It's time to nut up or shut up - <AUTHOR> http://blog.asmartbear.com/nut-up-or-shut-up.html <comment><USER2> I'm genuinely looking forward to watching this but to me it also demonstrates something about startups and silicon valley - who you are and who you're friends with matters almost as much as what you do. There's no way in hell he'd be launching with that client list if he was some random guy, no matter how awesome the platform was. The network effect of having the right early users increasingly seems like the dirty secret of the startup game. See: posterous.

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with that, I'm not certainly suggesting there's anything unfair about it - people work on trust networks, it's entirely natural and utterly rational - but it does make it clear how important it is to network, get your name out there and build reputation.

<comment><USER3> I agree (although I'm not in the valley).

It _is_ unfair in the sense of "unfair advantage." Of course I'll exploit it -- I'd be stupid not to -- but it's unfair.

This is exactly why increasingly it's hard to do a startup _without_ teaming up with someone with a reputation. Maybe this just proves that.

<comment><USER4> I think that many people are taking issue with the way you phrased your intro. Something like, "Hey, I'm launching a new startup, to prove to myself that I can do it again. Why don't you follow along because I'll be sharing each step of this journey on my blog!" may have been received better by the community. Nevertheless, the approach you took is a legitimate one. And of course, you'd be a fool not to take advantage of your notoriety as a means of propelling your new startup. You worked hard to get where you are, and fully deserve to take advantage of your position, connections, etc.

You can become Wordpress's Heroku if you play your cards right, and I don't see how you are not going to make big money out of this company as well. My only suggestion would be to reconsider your pricing, so as to make it more accessible (while also meeting the needs of those who don't quite require unlimited blogs). For example, you could charge $29 for a single blog, $49 for 3 blogs, $99 for "unlimited".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Some thoughts on the WPEngine itself (or at least, the site). These are in order of thought, not importance. Also, these are purely my opinions so take with a grain of salt.

1\. When I was starting my own blog, I looked around for exactly this. It didn't exist, or at least not in any form that looked worth doing, so I ended up (painfully) self-hosting.

2\. Having said that, for a beginner like me, $50 is _way_ too much to spend on the blog. I'm sorry, but I can host my not-making-a-cent blog on Dreamhost, and get the first year of hosting for $20 (the whole year, I mean). I really hope this is just the initial price plan, because I honestly believe that as you grow, it will make sense to let people host smallish blogs for less money.

3\. Someone on the blog post mentioned that "one-click staging" is confusing, since the "one click" part is not important. I agree.

4\. I think there's a small alignment problem with the prices in the pricing grid (they're top-aligned, not centerered). I'm on Windows XP + Chrome.

5\. (This one is really nitpickity): on the pricing grid, the "explanatory" sentence in the first and last column have end-of-sentence punctuation, but the middle column does not.

6\. I'd give more details and make it more obvious how to export. This will be a sticking point for people, so one of the major features should be how easy it is to import.

7\. Make it _really_ obvious that you can use your own domain name with this. This is important to people, and isn't obvious.

8\. Part of your tagline is "We make WordPress fast, secure, and scalable". I would actually stress the "easy" part more. I can make WordPress all those things myself, I just don't have time/knowledge. Stress the idea that this is a convenience thing.

OK Hope that helps, just some of my thoughts.

<comment><USER6> RE #2, the price issue is interesting.

I could rewrite your point on #2 from a different perspective:

"$20/year 'dreamhost pricing' is way too little to spend my the blog. I'm sorry, but I rely on my blog for my entire income and so I need to know the support at the level I need is in place, the quality for the service I need is there, I have the kind of traffic that needs performance optimization and CDN, and I need to know that this is a clearly long-term viable business so you guys will be around in years to come as my blog gets even bigger. I really hope this is just the initial price plan, because I honestly believe that as you grow, it will make sense to let people host much bigger comercialized blogs on here."

The point is we're simply looking at the entire blogging space and carving it up into different market segments based on needs and then super-targeting one segment.

Tony Schnieder (Automattic/WordPress.com CEO) said today at TechCrunch disrupt that WordPress blogs power 8.5% of the internet's websites - so we think it's clear that one size does not fit all and there are opportunities for different services to cater for different needs.

Finally don't forget there are much more expensive options out there... we're not WordPress VIP either which is several $1000's/month for service and support (TechCrunch, GigaOm etc run on this).

<comment><USER5> You're absolutely right, segmenting the market and choosing one niche over another is great strategy. I wanted to point it out from the perspective of a "beginner" for one reason: lots of people won't move the blog after it gets started out of fear/inertia.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I just had a client asking for this service. Companies are completely price- insensitive about blog hosting; most of the time, they're getting screwed over by contractors building "custom" blog solutions. For sites with custom domains and no branding, you should price this mid 5-figures annually.

My only nit: I understand the high-wire act you're performing to message "security" on this, but your story on security (summed: "FUD. Everything's insecure if it's managed poorly. That's where we come in.") was a huge turn- off. Wordpress _is_ distinctively insecure, which is why it needs hosting solutions like this. Your security graf made me think you don't actually know how Wordpress security works.

<comment><USER8> My only nit with your nit is that the security you are attributing to WordPress is more inherent with PHP and exists in any PHP-based CMS, including Drupal. Hate to be the guy that keeps defending WordPress but the problem is PHP and Apache and those file permissions... not WordPress itself. ;)

<comment><USER7> I think you're wrong about this. I've explained why many times on this site; here's the first one Google finds:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1328214>

Now, PHP is definitely part of the problem. But there are huge PHP sites that manage not to have these kinds of flaws.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> For a real challenge, do it without using your notoriety.

By far, the greatest challenge for any bootstrapped startup is marketing. Just from this blog post, tens of thousands of people will check out the site, blog and tweet about it, post links etc...

Obviously this is an advantage that you've worked very hard to gain and you must exploit, but you can't say you're standing in the same shoes as all of us other, completely unknown, bootstrappers.

<comment><USER3> You're correct!

But I didn't say I'm standing the same shoes. I said I'm going to see if I can do another startup.

<comment><USER10> That's a bit of a cop-out.

You did present it as following your own advice and seeing if it works. Seeing if it _really_ works requires you to be in square one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Just a very minor observation:

I've read this on the site : "15 years of combined experience". Lots of people find this 'n years of combined experience' pattern a bit lame.

For example:

[http://www.socialsecurityinsider.com/2010/02/combined- years-...](http://www.socialsecurityinsider.com/2010/02/combined-years-of- experience-another-stupid-lawyer-trick/)

<comment><USER12> I know what you mean. A team of guys at my old company had "40 years of combined C# experience." Not bad for a language released in 2002!

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Doing something like Heroku for Wordpress is a great business idea. I have tons of clients I'd happily point to such a service if I knew it was solid.

</comment><comment><USER14> Am I the only one who's a little disappointed?

Of all things he had to start another WP hosting company? He has the name and the money to do something bigger. I can't think of any motivation other than making money that went into this.

That being said, the staging area for testing changes seem like a really useful feature that I haven't seen in any other WP hosting service.

<comment><USER3> Do you also think Heroku is boring because it's just Ruby hosting?

Taking the largest, most vibrant blogging (and now general website and for some CMS) platform on Earth and trying to not only make it awesome but contribute new features and plugins back to the world isn't big enough for you?

Finally, you should know that for me "doing something bigger" isn't a motivation. I don't have a need to "change the world" or somesuch thing. I want to do something valuable, something understandable, something fun and interesting, and yes of course also make money.

<comment><USER14> Congratulations to your new business! I'm sure it'll be successful and I'm glad that you're happy with it.

I'm not sure if I'd call WP Engine whipping out your dick and getting a ruler, though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I know we've been told to "double your price. then double it again." but does the same apply in hugely saturated market spaces like hosting? Lots of hosts will bill you $8/month, oversell their servers, but still give you big numbers AND install WordPress for you. I'm curious what kind of reasoning went behind the pricing model.

<comment><USER16> I do not know of a single $8 host that does the following:

\- We upgrade the curated plugins we offer for you (though you can use any plugins you'd like)

\- We keep WordPress itself upgraded (when ready, new releases are not always perfect)

\- We make sure all the standard security stuff you'd read on any WordPress developers blog is in place (file permissions, admin account, etc)

\- We go further by offering hardware DoS/DDoS mitigation, intrusion detection, and redundant firewall protection

\- Aaron Brazell (Author of the WordPress Bible, <http://goo.gl/mGgi>) answers your support questions

\- Speed. Tuning of various caches, memcache for database/object caching, modifications to your theme or plugins, and so on.

\- Scale. We make sure your site stays up when you receive spiky or sustained traffic. Don't get Fireballed.

\- On top of that, we're the only hosting company (that I know of!) who also puts your static content (images, CSS, JS) on a CDN for you as part of the base price! Which means even faster load times plus more scalability. (Granted we haven't advertised this on the site yet, something we'll be fixing soon!)

\- Staging feature. Again, I'm not sure of any host who has something like this. We'll be adding more cool tools soon!

\- We spell WordPress correctly =)

At the end of the day you shouldn't compare us to an $8 host. You pay for what you get. We go above and beyond regular hosting.

<comment><USER15> Good answer. I didn't know that—that should be on your site somewhere :)

<comment><USER16> Haha you are correct, we definitely need to update our site to avoid confusion like this! Thanks for the feedback =)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> This to me sounds a lot like wordpress.com, albeit over-priced.

I did a cursory price comparison. WP.com is the most annoyingly secretive website I've seen about it's pricing, so all these are from the second hand accounts in the forums ( [http://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/please-be-more- up-front...](http://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/please-be-more-up-front- about-upgrade-pricing) ):

CSS upgrade $15 Map domain: $10 25GB space: $90 (I know WP Engine is 10GB) Unlimited users: $30 No ads: $30

$175, per _year_ , which is roughly $15/mo.

The one thing missing from WP.com is the custom plugins and support. Honestly, if you're running my blog, why do I need support, really? And they have proven infrastructure, which is another selling point you're making. The plugins make for an interesting offering, but is it really worth it?

Please don't take this as me being rude. I just can't see much of a difference between WP Engine and wp.com after reading the websites to justify the price difference. Maybe that's something to work on?

<comment><USER8> WordPress.com is a great service and you can get a lot of the same "stuff" that we offer. Obviously, they've been around a lot longer and have a ton of experiece.

WordPress.com has, essentially, two pricing structures - free and custom pricing starting at $500 for VIP customers. They make a ton of money in upgrades, as you noted.

They don't give you access to the files, unless you're VIP, and then you're still limited. You don't have access to plugins of your own choice. The freedom that you have with WordPress.org (self-hosted) doesn't exist on the theme, plugin or user side. But you get an amazing architecture, with almost no downtime, and a crack staff that knows WordPress inside and out.

WP Engine targets an entirely different market. We're targeting self hosted WordPress and trying to provide premium value for premium blogs. You couldn't take my blog, for example (<http://technosailor.com>), and put it on WP.com. There's too much I've done with it for it to make sense even if I bought the Custom CSS add-on. I can put it on WP Engine (and do) and get all the stuff that is offered.

I don't know if I'm making sense. I hope I am. Certainly, we are still honing our messaging.

One big bonus that no one else will give you is free CDN. If you need it, you're going to start at $40/mo roughly. And maybe pay up to 20 cents/GB bandwidth. I think you can see where this, essentially, pays for itself.

Plus, we are working with Automattic/WordPress.com and our customers should be seeing the benefits of that soon. Stay tuned. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm curious if you're using Wordpress MU for this or if you've built your own system. I built an app & plugin installer (flooha.com) which could be used to build, install and customize any php app, so I have some experience in this area.

It's a smart move to limit which plugins can be installed, to offer a very short trial and to have no free plans.

<comment><USER3> We allow our customers to use WordPress v3.0.1, which means either with OR without MU. Up to you.

We're NOT limiting plugins that can be installed. We're just building a list that we'll SUPPORT.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> How much interest is there in following something like this? I've had some startup ideas I've been mulling around with for years and finally decided to jump in head first. One thought that crossed my mind was writing a blog detailing my progress, obstacles, thoughts, etc throughout the process. I feel like, whether successful or a failure, the process would be interesting and useful to others. Any thoughts on this? Anything you'd like to see specifically covered?

</comment><comment><USER19> Looking forward to following behind the scenes on this. Saw the initial tweets about WPEngine and mighty interested in the 'lessons learned' re: using social for first block of customers.

From the comments: SmartBear's measuring initial success as $360k ebitda ($30k a month). While arbitrary, seems a smart goal. Makes for a sustainable and salable business (with room for a bit of R&D and bonus structure).

Oh, and Austin FTW.

</comment><comment><USER20> Curious whether the just-announced partnership between Microsoft and WordPress will impact your new venture?

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1732761>

<comment><USER21> I was just about to ask the same question. If anything, this probably legitimizes the WordPress platform for thousands of small business owners - the very people who could be WPEngine customers.

If they were on the tipping point of this platform ("It's open source? Is it safe? I don't know if I can trust it."), they may be tipping now. ("Ah, Microsoft uses it. It must be safe.")

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I think <http://www.wpwebhost.com/> will likely be your biggest competitor (next to WP.com), however they seem more like a standard host that just installs WP for you.

</comment><comment><USER23> Great Article! Obscene title. Best of luck with it.....

</comment><comment><USER24> Startups: Not For Women.™</comment>


Udemy Took Down My Coding Course with No Advanced Warning For an ID Check - <AUTHOR> I got an email from Udemy this morning (I didn't see it for four hours!) saying they had randomly taken down my coding course because of a spot identity check.
Wow am I pissed!
I guess the 300+ people who purchased the course this month are just screwed. And the like 1,500 others who bought it previously are just shit out of luck too.
This is insane!
Udemy has taken my course down and given me 24-48 hours to respond with my ID and a video saying I'm me, before they will put the course back up.
Couldn't they have done that BEFORE taking down my course and screwing over all my paying students?  Horrible behavior from Udemy. They should be ashamed.
I've done nothing wrong. The course is mine, was created by me, and is a popular course with great reviews.
I don't mind verifying my identity, but why not give me the chance to do that before you take down my course and screw over my paying students????
Here's the email they sent me: >>Hello, In light of recent events (which you can read about in our CEO's blogpost here: https://blog.udemy.com/maintaining-the-integrity-of-our-udemy-community/), we are conducting spot check instructor verifications and have temporarily taken down your course (NAME WITH HELD). Please email a copy of your government issued identification to copyright@udemy along with a 30 second or less video where you say the name of the course and that you are submitting this video for us for verification. Please do not submit any information already provided in your course profile. We will delete your ID from our systems within 24 hours of receipt. If we do not receive your ID and the video within 48 hours, we will delete your course from our site. Thank you in advance for keeping our learning community safe. Best regards, Udemy Copyright <comment><USER2> Pluralsight author here. Udemy have had lots of piracy issues in the past - for example, paid courses from authors on sites like Pluralsight have been illegally copied and sold.

Just a few weeks ago Pluralsight circulated an email on Udemy telling us, Pluralsight authors, that the two companies have met as Udemy has acknowledged the piracy problem and pledged to take down any flagged courses much faster in the future.

I don't know if there is a relation to that action and this takedown until an ID check, but there might be. Also, if you think about why they took it down immediately until you verify your ID: if someone flags this video and it is indeed a copyright infrigment, Udemy could be sued for not acting immediately.

I do empathise that takedowns without notice are painful when you're not the author - however as an outsider I am glad that Udemy on the other hand is starting to take piracy of courses more seriously.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm sure that piracy is the reason like you suggest...as per the email they sent me that referenced that sort of thing....

But the email they sent me said that they are merely conducting a "spot check", and for another thing - if they actually were responding to a flag, them "acting immediately" could be "immediately sending me and email and giving me 24-48 hours to respond" You know?

Like I said, I don't mind verifying my ID (even though I think I did that when I first signed up). I mind the way they did it. They could have given me warning first.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Glad to hear it sounds like the course is back up. I too feel that while Udemy has every right and reason to protect authors, but it shouldn't take down your course without warning or the ability to first prove it is your content within a short but reasonable time period.

Have you reached out to Udemy and asked why they took it down without first giving you the chance to prove the content is yours? What did they say?

Reading comments here it seems people are saying, "so what its only 24-48 hours". But when you pay for marketing and have clients paying for the course your credibility is at stake if that course becomes unavailable. And it is different in this case then saying the Udemy platform became unavailable for 12 hours because of some technical issue which people would be more forgiving of. So while you can point to Udemy as the issue here, it isn't fair to you or really even to their platform. Udemy should be more cautious to their own platform as this can negatively affect their ability to attract quality authors for fear their content will be taken down without warning, not to mention it will affect students who may get a bad taste in their mouth because they paid for a course on Udemy that then isn't available.

One last point, to the few people who said its only 24-48 hours, something you may not think about/know. Most students if they don't start a course within the first 24-48 hours of signing up, won't complete it, and many (if not most) will then request a refund. So you have to be laser focused on getting people into the process and getting them moving, that is why so much marketing spend is focused on getting people to work the course once they sign up. We do a lot of this type of marketing for individuals and training companies, most on custom platforms but the marketing and process is identical to Udemy et al, and this is a critical issue.

</comment><comment><USER4> Would you believe anyone who asks you to email a copy of your id really knows how to delete your ID from their systems or would care enough to follow through?

</comment><comment><USER5> Is it this course - [https://www.udemy.com/php-programming-for-affiliate- marketer...](https://www.udemy.com/php-programming-for-affiliate-marketers/)? I can access it just fine.

Maybe it was spot checked because affiliate marketing is often so closely associated with spammers and scammers.

<comment><AUTHOR> No, that's not the course.

<comment><USER5> Ah, sorry for jumping to conclusions then.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Do you show your face in your courses or just have regular video with text and audio? I do think they should have notified you in advance without taking the course down or even send you the notification without disabling the course.

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a course on Ruby on Rails...so the whole thing is screen casts of my desktop as I walk through each lesson. I don't show my face...

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I just found your course via an ad on ArsTechnica. Small world we live in. How long before you bring it up? I've been looking for a course.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I should also mention, the course is not new, it's been up for a year (maybe slightly longer) and it's not the only course I have on Udemy.

<comment><USER8> Could you please comment on sales, is it worth it? Would/do you live solely by your courses?

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> UPDATE: The course is now back up for current students and pending a quick review to make it 100% live again.

</comment><comment><USER9> I applaud your focus on your customers.

</comment><comment><USER10> Udemy has been going downhill for a while now. I have about 2 months in payouts from them. Still waiting.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think they hold all payments for 2 months as a matter of course...

<comment><USER10> Yea, I know. Been on the platform for 2 years. This is AFTER that wait period.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yikes!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Unless the _only_ time your students can access your course _would have_ been the next 24-48hrs (which I highly doubt), you/they are not being _screwed over_.

You are not _entitled_ to anything on their platform, and this seems like an honest attempt to combat piracy (which actually protects content creators such as yourself).

<comment><AUTHOR> The students paid for instant 24 hour access....they aren't getting it. If I bought a course and suddenly I couldn't access it for 2 days, I'd be pissed. And I guess the people asking for refunds now are doing it for an entirely different reason?

Yes, I am entitled to something with their platform, they make a lot of money from my content. A contract is formed, terms and conditions are agreed upon. Mail order law must be upheld. They have every right to combat privacy, but do it responsibly.

Why delete the course at all? A simple email saying "Hey, send us your id so we can verify you" would have been fine and done the trick completely. Give me 24-48 hours to comply before you delete the entire course and screw up a year's worth of work and marketing effort.

That would be an honest attempt to combat piracy. What they did was reckless.

<comment><USER11> You haven't lost anything if you haven't pirated your content (since they said they'd "put it back", as quoted from your original post).

It's an inconvenience, I'll give you that.

<comment><AUTHOR> Of course I've lost something...I've lost 2 going on 3 or 4 days of income from all the people who would have signed up but couldn't, I've lost all the money from the people who are demanding refunds, and I've lost respect from my students who think this is all my fault (and who it will be harder to sell future courses to). I've lost marketing dollars for ad spends that have sent traffic to the site the last 2 days pointing to a course that isn't there (granted I caught this one early but it's still tangible). The course website gets decent Google organic search traffic...but the course site has been gone for 2 days now...how do you think Google will react? I'd be amazed if they didn't penalize the site in the rankings after this.

What are you talking about?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'm getting messages from students asking where the course is...this is a nightmare!</comment>


IPad, schmipad, give me a MacBook Air on the road - <AUTHOR> http://www.tuaw.com/2010/12/02/ipad-schmipad-give-me-a-macbook-air-on-the-road/ <comment><AUTHOR> Dear Apple, for Christmas I would like a Macbook Air with 3G. Can you make this happen?

Thanks, Andre.</comment>


Prosecutors drop robbery case to preserve stingray secrecy in St. Louis - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/04/prosecutors-drop-robbery-case-to-preserve-stingray-secrecy-in-st-louis/

<comment><USER2> Since this is the FBI/other feds pushing local and state law enforcement to not reveal what a stingray does, or when it's used, we have to ask... What's so special about what a stingray does that they want to hide it so bad? Given the history of the FBI, stingrays probably do something that's pretty obviously a 4th Amendment violation, maybe even such a violation so grotesque that the FBI doesn't think it can raise up enough crapaganda to keep a magistrate from rejecting stingray use out of hand.</comment>


Ask HN: Flipboard + Flattr - would you use it? - <AUTHOR>

Hey everybody,
While taking a study brake I watched a video interview with the Flipboard CEO Mike McCue (Link: http://goo.gl/PIID), while listening it struck me.
What if you combined Flipboard and Flattr? Imagine Flattr integrated in all the content you're sharing (coming from publishers, not facebook photos etc.) and every share or like would "cost" you 1 cent. It sounds strange, but we all like HN because of the quality of the articles posted (and of course the discussions in the comments). Aren't there a couple of articles where you thought "Wow, this is very well written" or "Wow, so much good information in here"? Wouldn't you pay just 1 cent for it? If 1'000'000 people would pay 1 cent, the publisher of the article could make 10'000 bucks, for a one page article. The money collected from the sharing would be fairly distributed to the publishers, after Flipboard and Flattr cut their piece out.
Heavy "sharers" could book a package, like 15 bucks a month, where they can share as much as they want. These 15 bucks get also equally distributed to the content publishers (if you share 80% NYT articles, NYT gets 78% [if Flipboard and Flattr take each 1% off]).
Why am I writing this? Because I think it is an idea, which could work out for the publishers and great companies like Flipboard and Flattr.
Am I doing a Flattrboard now? Nope, just wanted to share with you guys this idea.
So why am I posting this on HN? Because I think MAYBE somebody from Flattr or Flipboard reads this and thinks, hey why not? (And then of course indirectly, I save the whole publishing industry, yeah, no problem :-)
Jokes aside, what do you guys think and where do you see the problems in this idea? <comment><USER2> I won't use anything related to flattr. Mostly because the guys that created it are heavily involved in thepiratebay. They trample on the rights of copyright owners in the name of "freedom" and "good will" and charge 10% on top of all transactions for a donation service.

No thanks!</comment>


Google testing first page of all ads, no organic results - <AUTHOR> https://goblackfin.com/is-seo-dead <comment><USER2> I wasn't sure until 3 minutes in. I think advertising money is a good indicator for useful content/services, if it is exactly what the person is searching for.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, its just plausible enough, until the part about raising sheep O.o

</comment><comment><USER3> April fool, nice try. better luck for next time! ;)</comment>


Tabletop Pong - <AUTHOR> http://www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/pong

<comment><USER2> Interesting! I wonder if they are planning on converting any other video game to tabletop.. pacman would be a challange!

<comment><USER3> Perhaps you can move magnets below the table?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This has been around for years. It's called Air Hockey.

<comment><USER5> In Air Hockey, you can move your paddle in two dimensions, you can apply a variable amount of force to the puck, the goals don't encompass the entire width of a player's side, and there are those little holes shooting air that carries the puck. They may look like small differences, but even minute changes to a game's mechanics can result in hugely different gameplay dynamics.</comment></comment>


Tech suffers from lack of humanities, says Mozilla head - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/oct/12/tech-humanities-misinformation-philosophy-psychology-graduates-mozilla-head-mitchell-baker <comment><USER2> I once attended a small scientific conference with a couple hundred attendees total. Over the two days of the conference there were many technical presentations to the full group, but two of the final presentations were non- technical. One presentation was from a science ethicist, who I believe was a professor at an Ivy-league school.

It pained me to be in the audience for the ethicist's talk and following Q&A session. She was unable to provide any framework for thinking about ethics which the scientists present did not already have. The scientists asked direct questions about how to approach specific ethical issues they saw in their own work, and her responses were all along the lines of "well, the important thing is that you think hard about it."

She displayed no ability to teach the scientists much, and no willingness to dive into discussion of their issues. Her presentation was a lot of the sort of thing that this article is trying to do: shaming STEM folks for their mistakes, and claiming the humanities is the cure-all. Let me make a claim: if the humanities are really a solution for problems created by STEM, all you should need to do is demonstrate the case. Technical and scientific crowds understand problems, and will jump on real solutions.

(Aside: of the STEM undergraduate programs I'm aware of in the US, they all require somewhere between 20% and 50% of classes to be in the humanities or social sciences)

<comment><USER3> Clearly she didn't discuss the danger of extrapolating a trend line from a single datapoint.

<comment><USER2> I make no claim as to whether competent science ethicists exist. Clearly this anecdote is a good example of what professors of humanities should try to avoid if they aim to fix problems in STEM.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> They keep on insisting this is the case but they never give reasons why and spend all of their time on the offensive. Cynically it looks like they want in on the action and are trying to extort what they want via character attacks instead of any merit. Like courting lobbyists. All while giving vague and unsubstantiated hype. Nobody needs such parasitic manipulators.

Even the example is a terrible one as it shows a lack of technical knowledge and hype susceptibility. Machine learning is vulnerable to all about spurious correlations - that isn't lack of humanities but not understanding how to apply statistics and the limitations of the tools. Despite what statistics say Nicolas Cage doesn't drown people.

[http://tylervigen.com/view_correlation?id=359](http://tylervigen.com/view_correlation?id=359)

That said a good understanding of history can act as a very good guide. Humanities may have their uses but their promoters never seem to be honest.

</comment><comment><USER5> Humanities knowledge is just a tool which may and may not be used for good. FAANG already hires tons of humanities and social science PhDs to understand user behaviors. Whether that's used for good or ill depends on what the corporations are incentivized to do, not on the number of humanities grads employed.

(I'm speaking as a social science PhD employed at FAANG.)

<comment><USER6> So the problem of the blindspots in STEM focused people and the fact that his leads them to just unthinkingly doing what they are told to do ... isn't a problem? Because it depends on what they are being told to do?

I don't buy that, more humanities knowledge distributed among everyone is clearly needed, because our system ensures that the people at the top are more likely to use that knowledge for ill and the lower ranks knowing what is going on can be a check on that.

<comment><USER7> Many of the people who go into STEM do so because they want to deal with the task put in front of them without it being complicated. They don't want to deal with a bunch of icky emotions, and they don't want to trip themselves up asking murky existential questions about why they're doing what they do. This is a condition of temperament, you can run them through a gristle mill of humanities classes, it doesn't mean they'll internalize it if it isn't what they're inclined towards. You can lead a horse to knowledge, but you can't make it think.

<comment><USER8> I think your characterization of people who go into STEM is detracting from what could be an otherwise compelling argument. There are stronger reasons why people choose STEM. I agree that adding a few ethics classes won't change ethical behavior outcomes for those who would have chosen STEM programs anyway.

<comment><USER9> I'm not as certain. I went into college full-on STEMLord type person. Humanities was useless, STEM was the only way forward, etc etc. Graduated much the opposite, wanting to see more people appreciate the Humanities and incorporate them into their work and such.

And it all happened because I took some interesting humanities courses, and had some fun teachers. My two philosophy ones -- a general introduction, then a Philosophy of Science course taught by a person who had actually gotten their undergraduate in biophysics -- really led to some interesting discussion, and got me reading deeper and more across the humanities. Now, that's _most_ of my reading, it seems.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A co-worker (and a great friend) of mine gave a lecture at University of Nebraska–Lincoln, on bridging the gap between the liberal arts and the tech industry.

He talks about the value that liberal arts can provide the tech industry. In my opinion he is also giving rhetoric against this notion that you are tied to working in the same field that you studied at school, and that you have to follow the "correct" path that other people tell you is "marketable" for your career.

We both studied liberal arts, and we both work together in tech. He got his PhD in Classical literature, and works on the strategy team. I am in my final semester for getting a BA in Philosophy, and I'm on the engineering team.

If you listen to the lecture, around the 28min mark he says "I asked him, do you regret majoring in Philosophy?" My response is still the same now as it was when he asked me. I don't regret it, and I don't regret choosing it over computer science or a related major. I believe having the philosophy background helps me live a better life, and helps me do my job well.

Ask certain academics in the philosophy department what exactly philosophy is, and they'll tell you something like: "the systematic testing of our rational beliefs about the world." This to me, is where philosophy and software engineering intersect.

Link to the lecture: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-wNv9FHLqM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-wNv9FHLqM)

<comment><USER8> Well of course you don't regret majoring in philosophy, because your outcome is good (you are employed). I wonder what the other folks who had much more difficulty getting jobs would recommend.

The lack of humanities seems to be mainly due to competitive factors and employers reducing risk. Assuming all other factors are equal, if you had only one spot to hire an entry-level software engineer, who would you take the risk on? The CS major or the philosophy major?

<comment><USER11> If that's all the information you had, you probably shouldn't be making a hiring decision anyway.

<comment><USER8> Could you elaborate? At no point did I say the education was the only information available, only that other factors are equal between the candidates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm not sure whether this is aimed at the Zuckerbergs of this world, or an attempt to shoehorn (yet more) leftist viewpoints into tech. Personally I'm just going to continue ploughing my autistic tech furrow until the entryists hopefully move on.

</comment><comment><USER13> When their real goal is to "tackle misinformation" they should abolish any thinking prevalent in the humanities.

If you want pure objective truth you need logic and evidence. Basically the tools that are employed by Math, Physics and Engineers. The concepts of Classical Positivism are over 100 years old and are still the best thing we got to find out the truth.

In order to "tackle misinformation" humanities have zero solutions to offer. Any mediocre engineer would be better.

<comment><USER14> A lot of the world's problems are just too complex and interconnected to have an accessible source of definitive truth. For example anything to do with pollution or major construction projects. You have to balance competing demands that are absurdly tangential, that should be a false dichotomy. But those are the choices that have to be made all the time and there is no analysis that can give you the answer.

Science and engineering strip out complexity to reach something simple enough to be modelled. It is naïve to believe that every problem can be treated like this.

<comment><USER13> > It is naïve to believe that every problem can be treated like this.

Is it really? I can make abstract models of all kinds of things and still get accurate predictions. The movement of single atoms in a gas is very "complex". Still thermodynamics can make precise prediction about pressure, temperature and volume of that gas.

Of course you always have to check if your model is accurate and if the abstraction does not take a very important part of reality in consideration.

How are humanities helping me with that?

<comment><USER14> A scientific predication is not enough to make a decision in these kind of cases.

For example, consider the building of a wind farm...

* The site is on the migration path of a species of endangered goose. You can model the number likely to be killed.

* Climate change is a problem. You can model the effect on the atmosphere of CO2 emissions.

* The turbines will be visible from a beauty spot and could effect tourism. You can model where the turbines are visible.

* People think that turbines are really ugly. You can quantity this with a questionnaire.

Lots of scientific predication and analysis going on here. But none of that tells you what you should _actually do_ about these issues. It doesn't tell you how many geese you are allowed to kill to reduce CO2 Any more than science can be tell you what flavor of ice cream to eat. It is a question of morality, geography, asthetics, sociology and politics. Why wouldn't you want to understand those things?

<comment><USER13> If I know all of the above mentioned quantifiable objective variables with a reasonable accuracy I can make a much more informed decision.

Again, why do I need humanities for that decision? What are the solutions they have to offer? How can they do anything else than to say "You have to do it that way, because we say so"?

If they say "this solution is morally right, ascetically beautiful, sociologically correct and politically desirable" aren't they imposing their own subjective unverifiable "truths" onto others?

<comment><USER15> Just as having an in depth understanding of mathematics, physics, or engineering helps us to make more informed decisions, so too do the humanities. Fields of study such as philosophy, sociology, or aesthetics do not attempt to establish, as you put it, _subjective unverifiable "truths"_ (to do so would be quite infeasible in the first place). Instead they allow for discussion and aggregation of information and reasoned opinions, so that a comprehensive understanding of the field and its many schools of thought may be reached.

Coming back to the wind farm, even once we have the objective variables, the decision we make will be based on factors of morality, geography, aesthetics, sociology and politics. By having a broad understanding of these fields and the various paradigms contained within them, we can produce a more informed decision than if these aspect were ignored completely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> A) Tech already hires psychologists to optimize mark fleecing.

B) This is rich, coming from an exec at a "nonprofit" that gets most of its money from Google.

C) Spend more time around humanities professors--no less ruthless than the engineers, but they can pull quotes from Foucault and Derrida to justify their own assholery. A less enlightened engineer would just have to accept that about himself.

</comment><comment><USER17> Mozilla has been on a role lately of making statements that make me skeptical about the future of their browser. I just don't feel like every software I use needs to have a robust social policy behind it. I'm happy to just use something that works well

<comment><USER18> How about just one? Just _one_ browser with a robust social policy? Would that be so bad for the world?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is such an important point. Engineering does so much to shape society and the lives of individuals. But we give zero training to new engineers in these issues. Worse, so many engineers I speak to are willfully ignorant or disdainful of the humanities. Engineers mustn't loose sight of who we work for: humanity.

<comment><USER20> What part of the humanities do you think would be helpful to engineers?

I so far hadn't seen anything that would be useful enough to make me not disdainfull of humanities, but i would be happy to be proven wrong.

<comment><USER11> Ideally the humanities forces you to think about values and the why of things, not just the how. Not all goals are worth achieving...you can "change the world" and make it a worse place.

More practically, the humanities teaches persuasion and rhetoric, in writing and in speaking, as well as reading between the lines when reading or listening. I work with engineers...kind of am one myself, though I was trained as a humanist...and I see them dashing themselves on those rocks on a weekly basis.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > _" Technology companies need to diversify their hiring practices to include > more people from backgrounds in philosophy and psychology if they want to > tackle the problem of misinformation online, the head of one of the biggest > internet charities has warned."_

If it's misinformation, shouldn't intelligent people of any background be able to identify and flag it?

> _" we are intentionally building the next generation of technologists who > have not even the framework or the education or vocabulary to think about > the relationship of Stem to society or humans or life."_

Oh. Because it's not about truth or critical thinking but frameworks and vocabulary.

<comment><USER22> > If it's misinformation, shouldn't intelligent people of any background be > able to identify and flag it?

Evidently not. Smart people from all sorts of backgrounds can fall for all sorts of scams, especially the ones tailored to them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Ah yes, we should tell engineers they need a behavior adjustment. This doesn't happen enough.

<comment><USER24> As a veteran programmer, I'd say that on average, engineers in the Bay Area do need an attitude adjustment. There are a lot of awesome people here, and bad behavior is an exception, but I've seen more douchey entitled behavior from Bay Area programmers than I have in the entire rest of my professional career.

Another thing I seen too often from programmers, is a disdainful, even disgusted attitude when faced with negative feedback. The first reaction should be to try and understand where the feedback is coming from, not to disdain it. What I've seen too often, is a defensive retreat behind the idea that the feedback is coming from an idiot. The thing to remember about online idiots, is that a) most people aren't them, most of the time and b) even when someone is that, they are usually far different in real life.

<comment><USER25> The feedback typically comes from people who think they are smarter than the engineers, or who have more social capital and so are used to be looked up to and respected. As such they get pissy when nerds question them.

Nerds tend to accept good solid feedback when a good reason is given; nerds rightly disregard feedback that is about pleasing peoples egos. Really smart nerds do strike a balance, but egos should be considered a flaw, and worked around as any other flaw.

<comment><USER24> _The feedback typically comes from people who think they are smarter than the engineers_

I know exactly the kind of feedback of which you speak. I once hired a tester to test a 2D game with Asteroids movement mechanics. His feedback: "Where are the brakes? It doesn't go where I point it." Well, that's sort of the point of the Asteroids movement mechanic, and my tester didn't even bother to understand the point.

 _Nerds tend to accept good solid feedback when a good reason is given;_

In my experience, not always. I've had a number of experiences where I explain my background as a fellow programmer, and I'm doing my level best at explaining in depth how I perceive a design as a user and why I'm reacting, and all too often, instead of getting clarifying questions or a reflection- back, I immediately get the start of some 'splainin. Conclusion jumped to after no iterations, and apparently after only a simple pattern-match. One time, I'd started explaining my reactions as a user, then got back a reply about the codebase. There were lots of changes to the UX, yet the major "plusses" for the change were from the POV of the programmer, and as a user, I'm left wondering, "What's in it for me?"

 _Really smart nerds do strike a balance, but egos should be considered a flaw, and worked around as any other flaw._

Most nerds never get past the point of only considering the egos of others to be a flaw.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Ah, yes, need more humanities to combat wrongthink.

</comment><comment><USER27> For examples of the consequences of big data and ML, check out mathematician Cathy O'Neill's book "Weapons of Math Destruction". She posits that the problematic systems share three key features: they are opaque, unregulated and difficult to contest, and at the same time scalable, thereby amplifying any inherent biases to affect increasingly larger populations.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weapons_of_Math_Destruction)

</comment><comment><USER28> There are plenty of ways you could improve a random engineer. One for many guys would be to have played a team sport, or been in a marching band. Or something else outside the scholastic bubble.

Another would be mandatory physical education in college.

</comment><comment><USER29> I'd also posit it would be helpful for larger tech firms and most accelerators to have an ethecist on staff, to help with the "could we vs should we" evaluation.

<comment><USER30> I'm willing to accept this if we only hire people who are on the opposite side of the ideological spectrum to whoever is suggesting this.

If you are a conservative, we will hire progressives to decide what is ethical and isn't ethical.

If you are a progressive, we will hire conservatives to decide what is and what isn't ethical.

<comment><USER2> I'm all for heterodoxy, but what about people who are just not ideological? Who do we pair them up with?

<comment><USER31> Both..?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> I just find it interesting how they seem to find AI to be the issue half of the time when it just reflects what it's shown. The example near the end just reflects their internal process give or take mistakes in the initial design and method used.

</comment><comment><USER33> It's not just the metaphorical "tech" that suffers, it's also the candidates themselves. When you have empathy and you prefer thinking about your impact (on customers, on the environment, on current culture, etc), what is open to you is a long and arduous road. Applying to companies, the choice is limited. Creating products, there's extra inertia. Acquiring experience with these constraints is also mentally draining at times. Self-image can also take a hit, when your beliefs have you refuse easy ways towards prestige or money. You might walk with your head held high, but not necessarily have the savings or the opportunities that your friends have. There's a social cost to "doing the right thing" that not everyone is willing or able to pay.

It takes a bit of luck to find the right places and projects, but to anyone out there facing similar struggles: continue believing in yourself. The system will come around eventually..

</comment><comment><USER24> In the US, there is a big problem with trying to get more balance in the STEM fields by introducing humanities education, in that the humanities in higher education are massively skewed to the left.

[https://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind](https://www.ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind)

Conservatives may understand human nature better than liberals:

[https://theindependentwhig.com/haidt-passages/haidt/haidt- co...](https://theindependentwhig.com/haidt-passages/haidt/haidt- conservatives-understand-human-nature-better-than-liberals/)</comment>


Our Commitment to your Rights and Privacy - <AUTHOR> https://blog.dropbox.com/2014/04/our-commitment-to-your-rights-and-privacy/ <comment> UVB-76 A completely botched response from Dropbox.

They had two options:

1\. Disregard the concerns raised as those of a vocal minority, while the overwhelming majority of their users are apathetic about Rice's appointment; refuse to legitimize the concerns by publicly acknowledging them and wait for the whole thing to blow over;

2\. Acknowledge the concerns as legitimate, and damaging to users' trust in their business; as a business that depends so heavily on the trust of its users, admit an error of judgment and remove Rice from the board.

Instead, they have legitimized and publicized the concerns, but are refusing to do anything about it. They're going to get a kicking for this. Someone pass the popcorn?

<comment><USER2> Furthermore, by making a blog post about it, it seems that they have pushed more of their userbase to delete their accounts (judging by reading the comments section on the blog post).

</comment></comment><comment> k-mcgrady >> "There's nothing more important to us than keeping your stuff safe and secure. It's why we've been fighting for transparency and government surveillance reform, and why we've been vocal and public with our principles and values."

Ok, so you believe government surveillance needs reformed. Why should you (dropbox) or we (the public) trust the woman who was part of creating that very government surveillance??

</comment><comment><USER3> "Dr. Rice understands our stance on these issues and fully supports our commitments to our users."

There are three possible things this could mean:

1\. Rice has changed her mind about NSA surveillance.

2\. Dropbox's commitments to their users do not include attempting to defend their data from government surveillance.

3\. This statement is full of crap.

I'm guessing 3, but 2 is also likely. 1 does not seem to be the one to bet on.

<comment><USER4> How about:

1\. Rice wasn't brought on for anything that has to do with data privacy and thus her views on data privacy are irrelevant.

2\. Rice doesn't have an uncontrollable compulsion to send people's data to the NSA and thus it's unlikely she'll be sneaking off to install backdoors.

<comment><USER3> Both of those would mean that Rice's appointment to Dropbox's board is no big deal, but neither one is compatible with their statement that she "fully supports our commitments".

<comment><USER4> It is a big deal, just not from your perspective because you're solely focused on data privacy.

The statement is meant to address the data privacy concerns raised about her appointment. This doesn't mean the concerns are valid, just that they exist and Dropbox is aware of them. The alternative would be to not address the concerns and look completely out of touch with or intentionally ignoring the frenzy of the past few days.

<comment><USER3> I have no idea how that's supposed to relate to my statement.

I'm just saying that their _statement_ (not the appointment, but what they said right here) is completely at odds with the notion that they care about the privacy of their users.

That's all I'm saying. I'm not _focused on_ data privacy, I'm merely _noting_ that this statement appears to either contradict the facts at hand or be an implicit admission that _they_ don't care about data privacy.

<comment><USER4> Oh ok. I think you're saying that because you think that Rice believes [something bad with respect to data privacy], by Dropbox saying that she's fully supportive of their commitments Dropbox must also believe in [something bad with respect to data privacy].

So I guess that comes down to what Rice's exact views are.

Personally, I doubt she's completely against the idea of data privacy in all cases and thus it's possible that Dropbox's existing views and policies on data privacy are compatible with hers.

And anyway, I doubt that Dropbox could or would stop responding to FISA requests or warrants regardless of who's on the board considering that they operate in the US.

<comment><USER3> Rice's exact views don't seem too difficult to figure out. She spoke publicly in favor of warrantless surveillance of US citizens. It's possible that she's subsequently changed her mind, which is why I included that possibility as point #1 above.

FISA requests and warrants aren't really at issue here. Warrants are exactly how this stuff is _supposed_ to be done. FISA requests are pretty much just an odd form of warrant, and any opposition to them comes down to thinking they shouldn't be issued, not that they shouldn't be obeyed. The issue at hand is _warrantless_ surveillance. Does Dropbox hand over user data to the government without a warrant? If not, given that Rice is in favor of such things and Dropbox says she fully supports their commitments, there is a contradiction somewhere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nobody will deny her experience in the "expand into new countries" bullet point, at least. They should get Putin on board as well, I'm told he too has an impressive CV and a big address book.

<comment><USER6> That's probably the most painful wording they could have put in their statement.

Certain people at Dropbox seem to have lost touch with reality.

Even if you want to defend the appointment of Rice, you have to be insanely insensitive to refer to international expansion as a motive.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Dropbox has probably freed up a Petabyte of disk space from free-loading geeks over the past two days.

In other words, Rice has probably already paid for herself many times over.

(Actually, I think the crew behind the Iraq war shouldn't be on any boards but rather in prison. This isn't a political issue in my mind but rather a criminal one. Killing over 100,000 on false pretenses is well beyond the pale of what civilization should allow.)

<comment><USER8> Are geeks more likely to be free users of DropBox than non-geeks?

<comment><USER7> I don't know.

But I do suspect the geek is more likely to be aware of Rice's appointment and close their account over it.

After all, the geek has options.

<comment><USER8> So let's assume that a geek user is just as likely to be a free user as a non- geek user[]. Then, the geeks leaving their service is a net loss to them, because how would it not be that? If it really was the case that geeks leaving the service was a net win to them, then their whole user base - which you'll recall, we assume has the same proportion to free to non-free users as the geek subset - is a net loss to them, either right now or overall, violating the more fundamental assumption that dropbox has a self-serving business model. Thus we have arrived at a contradiction, forcing us to accept that geeks leaving the service is a net loss to dropbox.

We don't consider the case where geek users are more likely to have a non-free plan than non-geek users, since then that is obviously a net loss to dropbox if they leave, under the reasonable assumption that paying users of dropbox are more profitable to dropbox then their free user brethren.

The last possibility, that non-geek users are more likely to be paying users than geek users, is no more likely than the two scenarios above, according to your own knowledge. So why did you assert that geek users are a net loss to dropbox to begin with?

[] and also that these two sets of users is a partitioning of the whole set of users.

<comment><USER7> I don't have to assume.

In this case I can sample. Now, my sample size isn't very large, in fact it's just one person... me.

I had a free account and I closed it. I doubt they care.

But don't you think you are taking a comment made largely in jest just a bit too seriously?

<comment><USER8> > I don't have to assume.

In this case I can sample. Now, my sample size isn't very large, in fact it's just one person... me.

Ah, yes. Very cute. Doesn't make a lick of sense. But cute.

> But don't you think you are taking a comment made largely in jest just a bit > too seriously?

It's funny how, when something does not hold up to scrutiny, it was all just a joke all along. Then the person that performed the scrutiny was just an uptight person that couldn't take a joke. Yes. Very convenient.

<comment><USER7> A downvote Dewie?

Really? That's your "scrutiny"?

<comment><USER8> I can't downvote posts which are replies to one of my own posts.

<comment><USER7> Oh. Looks like someone supports your position then:)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Obviously Rice won't change much about Dropbox policy and practices either way. I don't think that's really the problem here.

The problem here is what kind of ethics, common sense, or both we can expect from a company who puts somebody on their board who as far as the majority of the population of this planet is concerned should be standing trial for crimes against humanity.

<comment><USER9> > who as far as the majority of the population of this planet is concerned > should be standing trial for crimes against humanity.

What did she in particular do that would meet that bill, besides agree to serve in the Bush Administration? Can we at least wait a couple of weeks between witchhunts in the tech industry?

<comment><USER6> She didn't just "serve" in the Bush administration as the f-ing Whitehouse receptionist.

She was a prominent and powerful part of that administration, and as such participated actively in the WMD deception and the use of torture.

If the US wasn't the most powerful nation on the planet she would be in a jail cell in The Hague right now.

Completely ignoring what one may personally think of her, what kind of company would put someone like that on the board?

(Also, do you really not get the irony of using the term "witch hunt" given the actions of the so-called "victims" here?)

<comment><USER2> The real victims are already dead :(

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> You're committed to my privacy? How about that 1-click client-side encryption button that I've been asking of you for the past 2 years? How about a zero- knowledge policy? Let me know when these are in effect, and then I'll know you're "committed to my privacy", and not just paying lip service to it to gain PR points.

<comment><USER11> They can't implement with most likely totally changing their expenses in a big way. They dedupe content before storing it in s3, totally encrypting would most likely cause these prices to skyrocket.

<comment><USER5> It could perfectly well be a premium feature.

<comment><USER11> Sure, but most likely that would cause a huge engineering effort and they probably want to focus on keeping their core product as is and as easy to use as possible.

<comment><USER5> Do you mean Dropbox is not as committed to privacy as the statement makes them out to be?

<comment><USER11> They are committed to privacy, he just stated so in the link.

Just that they aren't SpiderOak and aren't going to encrypt all of your data client side before uploading it. That would require changing their entire architecture and they aren't going to do so.

<comment><USER5> It was tongue-in-cheek. If Amnesty International hired Donald Rumsfeld for his organizational abilities, most people would question their commitment to protecting human rights.

<comment><USER11> Sure but Dropbox is in the business of syncing files unlike AI.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> _We should have been clearer that none of this is going to change with Dr. Rice's appointment to our Board._

i.e. "We should have been clearer about how this isn't what it looks like."

</comment><comment><USER13> I'm not even going to get into the politics here, but I'll just say this: If you aren't happy with Dropbox, here's something to look at.

[http://www.owncloud.org](http://www.owncloud.org)

or

[https://github.com/haiwen/seafile](https://github.com/haiwen/seafile)

</comment><comment><USER14> Dropbox guys cannot be trusted therefore I have simply deleted the account.

</comment><comment><USER7> Seriously... this is like appointing Pat Robertson to the head of the California Porn Producers Association.

It is just about that stupid. Maybe stupider. Or else there is a whole lot I really don't understand and the managers of Dropbox do.

</comment><comment><USER15> They seem to have completely missed the point.

</comment><comment><USER16> I deleted my DropBox and moved my stuff over to SpiderOak.

</comment><comment><USER17> I'm switching to git-annex assist [https://git- annex.branchable.com](https://git-annex.branchable.com)

</comment><comment><USER18> Why do they feel a need to make a post about this if they are already honored by her joining?

</comment><comment><USER19> "Trust us".

Yes, I trust that you revealed your real position.

Gaining marketshare is more important to you than user data privacy.

Got it!

</comment><comment><USER8> Q: will boycotting Dropbox even matter if you're a free user?

<comment><USER20> probably make them happy. Could just fill up to your quota with garbage.

<comment><USER21> Would have to be unique garbage, such that de-duping isn't possible.

<comment><USER22> Great idea actually. Someone should make a project for this.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Tesla Model 3 Gets Consumer Reports Recommendation After Braking Update - <AUTHOR> https://www.consumerreports.org/car-safety/tesla-model-3-gets-cr-recommendation-after-braking-update/ <comment><USER2> Fascinating! I wonder what other fundamental performance characteristics of their vehicles Tesla can redefine at will, remotely.</comment>


Ask HN: People who looked down upon Node.js/JS, has ES6/etc. changed your views? - <AUTHOR> The JS ecosystem has gone through a lot of development recently, and with incredibly fast pace. ES2015, ES2015+, Babel, React, Angular, TypeScript.<p>People who looked down upon Node or JS in general, have your views changed? <comment><USER2> I used to be very pro object oriented (Java, C#, etc). Saw JS as a hack. Then I tried it and realized that it made my development time shorter. Thing is, it's a programming language and it can be as good or terrible as you want it to be.

Just because I moved to JS, doesn't mean I threw away the best practices I learned earlier. I still take a careful look at node packages I use and try to understand how it works before blindly using it. I've worked with some people who would look up something on npm, then immediately go npm install and go to production. You can do that in Java, too.

Only thing I worry about now is that I don't use Java, C#, etc enough to prove to job recruiters that I'm not rusty.

</comment><comment><USER3> ES6 is is such a lovely language to write

</comment><comment><USER4> I can't see why it would.

It amplifies much of the criticism of JS and the JS ecosystem that I have been presented with.

</comment><comment><USER5> Yes I admit years ago I hated JS but mainly because I had to work with IE5. Now it's interesting to me as an alternative paradigm I.e. the prototype based OO. Still prefer Haskell tho.

</comment><comment><USER6> No</comment>


Troubleshooting Java Applications – Sun Microsystems shows the way - <AUTHOR> http://www.sercononline.com/suntechdays09/ In the upcoming Sun Microsystems conference named "Sun Tech Days" to be held on February 18-20 at HICC Hyderabad, there is a full session dedicated to how different tools can be used for trouble shooting different kind of problems encountered in Java application development. This will be demonstrated by using case studies.<p>The tools which will be discussed are VisualVM, JConole, JDK commandlines like jinfo, jps, jstack, jmap, and jhat. <comment><USER2> Please don't post blatant advertising.</comment>


My very first meetup - <AUTHOR> http://onedeliberatelife.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/my-very-first-meetup/

<comment><USER2> I had my first meetup last week.

All dudes? Check. All cool? Check. Would go again? Absolutely.</comment>


Go 1.5 Release Candidate 1 is released - <AUTHOR> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/golang-announce/X0KwHwE1vp4 <comment><USER2> Huge improvements to the GC in this release, illustrated in this slide deck linked from the notes: [https://talks.golang.org/2015/go- gc.pdf](https://talks.golang.org/2015/go-gc.pdf)

<comment><USER3> > Tell people that GC is not a barrier with Go's low latency GC

If you have a time target of 350us, then a 3 millisecond pause means you are dead. So you either write Go in such a fashion as to not create junk or use c++. Systems and time sensitive languages cannot have GC.

<comment><USER4> > Systems and time sensitive languages cannot have GC.

This is not true, as not all GCs are stop-the-world, and all GC systems have some sort of pool system allowing you to manage/batch your allocations and sweeps. Root all your allocations for the inner loop, and unroot them/trigger a release when ready.

<comment><USER5> > This is not true, as not all GCs are stop-the-world, and all GC systems have > some sort of pool system allowing you to manage/batch your allocations and > sweeps. Root all your allocations for the inner loop, and unroot > them/trigger a release when ready.

Not for all allocations. You can manually do it for a subset of them, but pooling all allocations is generally extremely impractical.

How do you, for example, pool the allocations that closures or defer perform?

<comment><USER4> > How do you, for example, pool the allocations that closures or defer > perform?

It's a strange area that demands reliable or stable performance but uses closures and exceptions, two ways to inject a healthy amount of noise into your understanding of the program, and certainly blows the upper bound on "arbitrary wait time" to huge. I haven't been presented with a problem yet that allowed you to complain about GC with respect to latency where you would want implicit allocations happening all over the case....

<comment><USER5> You can't get away from exceptions in Go. Closures, maybe, depending on the code you're writing (though I doubt it), but the highly dynamic semantics of defer makes it impossible to avoid.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The improvements look fantastic! Great job GO team! I'm still more of a fan of the way C++ or Rust go about memory management but one of the great detractors to using GO for me has always been the latency issues (well that and the forced file structure but that's off topic).

I may have to give GO another shot with 1.5.

</comment><comment><USER7> Anyone know what happened to LiteIDE? The creator went radio silent all of a sudden a couple months back.

</comment><comment><USER8> Sheesh! You don't have to put go in it's name just because it is written in go[0].

[0] [https://twitter.com/rob_pike/status/618357610287226880](https://twitter.com/rob_pike/status/618357610287226880)

<comment><USER2> Ha! [https://github.com/robpike/nihongo](https://github.com/robpike/nihongo)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I never realized how odd it is, etymological, to release a release candidate before.</comment>


"Hilariously Asked Questions" - <AUTHOR> http://www.panabee.com/contact

<comment><USER2> Their site is full of these quirky posts. Check this one for example.

[http://www.panabee.com/domain-name-search/lists/greatest- lif...](http://www.panabee.com/domain-name-search/lists/greatest-life- accomplishments)</comment>


Spock sign-up flow demonstrates how to scare users away... (by Jeremy Zawodny) - <AUTHOR> http://jeremy.zawodny.com/blog/archives/009370.html

<comment><USER3> Uh, it's not a button, it's a link. Notice that it's pushed to the bottom and hardly given equal treatment as the actual button.

If you've ever seen many eye tracking studies, you know that items in the location on the page aren't likely to be seen, leading the user to believe (right or wrong) that they either must disclose a password or go away.

<comment><USER4> Of course they don't give the two options equal treatment. Why should they? All that means is that they don't want you to skip the step. They do provide an option to skip, however.

Maybe you missed it because you wrote the story with a sensationalist conclusion in mind. At least you got to say 'fuck', right?

<comment><USER3> Why should they? Respect for their potential users.

Implying that I missed because of how I'd written my take on it seems a little odd. You do realize that I wrote it after the fact, right?

Of course you do. But it's more fun to pretend that I don't "get it."

Had I wanted to be sensationalist, I could have done so.

<comment><USER5> The point is that you must look at the actual numbers - cost of scaring some people away vs. how many new users this brings in, to actually "get it." I've seen this exact technique work extremely well many times before.

Building a successful site is absolutely _not_ about giving users everything they want, how they want it. That line of thinking can be very damaging to your site.

<comment><USER6> Maybe you are right, but if everybody would be thinking like that, there would be no Linux, only Microsoft.

Some people crave a pure solution. For me, a web site that employs the trick above loses my trust, and I will never really feel comfortable in using it anymore.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I was a bit turned off by the Spock sign up process myself, but for different reasons. First, the invite email was extremely vague - "a new search engine that organizes information around people"? I thought it might be a new human- assisted search site (something which has been in the news a bit lately), but wasn't sure. Second, clicking the invite list brings you to a very basic sign- up page with no information. As I went through the sign-up process, I really wasn't sure what I was actually getting myself into, but since I'm pretty trusting I just went ahead anyway. Once I finally got to the site, I still didn't know what it was, but I recognized that it was some sort of search engine, so I typed in a search for a bookstore I like and got one result - <USER2> person who said they liked something or other which happened to use the same word as the bookstore's name. In the end, I really wouldn't have known what was going on at Spock if my friend didn't send me a link to an article about the site which nicely explained what it was. It's actually a pretty interesting idea, and I can see that the site would work better once more people sign up. Still, Spock needs to work on their user experience, especially on their sign up process. (Additionally, although far less important, they need to work on their icon: their little person favicon looks exactly like the calvin klein logo.)

</comment><comment><USER8> >I can't think of a very polite way to say "no fucking way", so I won't even try. There wasn't a button for that.

How could he miss the "Skip this step" button so clearly pictured??

</comment><comment><USER9> To me, the problem is not that they are taking my gmail password, but that they show me this tricky "spam your friends" screen before I am even ready to know wtf this new service is!

Regarding the sites getting my Gmail/Yahoo passwords, I don't think any site is really happy doing that. (We at Buxfer also do it, but it's tucked inside the site for users who really want to do it.) If Gmail and Yahoo were to open up even more and provide secure access to the addressbooks, nobody would have to do this stupid scraping anymore.

<comment><USER6> Thoughts about this:

a) I don't want people to give away my email address anyway b) perhaps it would be possible to create a kind of bookmarklet or browser plugin that would make it easy for people to submit addresses from their address book? For example a "buxfer-invitation-bookmarklet", which people could use to send buxfer invitations to people from their address book?

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I would be willing to trade the few users it scares away for the thousands (or tens/hundreds of thousands) that end up signing up as a result of these tools.

</comment><comment><USER6> Facebook does it that way, too. Everybody does it. I don't like it, though.

</comment><comment><USER5> Here's a cookie for not getting it ---> (*)</comment>


Ask HN: Is Quicken Safe? - <AUTHOR> Hi,
First time poster, long time lurker....
On the Mac, I use Little Snitch to monitor my computer's network connections.
My accountant really likes Quicken and more or less insists I use it.
When I start the desktop app I see it try to make several connections:
www.gstatic.com aa.online-metrix.net cdn.optimizely.com tags.tiqcdn.com cdn.mxpnl.com connect.facebook.net www.googleadservices.com api.mixpanel.com
Some of these are seemly benign (such as gstate) but others appear to be less so. For example when I google
aa.online-metrix.net
I get:
'''It is listed as a unsafe domain created to hijack web browser, and we identify it as redirect virus. ... Aa.online-metrix.net is a unreliable webpage belonging to redirect virus and potentially unwanted program (PUP) and it brags the capacities to show advertisements on the PC, both for Windows and Mac.'''
Also, I don't have a facebook account nor do I want to have anything to do with facebook. Does anyone know why my finance software is trying to make connections there.
All in all I kinda of wish I didn't know this about Quicken (just kidding) because I need to use it if I want to continue to work with my accountant whom I really like.  But now I am really uncomfortable about doing so.
I am curious how bad an idea do people think doing so is. Are there known safe alternatives?
Thanks in advance. <comment><USER2> www.gstatic.com aa.online-metrix.net cdn.optimizely.com tags.tiqcdn.com cdn.mxpnl.com connect.facebook.net www.googleadservices.com api.mixpanel.com

^^ These are CDN website and tracker used by large companies and sadly, it's not only in quicken but is injected on large parts of Internet and it is safe but privacy - just check your self on that.

Quicken looks promising based on it's RANK, popularity and domain age. Personally never used though!

If your accountant is trustable, give it a shot.

<comment><USER3> Thanks, privacy is always a concern but also something I have largely given up on. Which is definitely sad. I just thought it funny that aa.online-metrix.net seemed pretty bogus. On well. I remember the days when software companies (I worked at one) had strong polices prohibiting their software from communicating back to the company without user's explicit consent. Those days are long gone.

<comment><USER4> Some of the "bogus" domains are simply one of the hundreds of domains that resolve to the same resource, and belong to the same ad company, usually to circumvent adblockers and such.</comment></comment></comment>


TrackDuck – A Tiny Web Site Build Tracking Startup - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/02/17/trackduck-a-tiny-web-site-build-tracking-startup-appears-to-be-on-a-roll/

<comment><USER2> This title is link bait.</comment>


Accidental Office Manager: The Complete Guide For Outfitting Your Startup Office - <AUTHOR> http://refer.ly/accidental_office_manager__the_complete_guide_for_outfitting_your_startup_office/c/d7926052676a11e2bfbf22000a1db8fa

<comment><USER2> Wow this is an incredibly extensive list. Definitely wouldn't have thought of little things like a safe or acoustic panels for calls. Well done!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, both the office and making this list to share were a labor of love. It's all about the details.</comment></comment>


Want To Be More Productive? - Improve Your I/O - <AUTHOR> http://pythonwise.blogspot.com/2013/05/want-to-be-more-productive-improve-your.html

<comment><AUTHOR> If you have more ways to improve your I/O - please share :)</comment>


Ask HN: As serious readers, how important are discussions for you? - <AUTHOR> Hi everyone!
As a serious reader, how important are discussions for you? I love reading and I often find myself in the following situation:

  1) Read a really great book i.e., Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman (amazing read btw, 10/10 would recommend)

  2) Find someone to have meaningful, deep discussions with (someone who has also read the book)

  3) Profit.
 Unfortunately, #3 comes rarely. `:(`
I'm in the midst of developing an idea (http://qitab.club -- just landing page with additional details) which is trying to solve the following problems:

  1) Difficulty finding people who are reading the same book to discuss with

  2) Book clubs, which are great but have their own pace and their own roadmap
 I've tried finding book clubs but they always have their own roadmap and there are usually 100s if not 1000s in a single group. So, I'm trying to develop something where you can answer discussion questions for yourself and later, form small groups (the app helps with this) to discuss the book with.
I'd love to hear your thoughts and learn about the problems you face for your discussions.
Thanks for your time! <comment> dawg- I love the idea and would participate. I have experienced your problem as well, I love to read great books that are a little off the beaten path and don't really know many people with the same hobby.

But how would you keep it discussion-centric, with consistent high-quality, high-effort content instead of accidentally turning into a knockoff of Goodreads? Also, how will this be any different than a simple online forum about literature?

<comment><AUTHOR> Great questions!

1\. How would you keep it discussion-centric (not GoodReads) ...?

2\. How will this be any different than a simple online forum about literature?

To answer your first question -- the idea is to use the guided questions as a basis for your discussion. So, you already start on firm ground followed by questions/prompts for the group you're in. A lot of this is dependent on the UI/UX however, I am considering having structured responses which aren't entirely free form or even, a series of responses with a mix of both.

Why is this not just a forum about literature? Literature forums typically are composed of, essentially, smaller book clubs. The problem is that book clubs will have a group of people that you'll have to edge your way into and they'll be going at a specific pace and roadmap. On the other hand, with Qitab, you're not beholden to the whims of a book club etc. Instead, you start with structured questions to engage you with your text so you have the upside of a book club without being a part of one _and_ when you're ready, you can search out other people on Qitab who are also reading the book so you can engage when you want.

I hope that answers your questions! It would be awesome if you could visit [http://qitab.club](http://qitab.club) and sign up (you're e-mail is 100% confidential and _will not_ be shared with advertisers etc.) -- that'll be a really great vote of confidence and I can follow up with you as we're developing.</comment></comment>


Mocaroni, a free API prototyping tool - <AUTHOR> https://www.mocaroni.com

<comment><USER2> This is cool, but, you're missing one huge thing that is a glaring, glaring issue.

Are you not checking that the logged in user can access their own API projects? I signed up and was able to access whatever project I wanted. I created project 178, was able to change that to 171, to 2, to whatever I wanted, and saw their endpoints and what they were doing.

[https://www.mocaroni.com/projects/2/paths/new](https://www.mocaroni.com/projects/2/paths/new)

That's scoping 101. I see this is a Rails app. current_user.projects.find(2)

Like, hello?

That makes me wonder what else is available.</comment>


List of Resources for Learning Ruby - <AUTHOR>

An earlier hn post about learning Ruby (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4068633) got me thinking and since I haven't seen a good list of Ruby learning resources all together in one place in a while I put together a few of what I think are some of the better resources, in no particular order - most are just ruby, a few are for Rails. I'm sure I've missed a few good ones so let me know what those are.
(1) tryruby.org
(2) The Bastard's Book of Ruby http://ruby.bastardsbook.com/
(3) Pragmatic Studio Ruby Course - http://pragmaticstudio.com/ruby
(4) Eloquent Ruby by Russ Olsen
(5) http://www.rubymonk.com/
(6) http://www.rubykoans.com/
(7) Metaprogramming Ruby by Paolo Perrotta
(8) codeschool.com
(9) Michael Hartl's Rails Tutorial- http://ruby.railstutorial.org/
(10) The Rails 3 Way by Obie Fernandez
(11) http://www.railscasts.com <comment><USER2> I know that tryruby is based off of why's guide, but here's his great book in HTML form

[http://mislav.uniqpath.com/poignant- guide/book/chapter-1.htm...](http://mislav.uniqpath.com/poignant- guide/book/chapter-1.html)

I'd also recommend Zed's book as a place to do some exercises. It is pretty much a straight port of his Python book, so you won't learn the idioms, but it's still well structure

<http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah - I knew I was forgetting something! why's book is a must read for sure.</comment></comment>


On Blogging: A Response to Svbtle and Obtvse - <AUTHOR> http://peterdowns.com/posts/on-blogging.html

<comment><USER2> I'm running static generation on one of my sites, RSS included. Turned out to be very simple. Code is in Python, and right now I'm not sharing it because it's an unholy mess... but it does work.

Seriously, though, it's such a simple system, anyone who can program at all ought to be able to do it.

</comment><comment><USER3> I totally agree. There is a not so little comedy factor in this discussion.

I for one use some static generator too which is self baked and extensible with filters and plugins.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'd love to see your static generator — is it online anywhere?

<comment><USER3> <https://github.com/entropie/backbite> This was my first attempt. My webserver did not support ruby at this time but i really wanted a blog engine in my favourite language (running tumblog at <http://polis.ackro.org/> , and the blog <http://blog.ackro.org/> ). Its far to complex, but worked fine.

My second attempt ist much more simple. <https://github.com/entropie/backbitr> I just made a blog for my girlfriends webpage after month i did not do anything with it (iam not much of a blogger, tbh). It took me like 30 mins to get it up and running. <http://dogitright.de/~mit/blog/archive/2011.html> Its not completely finished, but it needs to be soon, cause of my GFs blog.</comment></comment></comment>