make it free to respond. Pay to initiate.

People spam with low quality requests. Make it so you only get a small number of non-responded requests.

People ignore requests and are not paying attention? Show number of responded/non responded requests in the last month.

</comment><comment><USER44> From the article:

 _Meeting friends-of-friends is the best way to find cool people, because liking is transitive AND because the low social distances force people to be on their best behavior._

If I were looking to date friends-of-friends in particular, I think I'd just use facebook directly. Though more often then not, I've already met such friends-of-friends via common events.

<comment><USER45> Hmmmm, I wonder if there isn't a hybrid model just waiting to be utilized here?

Imagine this; by utilizing a particular dating service you would agree to A) make your Facebook profile open to the person you are mailing and B) If both parties are interested in each other (designated if both exchange message more than once) this fact is known on each other's Facebook walls and C) if you go out on a date with this person (both people making this known to the dating website) each person open up their profile to the other individual to let the other person write a review of the date on their public wall?

<comment><USER46> I'd surprised there isn't a facebook app for dating. It seems such an obvious thing to do. (Or maybe there is and I'm just not aware of it).

<comment><USER47> Both these ideas are already done. Thread and zoosk. Google thread because it looks like its not active anymore.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Wait, what?

 _OkCupid seems to be at the forefront in this space. They get people in India to rate the attractiveness of new members and use that to limit your access to people significantly more attractive than you are._

Is this common knowledge? I'm shocked if it's true, but I'm sort of thinking there should be a [citation needed] after that.

<comment><USER37> I just checked my archives, and in June 2010, they sent out this email. Note that there is no indication of using offshore labor to determine this. Also, I have no idea if there are more categories, like top quartile:

We are very pleased to report that you are in the top half of OkCupid's most attractive users. The scales recently tipped in your favor, and we thought you'd like to know.

How can we say this with confidence? We've tracked click-thrus on your photo and analyzed other people's reactions to you in QuickMatch and Quiver. . . .

Your new elite status comes with one important privilege: You will now see more attractive people in your match results.

This new status won't affect your actual match percentages, which are still based purely on your answers and desired match's answers. But the people we recommend will be more attractive. Also! You'll be shown to more attractive people in their match results.

<comment><USER49> If it is true, it is too bad. Don't we know beauty is in the eyes of the beholder? Someone you find attractive is ugly to somebody else and vice versa.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Does anybody here want the domain name screwbeingsingle.com? It might make an interesting url for a dating site.

(I bought it for a buddy to blog on back in high school. He put up 3 or 4 posts, let it sit for a while, and then told me he didn't want it anymore.)

</comment><comment><USER51> It's very hard to make online dating site that can transfer real life situations and personal characteristic. Many variables had to be considered. But it is not impossible, chemistry can work even through line : )

</comment><comment><USER52> <http://piratedate.com/>, idea already implemented.

<comment><USER53> Where you can meet your (first) mate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> Has anyone tried using video instead of photos and blurbs?

<comment><USER54> I'm also curious. I suspect once the iPad2 and a slew of Android tablets with front-facing cameras are in the wild, we'll see lots of interesting software...</comment></comment>


Code & Conquer: A War Game for Coders - <AUTHOR> http://codeandconquer.co/#start <comment><USER2> I think that if you have at least a video of real game-play, your poised to take donations like this. If you have something users can download and play with, even if it's unstable, then you could definitely solicit. But a nice website and a vague concept is not good enough. I mean, in terms of specifics all we get is:

 _" You've just landed on an island. Deploy your soldiers and decide when and how to attack to defeat your opponents. Code your strategy in Python or Javascript (more languages coming up!) and prove your skill in a revolutionary programming competition."_

Yeah, no.

<comment><USER3> Agree. Or you show a prototype or AT LEAST a video of the gameplay concept or you won't get any donations

<comment><USER4> I love their design and I was a huge fan of Core Wars in HS.

I've been trying to get them to give me a peek for the last week, I really want to cover them/give them free ad space at launch.

Nothing. Radio Silence.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There is a good discussion of this on progit [1]. The general consensus was there have/are lots of coding games, so this is not revolutionary, and the product is currently vaporware for a startup contest.

1 - [http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/1lnm3m/we_want_...](http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/1lnm3m/we_want_to_create_a_war_game_to_boost_your_coding/)

</comment><comment><USER6> _" We are launching very very soon! Support us!

Get exclusive features and early bird discounts to become a premium player. Thanks for your help! "_

I've seen this posted here twice now. Wake me up when it is open for business.

<comment><USER7> >Get exclusive features

This is the quickest way to kill my interest in a game. I don't want exclusive items/features/modes/whatever the fuck you are selling. I want everyone who purchases the game, now and forever, to get an identical product.

Early bird discounts are fine, but everything else ruins the experience for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> For reference, this is an output of the Stanford startup engineering course (which I also signed up for after it hit the HN front page)

In the homework, this is what they mention the goal of the 'bitstarter' page to be: "Choose a project which you can get to a crowdfunder

People in the class have widely varying backgrounds, ranging from relative neophytes to fairly advanced students. Your goal is to figure out a final project that you can get to the level of a reasonable crowdfunding site. This can mean anything from verbal description and mockups to fully working code, or anything in between: whatever is necessary to make the sale and prove that you have a market. Note that you have control over who's seeing the crowdfunder (e.g. the people in your email list or social circle), so you are also determining the difficulty of the sale itself by choosing the market and the initial crowdfunding audience. Note also that you can just ask for someone to share your content on social media rather than pay you real money for a preorder. Open source projects are ok as well, not just for-profit businesses. The main guideline is to set your success bar at the point that it'll be an achievable challenge for you. That might be a target of $100 or it might be $100,000."

You can see the other projects here: [http://startupmooc.org/](http://startupmooc.org/)

<comment><USER9> I took this class in person back in the winter. I was under the impression that this class would help me hone my web dev skills a bit, but it really turned out to be very focused on business dev.

That said, Balaji provided some excellent advice, and the course itself is great for anyone interested in the startup process. Just don't expect to come out of the class as some web dev master.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Cool. Reminds me a bit of [http://aichallenge.org/](http://aichallenge.org/) which was TONS of fun.

</comment><comment><USER11> No mention of platform support, no screenshots, no details at all. Just "hand over ~10 usd and we will give you something in the future.

</comment><comment><USER12> This project is actually for sale.

[https://www.sideprojectors.com/project/project/144/code- conq...](https://www.sideprojectors.com/project/project/144/code-conquer)

or the owner is seeking a co-founder.

</comment><comment><USER13> Well this looks like it might be fun but it hasn't launched yet, so..

</comment><comment> todd-davies The AI Sandbox looks similar to this. I've played it before and it was good! [http://aisandbox.com/start/](http://aisandbox.com/start/)

<comment><USER14> Wow, been looking for something like this for some time... thank you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've been hoping for a game like this for a long time. That said, I'm not going to support it until they demonstrate how it's going to be played. The problem is that programming is a challenging—and often frustrating—experience, and building it into a game in a way that is educational and enjoyable is not easy. Heck—even Notch said he couldn't figure out how to build programming into 0x10c in a way that worked.

</comment><comment><USER16> Given the number of these sorts of code contests, which ones do Hacker News readers like/dislike?

I tried one mentioned on the reddit post linked in the top comment and enjoyed it (codewars). What do you all like?

<comment><USER17> I think this question is worthy of an "Ask HN" with one game per answer and people upvoting from there. Hope you post it as an "Ask HN" soon. :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> This looks pretty interesting. My friends and I are working on a game in a similar vein to this one (teaching programming through gameplay) however it is a 2D platform game. If you like this sort of stuff check the project I'm working on at www.betathegame.com .

We have done workshops with kids and have footage although we aren't releasing playable demo's just yet. We are closing in on completion. No need for donations but if you like what we're doing please share!

</comment><comment><USER19> Does the name coders bother anyone else? Whenever I hear coders I think of people who do medical coding and billing.

</comment><comment><USER20> The problem with these kind of competitions is replayability. I would love to see a programming game which is PvP and has good replayability.

</comment><comment><USER21> So any ideas about how to realize the technical side of such a game? Doesn't running arbitrary code bring all sorts of security risks?

<comment><USER22> There are loads of different ways to sandbox a given process. If they're feeling particularly paranoid/lazy running each match in an ephemeral VM would be one way. Here's a SO question with more: [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4249063/how-can-i-run- an-...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4249063/how-can-i-run-an-untrusted- c-program-in-a-sandbox-in-linux)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Reminds me of Code Ruler/Code Rally/Robocode. Really good ideas, especially for use in academic settings.

</comment><comment><USER24> I was excited until I noticed it hasn't launched yet. Looks fun though since Python is one of the choice.

</comment><comment><USER25> This looks very interesting. a game I can play without feeling like I am wasting my time</comment>


Ask HN: Good resources for learning electronic curcuits and PCB design - <AUTHOR> I feel lost. I watched videos & read tutorials but it's all pretty advanced stuff and I really need some curcuit basics. They just assume I know WHY to put a resistor here and a capacitor there.
I know some symbol basics but how do I know where to put what and why?
Do you know some tutorials/courses?
My goal is to create my own PCBs for multiple pet projects and being able to repair old ones. <comment><USER2> It's tough at the beginning, there are so many paths to go down, especially on the theoretical side of things.

My suggestion for beginners is to grab an Arduino and make a blinky project. Try to program some LEDs lighting up. This will help introduce you to the concept of current and resistance, and will have some direct feedback. Normally the biggest source of frustration is how long it takes to get from start to finish on a small project in electronics. I think Arduinos do well to shortcut this. Check out some of the adafruit tutorials and boards to start on the right foot.

After that if you're interested in PCBs, I do short courses on YouTube under my brand called Contextual Electronics. Search for things like "Shine on you crazy KiCad" and "Getting to blinky" on YouTube, or check out the link below. The former is the simplest version of a PCB plugged into a Raspberry Pi (controlled via Python), and the latter is using a 555 timer to do the same without any programming elements. These are both primarily LED focused again but only because it takes some time to get used to electronic components before moving on to more complicated things like inductors and op amps. If you end up being interested in that, I have entire courses on my site about how to use those in your designs, in increasing complexity. The most recent course shows how to design a board with bluetooth and cellular capabilities.

Good luck! Electronics to something I've been doing for 20 years and I still get excited about working on it every day.

[https://contextualelectronics.com/courses/shine-on-you- crazy...](https://contextualelectronics.com/courses/shine-on-you-crazy-kicad/)

[https://contextualelectronics.com/GTB](https://contextualelectronics.com/GTB)

<comment><USER3> Woah this looks seriously invaluable for a beginner. I studied CompE and ended up going the software route. I am now just coming back to electronics with the hopes of combining my software knowledge with hardware to build useful consumer electronics.

It's people like you, Dave Jones, bunnie, and folks at adafruit that make this stuff accessible and feel approachable . YouTube University is real. Thanks man.

<comment><AUTHOR> For me it's more about creating something that I can touch and projects that have an end. Electronics and PCBs in particular just happen to be really interesting to me.

But other than that I can only agree with your comment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Like in software it pays to learn from open source, so in hardware. I understand it might be a bit early, but here are a couple resources to find open hardware projects that you can learn from:

\- CrowdSupply: [https://www.crowdsupply.com](https://www.crowdsupply.com), most project are open

\- OSWHA directory: [https://certification.oshwa.org/list.html](https://certification.oshwa.org/list.html)

(and -spoiler- in my profile you can find one more :)

</comment><comment><USER5> [https://www.udemy.com/course/crash-course-electronics-and- pc...](https://www.udemy.com/course/crash-course-electronics-and-pcb- design/?utm_source=adwords&utm_medium=udemyads&utm_campaign=LongTail_la.EN_cc.US&utm_content=deal4584&utm_term=_._ag_81829991947_._ad_436603485109_._kw__._de_c_._dm__._pl__._ti_dsa-1007766171592_._li_9019556_._pd__._&matchtype=b&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIpdf74e-A6wIVjobACh0QWgpTEAAYASAAEgL2nvD_BwE)

<comment><AUTHOR> That looks interesting, thank you! Didn't even think about looking on Udemy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Take a look at [https://ultimateelectronicsbook.com/](https://ultimateelectronicsbook.com/)

It starts with fundamentals and includes in-browser circuit simulator to experiment with.

Once you have the fundamentals, something like "The Art of Electronics" by Horowitz and Hill is useful for rules of thumb and do's and don'ts of circuit design. Warning: this book by itself will not teach you enough fundamentals to be useful.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm going to take a look at the link. Thanks. I already found "The Art of Electronics" but it's too advanced for me right now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Get an electronics 101 book that is intended for highschool students. It will explain 85% of what you will need.

<comment><AUTHOR> That would be a good start since most books I found are not targeted at beginners.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> _Meta_ :

You can open an account at:

[https://www.electro-tech-online.com/](https://www.electro-tech-online.com/)

[https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/](https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/)

[https://www.edaboard.com/](https://www.edaboard.com/)

These are forums with _extremely_ helpful members. The format is different than Stack Overflow's "Question/Answer". It is built on the "Post/Thread". You can have threads that go on for 40 pages and span a year, when someone is doing a project, and these magnificent creatures will accompany the users with feedback.

One thing I've done when starting to do PCB is submitting the design to electro-tech-online.com asking for feedback and how I could improve it. You'll have people there with decades of experience go through it, make actionable suggestions on the design stinks and why they're not good.

You can also share a project you're doing as you are doing it, and they can help with the brainstorming/ideation and implementation, they would ask questions and question assumptions.

If you write firmware for microcontrollers, they can also chime in and help you refine the code. If you get into that community, you'll be on a fast track because you'll have people who can do that in their sleep help you in the nicest way.

 _PCB Design_ :

You can get yourself CadSoft EAGLE or KiCad, print the tiny documentation in a booklet format, then read the whole documentation, page by page, annotating it, trying every functionality. Making routes, ground pour, layers, with commands and with the mouse.

Dave Jones' "PCB Design Tutorial"[0], will also be very helpful.

 _Soldering_ :

Check out Dave Jones' multi-part videos on soldering[1][2][3]. Part 3 is for surface mount, don't bother with that just yet.

 _Electronics_

Depending on where you're starting from.

Absolute beginner? Take a look at Tony Kuphaldt's " _Lessons in Electric Circuits_ "[4]. It is split into multiple volumes (DC, AC, Semiconductors, etc...)

Somehwat beginner? Take a look at " _The Art of Electronics_ " by Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill. It's one of the books one has to have just in case civilization is destroyed.

Fun trivia: The chapter on transistors explains them by introducing a figure called "Transistor Man". That figure was drawn by Edward Purcell, which you may have heard of from CPMG (Carr-Purcell-Meyboom-Gill). He also won the Nobel Prize for the discovery of the Nuclear Magnetic Resonnance.

You can get an electronics test board like [5] on which you can experiment circuits without soldering them, and with fewer flying wires. The ones that have the screws that hold power input are nice. Then you can buy a bunch of operational amplifiers, LED, logic cates integrated circuits, resistors/capacitors/inductors and play with that.

A bit more advanced or not:

\- Texas Instruments' "Op Amps For Everyone"[6]

\- "Op-Amp Concepts" by Greg Kovacs

\- "Op-Amp Applications Seminar"

In depth:

\- "Troubleshooting Analog Circuits", by Robert Pease.

More in depth:

Application notes from manufacturers to get ideas for designs.

But to sum it up:

\- Getting on dedicated forums

\- Getting the test board and components (to tinker)

\- Getting software for PCB design (just for the design)

\- Share the design on forums to improve _fast_

\- Print the board at a PCB shop

\- Solder the components following the tutorial

\- Learn more and more and go deeper at every phase after every win

So you may first start by getting components and assembling them on the board to make a circuit work, then designing a PCB for them and soldering them to make a working "prototype", but you will also learn more reading the books, exchanging with others, reading application notes or resources from manufacturers.

All the best,

[0]: [http://www.alternatezone.com/electronics/files/PCBDesignTuto...](http://www.alternatezone.com/electronics/files/PCBDesignTutorialRevA.pdf)

[1]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Sb21qbpEQ)

[2]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYz5nIHH0iY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYz5nIHH0iY)

[3]: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9FC9fAlfQE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9FC9fAlfQE)

[4]: [https://www.ibiblio.org/kuphaldt/electricCircuits/](https://www.ibiblio.org/kuphaldt/electricCircuits/)

[5]: [https://static- resources.imageservice.cloud/4858576/breadboa...](https://static- resources.imageservice.cloud/4858576/breadboard-is-also-called-universal- circuit-board-or-integrated.jpg)

[6]: [https://e2echina.ti.com/cfs-file/__key/telligent- evolution-c...](https://e2echina.ti.com/cfs-file/__key/telligent-evolution- components-attachments/00-52-01-00-00-04-59-46/OP-amp-for-everyone.pdf)

<comment><USER3> Wow thanks for the resources - I like the recommendation of getting feedback on your design via the forum. Going to check it out now. And also reading the software documentation for pcb.

Any considerations you'd recommend before deciding on kicad versus the other software available for pcb design?

<comment><USER8> I have worked much more with CadSoft EAGLE, not much with KiCad. I mentioned its name for more choice, but at this point it doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is to avoid analysis paralysis and searching for the optimal path to learning. Which means avoid any debate on the right soldering iron, the right software, the right board, etc. and just pick any single one and get started.

You can go down the rabbit hole and consume hours upon hours on YouTube videos delving into details on whether this soldering station is best, or this multimeter is best. Pick one that doesn't suck because at some threshold of quality/brand, the differences only matter to those who are advanced enough that a particular capability matters most. It's like optimizing to shave off a millisecond by reducing drag: sure it matters to Formula I drivers, but not to me at my level.

Jump both feet in, experiment, get a bunch of components, and build stuff. When you get into these forums, you'll hear about things and read conversations that recommend designs, or other resources such as books/blogs/courses, and you'll absorb a bit by osmosis. Then you make something with these resources to consolidate knowledge.

You can also follow a couple of channels or Twitter accounts. Even if you don't always understand, familiarizing yourself so you can act on things later is useful:

\- [https://www.youtube.com/user/EEVblog](https://www.youtube.com/user/EEVblog)

\- [https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAmpHour](https://www.youtube.com/user/TheAmpHour)

\- [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcs0ZkP_as4PpHDhFcmCHyA](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcs0ZkP_as4PpHDhFcmCHyA)

\- [https://www.youtube.com/user/BTCInstrumentation/videos](https://www.youtube.com/user/BTCInstrumentation/videos) (more instrumentation, from Tony Kuphaldt)

\- [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCivA7_KLKWo43tFcCkFvydw](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCivA7_KLKWo43tFcCkFvydw) (Ben Krasnow)

<comment><USER3> Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm on the exact same boat so I don't think there is much advice I can offer as I'm in the midst of working through similar challenges. But designing pcb layouts for my projects is also one of my goals. Take a look at the book Hacking the Xbox by andrew bunnie huang - read Appendix C "Getting into PCB Layout". It's good and informational - it won't give you a solid understanding but it will expose you to the terminology, tips and tricks, and the software you'll need. Read it. Right now. Then you can work backwards on what you need to know. Design a simple circuit and see it all the way through to pcb fabrication. Doesn't matter if it's dead simple or that designing and fabricating it on pcb is overkill. It will expose you to the entire process. Invaluable.

The feeling lost bit is probably common but when that's the case focus on your end goal. Here's my general approach so far.

\- I got a personal project that I have no choice but to see through to the end. Having this as an end goal helps direct my focus.

\- I avoid most rabbit holes - especially when it comes to learning theory. The rabbit holes are endless. I focus only on the rabbit holes that help me meet my end goal even if that means skipping fundamental stuff. This is really hard sometimes but if it's fundamental it'll come up again and again until ignoring it is not an option or maybe you just become curious enough to explore. My curiosity is dangerous here so I try to curb it the best I can. (maybe I should block time off specifically for exploring my curiosities and go deeper on concepts that may not be immediately relevant)

\- I work on some aside prototypes to build an understanding of fundamental circuit components/concepts e.g. LEDs, resistors, voltage, current, resistance. Once I put something together I read a little bit of theory behind the components. Or sometimes it's the other way around - I read the theory then I put a simple circuit together using a breadboard and some wires.

\- I bought tools based on advice I found in Books, YouTube, HN, and Reddit. For me this meant buying passive components, a breadboard, pre-cut wires, 22-gauge wire spools, soldering station (and various soldering equipment), hand-held tools (e.g. wire cutters, multimeter, tape measure), a power supply, safety equipment, and a 3d printer. I went on a spree. With that said I bought tools aligned with my goals.

\- It also helps when I recognize that it takes time. Picking up and mastering a skill or at least becoming competent is a multi-year process. More importantly - I have that time. I have today, tomorrow, next week, next year to keep getting better. So there's no pressure. Man what a gift.

\- I look to people that have the expertise and listen to what they have to say. That either means watching youtube lectures by people like bunnie, dave jones, authors of books. And just reading books like the Art of Electronics, Hacking the Xbox. Or finding material online and reading some more.

What an awesome time to be alive. Resource are endless - it's just a matter of paring stuff down based on your goal. Good luck on the projects.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's pretty good advice. At least for me. Thank you for commenting.

There's already a PCB with a simple curcuit from a tutorial on it's way. I hope it works out.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Testoid.net -- Collaborative Android beta-testing - <AUTHOR> http://testoid.net/

<comment><AUTHOR> Disclaimer: This isn't my project, I saw it on reddit: [http://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/o7t5u/what_if_yo...](http://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/o7t5u/what_if_you_could_show_your_app_to_other/)</comment>


Ask HN: How do high-school coders get noticed? - <AUTHOR>

Not in college yet, and want to know how companies/colleges know I'm down for business. Anyone have any tips? <comment><USER2> At companies 99% of the time it is former or current coders who hire other coders.

And coders don't care about how old you are. It is all about what you have done and what you can do. So the best thing you can do to get yourself noticed is to build and show something great. It doesn't have to be huge just needs to work, be bug free and polished.

<comment><USER3> >be bug free

I think that would be a first in the annals of the industry :) I assume you really mean 'no obvious/glaring bugs'. Of course that could also be satisfied by Hoare's famouse quote [1], or by simply being so trivial as to not allow the oppurtunity for a bug.

[1] There are two ways of constructing a software design. One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies. And the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.</comment></comment>


Backdoor accounts discovered in 29 FTTH devices from Chinese vendor C-Data - <AUTHOR> https://www.zdnet.com/article/backdoor-accounts-discovered-in-29-ftth-devices-from-chinese-vendor-c-data/ <comment><USER2> Hanlon's razor of course, but it is hard to believe that this isn't malice masquerading as stupidity. Hard-coded credentials, zero encrypted protocols used for transport, and weak crypto for the credentials.

Guest/[empty] really makes it art.

I am more inclined to believe Hanlon's razor applies to whatever network engineer put one of these dumpster fires on a network without noticing these massive flaws.</comment>


Google Chrome Global Market Share: 2% - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/02/getclicky-analytics-service-tracking-2-google-chrome-usage/

<comment><USER2> Let's say for the sake of simplicity that there are 1 billion Internet users worldwide. (I believe this understates the population, but I can't find an authoritative stat quickly. [1]) Did 20 million of them successfully download, install, and start using Google's experimental, heretofore secret, Windows- only browser today? 12 million more people than downloaded and installed Firefox 3 on its record-setting day? After the enormous effort expended getting to that record, both in a concerted registration, notification, and PR blitz? Factoring for the late start, relative to many non-US timezones?

I'm going with no -- more specifically, not even close.

1\. [http://www.google.com/search?q=number+of+internet+users+worl...](http://www.google.com/search?q=number+of+internet+users+worldwide)

<comment><USER3> how many people do you think see google's homepage everyday?

and just before clicking search they see this ...

New! Download Chrome (BETA) - the new browser from Google

i guess lots of them clicked it.

<comment><USER2> No doubt putting it on Google.com would have a huge impact. Did they do this? I didn't see such a link on Google.com yesterday or today, logged in or logged out.

<comment><USER4> Perhaps you are using a mac or linux? They wouldn't link it for OS's that don't have it yet.

<comment><USER5> I'm on Linux, and I see the link on google.com whether I'm logged in or not.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> _"...their client base is certainly not statistically relevant to the Internet as a whole. But"_

That's a big ole But

</comment><comment><USER7> Sorry, buy I find this statistic _extremely_ hard to believe.

</comment><comment><USER8> I like many others downloaded it to try it out. I'm back in Firefox now because there are simply too many lackings with Chrome, and I'm not even considering extensions yet.

So if I'm counted in those stats, I want out.

<comment><USER9> I'm in the same camp. Chrome really needs a decent ad and popup blocker. I think I've grown spoilt on firefox.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> 2% market share claimed in 1 day? Thats a great start I say.</comment>


Ask HN: I can't specialize, how to differentiate myself? - <AUTHOR> As a DevOps Engineer, I'm asked to work on countless random things all the time. It's hard to specialize which means each new project is a struggle from scratch.<p>Considering the demands aren't going to change, what skill(s) could I develop? <comment><USER2> Psychological skills will help.

I have been working in unfamiliar territory for so long that it's become one of my strengths. The first skill to develop in this domain is that of acceptance. Accept the unfamiliarity. Accept that you are going to do the work. Accept that the process is going to painful at times, and realize it isn't going to be painful all the way. After you accept, consider how much further you may go if you actually embrace your work. You're going to have to do it, so why not give your best? This may likely require you to put more into the process but the accomplishment is how you reward yourself.

You can become a generalist with specializations. You don't have to only be one or the either.

</comment><comment><USER3> Highly recommend to read this book:

Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

The author went on lots of Podcast shows, you can start from there before you spend any $.

<comment><USER4> It's an excellent book. But it presupposes that the reader enjoys the processes of learning, discovery, experimenting and lots of failure. The process of becoming an accomplished generalist involves a lot of "struggle".

There are folks who like to keep things simple, consistent and predictable. They are the ones who rarely pick up another book after they finish their education. They also give up far too easily when confronted with a challenge. Nothing wrong with that, but those choices lead to specific outcomes. No pain, no gain.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> There is nothing wrong with being a generalist! You could just focus on cloud technologies and it would occupy a lifetime. Deep dive into linux api, systems programming, risc-v, fpgas, etc

MeganWachs - Keynote RISC-V and FPGAs: Open Source Hardware Hacking

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCG5_nxm2G4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCG5_nxm2G4)

And just keep diving. Get low level. I think next gen cloud architectures, gpu, tpu. Next gen lidar, radar. Playing with 4D point clouds in VR. That's about as hot as it gets right now ;)

DigiKey & AdaFruit "All the IoT"

[https://www.digikey.com/en/resources/iot-resource- center/vid...](https://www.digikey.com/en/resources/iot-resource- center/videos)

</comment><comment><USER6> You absolutely can specialize, you can even describe your current role in a way that sounds specialized - "Build/Release Engineer specializing in CI/CD and cloud native technologies."

As far as specialties inside DevOps - security, OCI, schedulers are general areas that have specialist roles available. Another option is to specialize in a tool or tooling ecosystem relevant to DevOps. For example, you could decide to learn AWS service offerings inside and out or specialize in webtech on bare metal and land a role at a company that has the scale to demand optimal bare metal deployments.

</comment><comment><USER7> There's value in marketing yourself as someone who has a variety of domain expertise. Having a wide portfolio of projects is attractive for companies with uncertain needs, or in new domains.

I'm in biotech, and being the "software guy" on my team has left me in a similar situation, and I asked the same questions for how to market myself to Ph.D. programs, which are all about specialization.

</comment><comment><USER8> What kind of problems do you _like_ to solve? Figure that one out and then learn the tools/skills required to solve those problems.

</comment><comment><USER9> Something like "MLOps" maybe? [https://towardsdatascience.com/the-rise-of-the- term-mlops-3b...](https://towardsdatascience.com/the-rise-of-the-term- mlops-3b14d5bd1bdb)

Or, if you have time, contribute to some Open Source tool you use or like. It can help with differentiating.

</comment><comment><USER4> You don't provide any context as to what form your struggle takes with each new project. So it is hard to give general advice. However ...

In doing the many random things, have you noticed any that you enjoy far more than others? If so, then it might give you an ideas as to what area to focus your learning and development upon.

</comment><comment><USER10> Do you make any of these random things easier to deal with the next time around? If so that's your specialty, otherwise you could start thinking about ways to do less to get more done whether it's with scripts/tools, other software, documentation, interacting with others, etc.

</comment><comment><USER11> A DevOps Engineer is a pretty specialised job in the grand scheme of things.

</comment><comment><USER12> Money and accounting.

Not to deep, just understand the difference between opex, capex, and what implies to your job.

This will make you able to speak with the business inthwir own term.

</comment><comment><USER13> You can specialize in any area you wish to. Just find what you like and put your interest in it during your slow moments or after work hours.

</comment><comment><USER14> What do you want to specialize in?</comment>


Why Everyone's Leaving YouTube - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQuE0wfjzf0 <comment><USER2> Tying yourself (and your job and income and status) to one company or one platform for years on end seems like a terrible choice. It doesn't seem to matter much what the service or platform is: Youtube, Twitch, Airbnb, Uber, Monsanto, etc... who cares? If you need that platform for your career then that platform owns you.

Every company is going to cut costs and converge more to the safe mean over the long term. The history is pretty clear on this. Why would you tie your whole life to a company and then spend every day complaining about that company?

<comment><USER3> If you truly believe that... then you must change jobs every few years. If not, you're a hypocrite. So, how long have you been at your current job?

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> This video was made by the collaboration of various popular youtube content creators. It's about how Youtube is applying its rules inconsistently and in favor of big media corporations. Many say they'll leave Youtube, possibly moving to LBRY for a decentralized version of Youtube.</comment>


Nothing Works – Patreon CEO - <AUTHOR> https://youtu.be/Zf5rKTCMNnU <comment><USER2> Really great video and really relatable as someone with some success myself, nobody but me often sees my failures but for each success there are hundreds, if not thousands of mistakes that lead me to it.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a really awesome story. I totally relate in so many different ways.</comment>