Django Advice - <AUTHOR> http://stevelosh.com/blog/2011/06/django-advice/

<comment><USER2> I'm a big fabric fan and use if for server bootstrapping and deployment. I've tried to get into puppet a few times but it always seems overly complex to me. Is puppet useful if I'm only running a handful of servers or is it designed for 10s (or 100s) of servers?

I noticed he used puppet and fabric in this article so it made me interested what puppet it doing better for him than fabric.

Is there a repository of examples? Like just bootstrapping a debian box with nginx/apache/postgres (or mysql)?

Thanks!

<comment><AUTHOR> I'd say Puppet is useful even if you're running one server, especially when you use it with Vagrant. If you use it for EVERY bit of setup on your server (no manually installing packages!) you can be sure that your development VM and production server are both the same environment.

Puppet is declarative, Fabric is imperative. With Puppet I can say:

        Make sure the directory /var/www/foo exists with permission 755 and owner foo.
        Make sure the nginx vhost "foo.conf" exists in sites-enabled with content X, and this depends on /var/www/foo existing.

With Fabric you have to handle all the edge cases. What if /var/www/foo already exists? What if it's owned by someone else? You have to manually code all the 'mkdir' and 'chmod' commands instead of just saying "this directory should exist like this".

Right now there's no public example repo, but I'm planning on cleaning up and open-sourcing our Puppet/Django/Vagrant skeleton this week so we can use it during the Django Dash.

<comment><USER3> I'd be interested in seeing this once you're done. Is there some github profile I can watch or somewhere that you plan to put it?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> A general tip that has served me well: use tmux ( <http://tmux.sourceforge.net/> ). My typical environment consists of a a few vertically stacked panes. Up top is my vim session, below that is a shell. Below that is a horizontal split with runserver on the right and cake watch on the left.

<comment><AUTHOR> I used tmux for a while and it's great. I've since switched to DVTM + dtach because they're more lightweight and simple than tmux.

I never used 80% of tmux's features, so the simpler tools are better for me. If you're a tmux power user DVTM+dtach might not work for you.

dvtm: <http://www.brain-dump.org/projects/dvtm/> dtach: <http://dtach.sourceforge.net/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Great post.

But I still don't think Vagrant is that big of a help. I agree that compiling stuff like PIL on OSX can be a bit of a bother, but on production machines it's no bother at all.

And developers usually have to do it once, as, at least in our company, they do not change the projects they work on that often, but rather do them from start to the finish (we find it more productive this way). PIP requirements file with proper package versions is a must of course (Fabric deployment). As is staging server, but speaking from the experience - it's just a precaution, it works well.

Cheers for a part about Django Admin. I think it's the single most annoying, hack-needing piece of Django (as Django is great itself, we should expect perfection).

We are starting our own series of Django tips, mainly related to deployment, performance and scaling - at least one tip weekly. But thanks to you I decided that first we'll write about things we use to make Django admin work with you not against you - <http://www.askthepony.com/blog/>.

</comment><comment><USER6> Great article, but I'm still not sold on using Vagrant. Is there a case where it can help if I'm not deploying one app per vm? I often host multiple apps on the same VM slice.

</comment><comment><USER7> Wow, this is pretty comprehensive. Definitely gotta try django-annoying and automate things more with fabric/puppet/vagrant.

</comment><comment><USER8> vagrant looks interesting. here are some answers to questions i was going to post here but ended up finding myself via the docs:

\- what this adds to just using VB itself is that they provide pre-configured, minimal environments, kept as small as possible (less than 500MB).

\- pre-configured means that it includes ssh, VB extensions, sudo, assumes NAT addressing.

\- it has some support for multiple vms (DB and web separate, for example).

BUT i still can't work out what environments are available for download. there must be an obvious list somewhere... :o(

<comment><AUTHOR> _BUT i still can't work out what environments are available for download. there must be an obvious list somewhere... :o(_

<http://www.vagrantbox.es/> has quite an extensive list of user-created Vagrant boxes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> What have you found to be the best way to implement a REST interface? I noticed the @ajax_request shortcut but nothing response code specific. I've been using Django-Piston which has been... challenging at best.

<comment><USER10> If your rest interface is deeply tied to the Django DB, I'd suggest TastyPie.

Otherwise Django-Piston sadly is the way to go.

<comment><USER11> I find it to be exactly the opposite. Django Tastypie is in no way tied to the Django Orm.

<comment><USER10> It's not intrinsically tied to the ORM. Sorry if I gave that impression. However it has many helpful shims and subclasses that interface with the ORM.

I'm looking at ModelResource as my example.

If you aren't working with a NoSQL database or a search engine, or grabbing data from an tertiary resource then the sheer complexity found in TastyPie might not be for you.

Django-Piston doesn't offer many features, but its dead simple in its usage.

<comment><USER11> Yep, I agree. Tastypie has a steeper learning curve, due to beeing more flexible. When I used Piston, jespern was not actively maintaining it, but using a private branch for bitbucket.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> _Very_ informative article. I always find it interesting to see what experienced Django developers are doing. I will definitely be trying out some these tool, especially Vagrant and Puppet.

<comment><USER13> Yeah I knew a lot of these tricks. But I've been considering learning chef and I didn't know about Vagrant. Now I know what I'm doing this weekend!

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Geez, I've been using Django since 0.92 and there's quite a few things here I never knew about. Good stuff.

</comment><comment><USER15> I would love to see more details of the fabric+vagrant integration. For instance, you don't show how the prod/dev prefixes in your fabric commands are used to set the vagrant destination host, or the site urls. The vagrant way of things seems to be using "vagrant ssh". I know it sets up port forwarding to accomplish that, but how are you establishing the map of port# -> environment type? Just by convention, within the Vagrantfile?

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point. Here's the 'dev' task:

        def dev():
            '''Run on the development (i.e. Vagrant) server.'''
            env.env_name = 'development'
            env.site_name = 'MYSITE'
            env.process_name = 'gunicorn-MYSITE'
            env.process_owner = 'gunicorn'
            env.puppet_manifest = 'dev.pp'

            ssh_info = local('vagrant ssh_config', capture=True).splitlines()[1:]
            ssh_info = dict([l.strip().split(' ', 1) for l in ssh_info if l.strip()])

            env.key_filename = ssh_info['IdentityFile']
            env.hosts = ['%(User)s@%(HostName)s:%(Port)s' % ssh_info]

            env.site_path = '/var/www/MYSITE/MYSITE'
            env.venv_path = '/var/www/.virtualenvs/MYSITE'

            env.site_url = 'http://localhost:4565'

In a nutshell: it uses `vagrant ssh_config` to get the SSH info at runtime.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Vagrant looks very interesting. For writing code I prefer Vim but I also use PyCharm on OSX mainly for its excellent debugger and code browser. Does anyone know if there's a way to get PyCharm or perhaps other IDEs (running on OSX) to run the Django dev server through Vagrant?

<comment><USER17> you can set PyCharm to upload files on save. it'll scp all changed files for you and can run post upload scripts, for example to restart httpd.

Settings -> Deployment

Point to your Vagrant instance IP

Settings -> Deployment -> Options

and select 'upload changed files automatically'

EDIT: sorry I lied re opst upload script, must have confused with something else

<comment><USER16> Thanks for that tip. What I'm really curious about though is if there's a way to set PyCharm's Python interpreter to something not on the local host (e.g. the Python interpreter on the Vagrant VM). I'd be surprised if this turned out to be possible but thought it wouldn't hurt to ask.

Edit: I just found out about the remote debugging feature in PyCharm which may actually do what I want:

[http://blogs.jetbrains.com/pycharm/2010/12/python-remote- deb...](http://blogs.jetbrains.com/pycharm/2010/12/python-remote-debug-with- pycharm/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I'm not really a Django user, but I was interested in the Vim section of the post. I work with Rails and my personal approach to setting framework-specific commands, mappings, etc. is by using the proj plugin: <http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2719>. It's fairly simple, it just sources a project-specific vimfile when you tell it to. I keep a ton of settings in "~/.vim/projects/rails.vim" and I place a "runtime projects/rails.vim" in the project file. This kind of a workflow might give you more freedom in customizing your vim for Django projects, but it really depends on whether you can get used to that. Just a suggestion :).

</comment><comment><USER19> Great Great article. Just started using Django and this basically covers every single pain point that I've had thus far.

Thank you so much.

</comment><comment><USER11> It's a little bit odd, that the first tip is using Vagrant, and almost all the other tips are hacks to make up for that decision.

<comment><AUTHOR> Uh, what?

        Topic                                       Vagrant-Related?
        </comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment></comment><comment>
        Vagrant                                     Y
            Why Vagrant?                            Y
            Using Fabric to Stay Fast and...        Y
        Wrangling Databases with South              N
            Useful Fabric Tasks                     Y
        Watching for Changes                        N
            Using the Werkzeug Debugger with...     N
            Pulling Uploads                         N
            Preventing Accidents                    N
        Working with Third-Party Apps               N
            Installing Apps from Repositories       N
            Mirroring Repositories                  N
            Using BCVI to Edit Files                Y
        Improving the Admin Interface               N
            Enter Grappelli                         N
            An Ugly Hack to Show Usable Foreign...  N
        Using Django-Annoying                       N
            The render_to Decorator                 N
            The ajax_request Decorator              N
        Templating Tricks                           N
            Null Checks and Fallbacks               N
            Manipulating Query Strings              N
            Satisfying Your Designer with Typogrify N
        The Flat Page Trainwreck                    N
        Editing with Vim                            N
            Vim for Django                          N
            Filetype Mappings                       N
            Python Sanity Checking                  N
            Javascript Sanity Checking and Folding  N
            Django Autocommands                     N
        Conclusion                                  N

5/32 sections are Vagrant-related. 5/32 != almost all.

EDIT: My bad, there are only 31 sections total. Still, 5/31 is not almost all.

<comment><USER11> You are right. My bad. My point though, was that I think the cost in terms of complexity of using Vagrant for development is too high. The goal of having your dev environment match your prod. env. is not the right approach in my opinion. This the role of the staging environment.

<comment><USER20> The goal should be to keep environments as similar as possible, which vagrant helps to accomplish. Just because you can develop locally on your Mac before pushing to a QA/Dev/staging environment doesn't mean you should.

Obviously your Dev environment isn't going to be able to match every aspect of your production environment, but keeping the same platform builds across environments is something that all teams should be aiming for.

<comment><USER11> That might be your goals. My dev environment should be as painless and fast as possible. This is what I spend all day using.

<comment><USER20> It's what I spend all day using as well. The dev environments I've either implemented or been a part of (web centric envs) have all used local folders mounted to VMs that provide that painless and fast requirement you speak of while removing any pain points associated with varying platforms. You dont need to sacrifice the former to achieve the latter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Excellent article!

Would you detail more on puppet please? "Run Puppet to initialize the VPS."

</comment><comment><USER22> I find that the warnings and hints from <http://jshint.com/> are better than what jslint offers.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm sure jshint could be integrated into Syntastic pretty easily.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Steve, when you say that you mirror 3rd party apps, does that mean you don't install anything from PyPI (like South)?

</comment><comment><USER24> I love your articles, but this one hits the sweet spot. Thanks for another great article.

</comment><comment><USER25> Unrelated: His blog looks very nice, what is powering it?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a static site rendered with Hyde.

[http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/01/moving-from-django-to- hyde...](http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/01/moving-from-django-to-hyde/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Great gems in this article. Thanks for the great info.</comment>


Picking a random element from a stream - <AUTHOR> http://geomblog.blogspot.com/2008/01/happy-birthday-don-knuth.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's a link to the Stack Overflow question I found this from.

Pretty cool algorithm!

[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2532218/pick-random- prope...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2532218/pick-random-property- from-a-javascript-object)</comment>


Owner of a Credit Card Processor Is Setting a New Minimum Wage: $70,000 a Year - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/business/owner-of-gravity-payments-a-credit-card-processor-is-setting-a-new-minimum-wage-70000-a-year.html <comment><USER2> This is really interesting because it juxtaposes two fundamental issues: (1) The business need to make sensible, sustainable decisions that increase the ability of the company to prosper, and (2) the human need to address the day- to-day realities of getting by on a sub-$50k salary.

Notably, the article focuses almost entirely on #2, but doesn't really try to claim that this is a strong business move.

I have really mixed feelings on this. Too many businesses are all about profits and have forgotten the critical human need for compassion.

But what are the consequences of one business offering way above market salary for a given position? What happens if a better man for the job shows up? At such a market premium, the business could reasonably hire the slightly better person and terminate the other person, but then this is hardly "compassionate."

And will employees remain with the company even if they're no longer in love with their job because the salary is substantially higher than a comparable position elsewhere? Does this serve or hurt the company?

I'm not really criticizing or supporting this move. I'm just really curious how it will play out.

<comment><USER3> Well, Ford didn't do too badly.

As for what if someone better shows up, well if you were swapping out staff every time someone you thought was better showed up, irrespective of money, you would kill off your business. Stability is more important than chasing some vision of perfection if you are wanting to get stuff done.

<comment><USER2> That's a good point. Part of me is trained to think about this like an economist (the subject of one of my bachelor's), but in the end I really hope that human compassion triumphs and this proves to be a win-win. I'm routing for Mr. Price.

<comment><USER3> Ford wasn't doing it to be nice. Ford was trying to cut turnover as that was costing him loads.

<comment><USER4> And likely getting better quality, harder workers in the process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I commend the spirit of what this CEO is trying to do, but if I am an investor, director, or just even regular employee I would have serious reservations about this business strategy.

> pay for the wage increases by cutting his own salary from nearly $1 million > to $70,000 and using 75 to 80 percent of the company's anticipated $2.2 > million in profit this year.

I don't know what the financials for Gravity look like, but this really only makes sense from a financial standpoint if (1) the company can't re-invest the profits with a better ROI (rate of return) and (2) they aren't worried about competition - i.e. have a serious business moat. In addition, the company will have a higher payroll tax burden because of the higher salaries. (1) is somewhat justifiable as investing in your employees may garner loyalty/harder work which may raise the top-line, but (2) seems unlikely. There are a lot of credit card processing companies.

What happens if profits aren't as good next year? Are they going to slash wages to previous levels (or lower)? Or, if he's intent on sticking to the $70k minimum wage, this means he'll have to let go more people if the time comes. Did they look at alternatives - issuing more equity, special dividend, more generous bonuses??

I wonder how the conversation with finance went on this one.

<comment><USER6> You're assuming there are other investors/directors that aren't Dan Price.

At their current size/growth over the past 10 years it seems like they're a lifestyle business (urgh, I hate that phrase) where the company has grown organically from a small level of investment.

If Dan wants to provide his employees a higher level of pay from what probably seems to be a very predictable business, then that's his prerogative.

Businesses only have to act as psychopathic entities when they're run by dispassionate third-parties who's only motivation is literally increasing the profitability/value for shareholders.

<comment><USER7> He will be instantly out-competed by people who actually understand capitalism and markets and will die poor, alone, unloved, and unwanted by the world. The people he tried to help will be struck down with him as they lose the jobs they've scrabbled their whole lives to maintain.

Businesses only have to act as profit-seeking (that is the word you mean when you say "psychopathic") when they... want to survive.

<comment><USER8> I don't know why you chose to write your first sentence, which is so hyperbolic it makes you into a personal joke (he'll die alone and unloved? really? Why not add, "as a meth addict in a homeless shelter in Rio, on the run from the law after attempting to stick up a group of tourists with a butter knife.")

If 18 people can build a $1 billion Internet company, you can do the same while subsidizing out up to a few hundred $80K salaries (let's say $8M/year burned, which is 100 such employees) without any consequence whatsoever. Zero.

After your intro sentence, which sounds like you're attempting to get everyone to stop reading and downvote you, by writing something patently ridiculous, your second sentence is interesting.

Now that nobody is reading, you write:

>The people he tried to help will be struck down with him as they lose the jobs they've scrabbled their whole lives to maintain.

This is interesting. Yes, he is paying well above-market for these jobs. What is the consequence? Someone working as a janitor for $80K is in a job he or she could not ever hope to replace should they lose it.

What about hiring? Since he is paying above market (double), the natural result is that he should have 800 applicants for any job that becomes available. (The only reason he wouldn't is information dissemination.) i.e. if there are 100,000 janitors making $30K working a city, it would make sense for 50,000 of them to apply to him for $80K.

This could have a very large distorting effect. Or, maybe it won't.

We're still not talking 6 figures here. While doubling someone's wage is a very large step up, it is by no means the kind of step that completely distorts the market. And what if someone does scramble to keep or get an $80K job, but actually loses it? In fact, people lose cushy jobs they're happy with all the time. I think this is interesting and unfortunate, but by no means will ruin the people who enjoyed a period of unexpected windfall. In effect, they just become very moderate lottery winners. (They "win" a free excess doubling of their salary, while it lasts.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > "Under a financial overhaul passed by Congress in 2010, the Securities and > Exchange Commission was supposed to require all publicly held companies to > disclose the ratio of C.E.O. pay to the median pay of all other employees, > but it has so far failed to put it in effect. Corporate executives have > vigorously opposed the idea, complaining it would be cumbersome and costly > to implement."

\-- Why would a ratio be costly to implement?

<comment><USER10> It is most likely not the ratio part but the median pay of all other employees part. You need to keep an ordered list of the pay of every single other employee and keep it up to date as people join and leave the company. Then there is the issue of accounting for part time or temp workers.

<comment><USER11> So like

        SELECT MEDIAN(salary) FROM employees

(That's valid Oracle.)

I mean I get that there'd need to be some adjustments to normalize salary to yearly salary and factor in non-cash benefits, but come on.

<comment><USER12> But in production this takes 3 Java developers, 2 Oracle "specialists", one year and a couple million dollars to implement.

<comment><USER13> Ah, back when I was a programmer without any SQL/DBA skills, I thought like this too. Now I know better than letting unskilled workers (e.g. lots of so- called DBAs, most developers) develop schemas or queries.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It will be interesting to see if the salary increase (for some it will be double) will result in overall better workplace happiness, higher retention rates (meaning less resources required to train replacements) and a better end product as a result of employees being happier. This is really great, other startups and companies should take note of what is happening here.

While it will result in a temporary downfall because profits are being used to fund this in combination with Dan Price's pay-cut, I think the long-term results will mean the company eventually makes that money back and then some more. We need more risk like this in the business world, invest in your employees who in turn will want to be at work and want to do a good job to keep their salary.

<comment><USER15> I imagine he'll be getting calls from management theorists wanting to do some long term studies to see what happens to happiness, motivation etc.

Traditional management theory has that money is a poor motivator because the effects wear off quickly and people soon come to believe they are "worth" their pay increase. Other perks / benefits are often valued disproportionately more than money.

Now a massive pay rise that takes people out of a problematic income zone may completely upend that, or over time it might have unintended negative consequences. Off the top of my head I wonder what consequences might be for the workers who were on higher salaries now perhaps feeling relatively under compensated.

<comment><USER16> If I recall correctly (I'm thinking this is from some of Daniel Pink's work), some recent studies show that more money _does_ help up to the point where employees basically don't have to think about their own material problems... and can therefore focus on solving their employer's problems. And beyond that, it's a poor motivator.

My guess is that the ~$70k mark is about right for ensuring middle class security outside of major metro areas.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> "[happiness] rises with income, but only to a point. And that point turns out to be about $75,000 a year."

It seems that there is no such limit. See the second plot from [http://danluu.com/dunning-kruger/](http://danluu.com/dunning-kruger/), or the original paper: [http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2013/...](http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2013/04/subjective%20well%20being%20income/subjective%20well%20being%20income.pdf)

Just the scaling is logarithmic. However, the main conclusion remains the same - to maximize happiness, some redistribution is good.

<comment><USER18> It's a unfortunate that an expensive business decision was made based on an article that wrongly interpreted a graph.

<comment><USER19> Actually, that's not the original paper, it's a different one. Here is the original paper:

[http://www.pnas.org/content/107/38/16489.full](http://www.pnas.org/content/107/38/16489.full)

You can see that the income scale is actually logarithmic. Did that blog author even read the paper? Kind of ironic him throwing around Dunning Kruger references.

Anyway, the happiness definitely does level off at around $75k in the Kahneman and Deaton paper. It's just that other research shows happiness increasing beyond this point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Yeah, I kind of do the same at my company, but it's not a public matter.

Once an employee gets enough training and is valuable enough for the company, my minimum wage is 1200 pesos weekly. (I'm from Mexico). It's not a huge change, but almost any employee reach that salary within a year in my company. (The minimum wage in mexico is about 402 pesos weekly)

<comment><USER21> ~4000 USD a _year_ , given paid vacation time? Did I get that right? Any tax/medical/etc comming out of that? I knew there was a big difference from the US to Mexico... but... wow.

<comment><USER22> Cost of living is accordingly lower. I lived quite comfortably on my monthly wage of $400 in South Africa when I was starting out in 1998. When it got to around $1800 a month it was really, really comfortable. Your foreign purchasing power sucks so I never bought Apple, but food, accommodation and anything else in the local economy was affordable as heck.

<comment><USER21> > Cost of living is accordingly lower.

I get that it is lower, I'm a little surprised that it could be _accordingly lower_. I mean Mexico and the US must be pretty much the same market in terms of food, energy, water prices etc. Half I could understand, one tenth for crossing a border with lots of trade going both ways... it's more than I expected.

<comment><USER13> You pay the billionaire overhead in America.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> It's interesting to see just how many people are willing to argue against a business paying their employees more, when those commentators have no involvement in the issue at all.

<comment><USER24> I don't think people argue against a business paying their employees more. It's up to the owner of that business to decide.

What people argue against is legal requirements for other, or all, companies to do the same.

<comment><USER13> A lot of the heated responses I've seen seem to respond to the assumption that a successful business experiment is obviously being showcased to model a mandate around it. Can't get some people off their scripts to save them, I tell ya.

<comment><USER24> Well, " _under a financial overhaul passed by Congress in 2010, the Securities and Exchange Commission was supposed to require all publicly held companies to disclose the ratio of C.E.O. pay to the median pay of all other employees, but it has so far failed to put it in effect_ " sounds a little bit like someone wants to mandate this kind of a practice. (I'm not in the US so such a law does not impact me directly, at least not at the moment, but as experienced with the totally nuts application of SOX laws, such things passed by US Congress may mean WTF moments to people at the other side of the world).

[edit: typo]

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Interesting.

A couple of thoughts:

(1) It effectively sets a certain bar at the company. There are no poor people working here. There are no disappointing dead ends. All jobs here are decent, by general standards. I'm sure that's culturally significant within the company.

(2) It sets a certain bar for employee productivity.

(3) The famous 'pirate codes' usually had rules for distributing booty. Captains got between 2 and 10 shares, while regular crewmen got 1. It's striking how much more CEOs get compared to pirate captains.

<comment><USER26> > _There are no poor people working here. There are no disappointing dead > ends. All jobs here are decent, by general standards. I 'm sure that's > culturally significant within the company._

I just visited Australia for the first time in 9 years, after having lived there for the first 23 years of my life. I've been living in North America (Canada and the US)

Your comment is exactly how Australia feels. There are virtually no poor people, nobody is left behind. Even people working "dead end jobs" like retail are perfectly happy. I would say they're happier than "career" people in North America.

<comment><USER27> A significant confounder is that resource exports are a major fraction of the Australian economy:

[http://www.tradingeconomics.com/australia/exports-of- goods-a...](http://www.tradingeconomics.com/australia/exports-of-goods-and- services-percent-of-gdp-wb-data.html)

I'm not insisting that policy differences are necessarily less important than that, but it's possible that Australia simply has better outcomes to select from.

<comment><USER26> Australia has a GDP per capita of around $43,000 while the United States has a GDP per capita of around $53,000 [1]

I suggest the United States has the better outcome to choose from, it just chooses not to.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> They might be less happy when they have to have layoffs because they can't actually afford to pay people more than the value they provide the company.

<comment><USER29> I'm with you, but did you read that the increase was already paid for out of profits and by reducing his own salary?

I'm not sure if he is still head of the board or what, but this is definitely a bold move. Still, $70k in Seattle is only like $52k in my lowly city of Myrtle Beach, SC. It isn't a whole lot of money for any professional salesperson, clerk, or the like to make. It will certainly be a big win for morale and one would expect, performance, and retainment/turnover.

I guess we will see.

<comment><USER30> It's only going to increase the morale of the 70 employees receiving the wage increase. I suspect it will cause some degree of resentment in the rest of the company. It also removes the incentive to improve for the lower tiers, since they have further to move up the ladder before they see an increase in pay.

Personally, I think it's a noble but foolish move.

<comment><USER31> > I suspect it will cause some degree of resentment in the rest of the > company.

Why is that? While some people might be that petty, it's very possible that Gravity never hired those kinds of people in the first place.

> It also removes the incentive to improve for the lower tiers, since they > have further to move up the ladder before they see an increase in pay.

Why is that? I don't think the idea here is to raise everybody's wage and then institute some kind of 30 year wage freeze. It's to establish a baseline living wage so that none of your employees need to be hustling for other opportunities just to pay their living expenses. They can focus on their work and their lives. Rewarding exceptional behavior is a small cost once that's out of that way, and I don't see why we shouldn't expect to see it here.

<comment><USER32> > Why is that? While some people might be that petty, it's very possible that > Gravity never hired those kinds of people in the first place.

It may be petty for someone making several hundred thousand a year to resent someone who's market value being 30-40K being bumped up to 70K but for the vast majority of college graduates that is a slap in the face. Your giving everybody the rewards they worked their asses off for. I don't consider that petty, I consider that basic human disposition. Especially in a place like a credit card payment processor. I doubt many people working there go home and take pride in telling their family and friends about the work they did that day and how its making the world a better place. The majority of them are probably working for the paycheck.

Now don't get me wrong. I do admire the guy for what he is doing. Its a great selfless act. But I'm just saying its completely reasonable and understandable for those employees who where currently making ~ 70K to feel resentment and it does not make the petty or bad people. I would hope they thought this side effect through and have plans to deal with it. Since its not going to just be one or two bad apples but the vast majority of people in that position.

<comment><USER33> A good chunk of college graduates will never see that kind of pay. If you think people only go to college to make more money, you need to think again. Many careers for college graduates pay _below_ average, and people knowingly still go for them.

E.g. in the UK a prime example is law school. The average pay for a UK solicitor is well below the national median salary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I'm not sure why he would not phase this in gradually.

Also, I've read somewhere that paying someone significantly above market rate can lead to more stress due to increased fear of job-loss. $70,000 is great, but only if you're able to convince your employees that they're worth $70,000.

(edit: I missed the part about 3 year phase in. I still wonder about the effects of paying someone 60% above market rate.)

<comment><USER35> Spoken like a true republican.

<comment><USER34> quite the contrary, I'm a union-supporting liberal.

<comment><USER35> Then I'm at a loss as to why you'd be against a fair wage.

<comment><USER28> Paying more than what the job is actually creating in value isn't a fair wage. It's the type of thing that is likely to put a company out of business. Then instead of having a 70k job they didn't earn they are unemployed.

<comment><USER36> But the employees _are_ creating more value than they are being paid. The company is a going concern and are still making a profit even while paying everyone at least $70k.

OTOH, take a startup that's paying everyone over $120k and is running in the red on VC money. Those employees aren't (yet) creating enough value to cover their salary.

It's just that it's become so ingrained that companies must maximize _profit_ for their owners at the expense of the employees that we've lost sight of whether it's right or not. (I posit it's not.)

<comment><USER37> Indeed. I think it's pretty ridiculous how critical people here are of these raises. It's as if Dan is doing something unnatural when he's not maximising his own profits.

<comment><USER33> A reason we have seen through history is that company owners often use as an argument that it can't _possibly_ work for all kinds of reasons. If someone pays more (or cuts working time) and remains successful it creates an example of viability, and also changes the market - even if only slightly in the case of a single small company like this - and at least some people worry it will affect them to.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> I'm curious how quickly the company's manpower model already progresses people from entry levels to more productive and higher paid roles. Can they do this by making their people more productive, and thus worth more in the labor market or as part of the company? And if so, how are they going to do that? That's a workforce-led business model: We're going to provide value in the market place by taking people and training them up to do productive stuff for customers. We're basically investing in training people to enhance their productivity.

So what would be really interesting is if Gravity were to say, if we've got people stuck at entry level after two years, then we're doing something wrong and we've got figure out how to grow them better.

That is a model that all managements and investors would want to emulate. And then you're paying people more not out of noblesse oblige but because they are literally empowered to go make more. It's a much better model, economically and morally, than CEOs and investors paying more because they're such great people.

Probably most profitable and growing companies are already doing this to one degree or another. Your best workforce strategy is finding good people and then making them better.

</comment><comment><USER39> Looks like a good trend to me. WallMart upping it's pay, Starbucks paying for college. Etc...

I think value added from workers not under the poverty line is a force multiplier for business. Source? Arm Chair economics.

</comment><comment><USER36> I wonder if they're considering becoming a B-Corporation.

It sounds like they're beginning to espouse the triple bottom line concept.

[http://www.bcorporation.net/](http://www.bcorporation.net/)

</comment><comment><USER40> Interesting that paying marginally adequate wages is allegedly a difficult business decision from a competitive standpoint (although judging from the steady rise in profitability in industries across the board, I doubt it).

But if so, perhaps running trade deficits for decades on end with nations that brutalize their work force was not such a good idea after all.

</comment><comment><USER41> This does not work in businesses with either low margins (profitability) and/or high labor intensity. You will not be able to obtain any new funding. In addition, this policy being only selectively applicable will increase wage differentials.

<comment><USER42> > Mr. Price ... would pay for the wage increases by cutting his own salary > from nearly $1 million to $70,000

There's money in every successful company that could be redistributed — it's a moral choice whether you do so. If you prioritise your own comfort over that of the people you stand on, feel free to do so.

<comment><USER41> > and using 75 to 80 percent of the company's anticipated $2.2 million in > profit this year.

You forgot this part of the source of funds. This will not be a one-off reduction in profits. Increasing the wages of the 70 affected employees from an average of USD 48k to USD 70k translates into an annual cash outflow of at least ca. USD 1.5m. This reduction in cash flow will make it more difficult to (re)finance the business.

As said before, this is not viable for businesses with low margins and/or high labor intensity. So you imply that those business owners (i.e., with low margins or high labor intensity) prioritize their own comfort over that of the people they stand on?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> > Mr. Price, who started the Seattle-based credit-card payment processing firm > in 2004 at the age of 19, said he would pay for the wage increases by > cutting his own salary from nearly $1 million to $70,000 and using 75 to 80 > percent of the company's anticipated $2.2 million in profit this year.

What a crazy world we live in where people can start companies and pay themselves a salary of $1 million. Wouldn't that money be better off being reinvested into the company? Sure, they are doing it now, but didn't it cross their minds when they (he?) first decided his contributions were worth $1m per year?

<comment><USER44> Yeah, what a crazy world where a person who creates 70 jobs after taking on great personal risk and working hard gets rewarded after 10 years. I suppose you'd rather that he never got rich, and didn't even bother to take on risk and work hard and create those jobs in the first place, because why bother if he's just going to make the same money he would otherwise?

<comment><USER45> As this is HN, surely the argument is along the lines of "he should plough everything into growth and take external investment too". Then, instead of paying himself $1m per annum now, he could have a 10% chance of $100m in 10 years time!

I think his 70 employees probably prefer his existing approach, even when he was taking all the $1m for himself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> This is amazing, the new triple bottom-line company...? not for the environment but for the people. Interesting times call for innovation everywhere.

Go Pro announced the opposite news today as highest compensated CEO (sold shares).

Personally, I think companies that have decent margins should create a culture of well paying jobs and high value for their employees. I guess this already occurs with companies like FB, Google, Banks, etc.

</comment><comment><USER47> A great employer. Appreciate the employees. But one big question, if he ever do this , will he feel satisfied with his income in future?

<comment><USER3> One of the few things that money genuinely cannot buy is the satisfaction of proving to yourself that the lustre of a shiny coin is not what rules you.

<comment><USER48> You can - withdraw all your money as bank notes and convert to gold bullion coins in suitcases, sail in a hired boat to the middle of an ocean, drop suitcases into the ocean. Sail back to port, yell "The lustre of a shiny coin is not what rules me!".

Or do what this CEO did and buy it using a reduction of income.

<comment><USER3> You could say that turning down or throwing away money is purchasing the experience of turning down or throwing away money, but I think that is stretching the definition somewhat.

Buying tends to usually involve an exchange of items of value with another entity, rather than not exchanging anything or dumping gold in the sea.

By your definition, it would seem I purchase my sleep by not working while unconscious, which is obviously ridiculous.

Just because you can look at something as a financial loss, whether it is something of value being destroyed or an opportunity to profit not taken, does not automagically mean that something was therefore purchased.

<comment><USER48> It was meant to be a humorous post, but I'm glad you humoured me anyway. Let's do this.

 _By your definition, it would seem I purchase my sleep by not working while unconscious, which is obviously ridiculous._

My definition of buying means giving up tangible goods, i.e. gold, money, shares, in return for a change in the world (e.g. receiving a massage).

So, to exchange time for sleep would not fit as your time is not a tangible good. And since you require sleep to work, it would be more accurate to say you earn the ability to work by sleeping. I stipulate no buying is involved.

Opportunity cost does not necessarily mean buying. Exchanging a tangible good for something else does.

I suppose where your definition and mine differ, is in your definition you require a sentient seller, and in mine the seller could be non-sentient, or could be metaphorically represented by a collective of gold owners who would benefit from you losing your gold to the ocean.

<comment><USER3> To buy something I definitely think requires a sale and an implicit contact between two parties. Also, it is perfectly possible to buy something with your time, tangibility is not required for something to be purchased, definability for the purposes of the contractual arrangement is the important bit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> Yes, boost the lives of already rich people instead of figuring out where that money could do real good. And he gets reinforced for it by getting a news article.

<comment><USER50> I would hardly call earning 48k "rich" in the US. Sure, the same money could buy education for lots of bolivian children, but do we really have to point out a "more noble cause" any time somebody tries to do some good?

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Ahem... Inflation.

</comment><comment><USER52> Minimum wage is in favour of big corporations because it raises barrier of entry for the competition.</comment>


Pigeons In Space [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4sZ3qe6PiI&feature=kp

<comment><USER2> The video is interesting, but it looks more like some pigeons inside a plane in a parabolic flight to simulate the lack of gravity than pigeons in space.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced_gravity_aircraft](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced_gravity_aircraft)</comment>


Leon Open-Source Personal Assistant: Introducing the To-Do List Module - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ahfg6rRI9Lw <comment><USER3> A blog post etc would probably go better than a youtube video - <USER2> generally avoid clicking on videos here.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the info. You can find a short introduction here: [https://github.com/leon- ai/leon/tree/develop/packages/calend...](https://github.com/leon- ai/leon/tree/develop/packages/calendar)</comment></comment>


Shields Down: "Happy people don't leave jobs they love." (2016) - <AUTHOR> http://randsinrepose.com/archives/shields-down/ <comment><USER2> People can leave for other reasons than "shields down" envisioning of a different future.

I've previously quit a job without looking for or having any other job lined up, remaining unemployed for several months afterwards until finding something satisfactory.

In that case, a start-up founder deeply infused his specific religious faith in all aspects of a company, even hiring many staff from his place of worship and doing blatant things, like having the head of HR directly ask new hires what their religious preferences are.

Sometimes you just discover you're working in a situation that's flat not OK, for reasons of abuse, unethical behavior, intolerable micromanagement, whatever. When it's bad enough, there is no shields down moment: you just quit. Because getting away from bad people is often healthy.

</comment><comment><USER3> Unless they get paid 20% more than their current salary. Which means you have to pay your employees well for them to be happy and to love their jobs.

<comment><USER4> Switching jobs is a big risk because it's impossible to reliably tell if you'll be happy; personally I wouldn't take that risk for 20% more. Maybe 50% more.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: PayPal seems to be on the down. Solution? - <AUTHOR>

So it seems PayPal is gradually losing all support from people in the tech community. It's making mistake after mistake after mistake. But it's got a huge user base, and seems to do the job.
I'm building an app where clients will pay the company, the company will take a %, and then deliver that to developers.
What would be the best payment solution? Any ideas? <comment><USER2> Really? Hadn't heard that. I know that people who want to write competing businesses will say that it's down but, in the real world, it is very much the standard. PP's customer service has really gotten better as well.

I'm quite happy with using them for handling payments on our site. They've been far better than Authorize.net, for example, at preventing/handling chargebacks.</comment>


Black, female, and a Silicon Valley 'trade secret'  - <AUTHOR> http://money.cnn.com/2013/03/17/technology/diversity-silicon-valley/

<comment><USER2> Isn't the point to hire the most qualified irregardless of gender or ancestry?

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure it is. But why the need for secrecy if everything is on the up and up? If all companies have a similar demographic makeup it's probably an indication that indeed people are being hired on merit. However if some companies deviate from the norms there might be more to it.</comment></comment>


Automated Debian Packages with Bricklayer and Docker - <AUTHOR> http://orelhas.in/bricklayer-docker.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Create an automated Debian Packages with Repo included with Docker and Bricklayer.</comment>


WikiHouse's DIY kits are the open-source way to build a house - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2012/02/start/the-home-you-download

<comment><USER2> If you know where to look, you can find Sears and Roebuck houses in a lot of American cities. Sears, which was after all a business, provided not just plans but parts.

</comment><comment><USER3> Are there any pictures of completed WikiHouses anywhere? Couldn't find one via web search.

<comment><AUTHOR> I couldn't find many either; just the one from a cursory search:

<http://www.wow-huh.com/be-lazy-like-a-fox/></comment></comment>


Ryan Hoover Tells How He Built Product Hunt with a Globally Distributed Team - <AUTHOR> https://youteam.io/blog/product_hunt_ryan_hoover_how_to_succeed_with_remote_team/ <comment><USER2> Hi Ryan! It would be interesting to know your and Product Hunt's take on employee motivation. How do you manage to track it considering the remote setup? Do you have a special programme in place / bonus system? How do you approach it?

</comment><comment><USER3> Ryan, do you also organize remote team retreats? I've heard some fully distributed teams love it once in a while going together to the sunny beach or climbing another mountain. If you do so, where do you go?

<comment><USER4> Funny you ask. Jacq on our team is planning our next retreat. Earlier this year we brought everyone to SF. The year prior shortly after the acquisition, the entire team (including AngelList) went to Mexico which was a great opportunity to get to know the broader team.

This time we may do an offsite elsewhere, which might be more fun and affordable.

<comment><USER3> Sounds awesome! So now, where can I submit my job application? Just kidding xD But if seriously that's cool. I'd suggest Southeast Asia - Chiang Mai, Thailand or Bali for your next retreat which would be fun and definitely affordable in comparison with SF.</comment></comment></comment>


Let's hijack a botnet and see what we get: 1million IPs, 100k bots, 70GB of data - <AUTHOR> http://themomoblog.com/latest-on-torpig-banking-trojan.htm

<comment><USER2> Looking at the other posts on this blog, there's clearly something fishy going on. The source code uses some blackhat SEO and I could find an identical article [http://www.articlesbase.com/small-business- articles/latest-o...](http://www.articlesbase.com/small-business- articles/latest-on-torpig-banking-trojan--908089.html) (though I doubt that one's original either) that dates to 1.5 years earlier.

Someone should delete this link (or at least rel=nofollow) now because the fact hackernews is linking to this promotes that issue with SEO baiters taking over Google.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry everyone. Read the article and thought it was interesting. I'm not associated with this site. If anyone has the original link, please post it so a mod can update.

<comment><USER3> Throwing torpig and one of the numbers from the article into a search gets a likely source.

[http://news.softpedia.com/news/Researchers-Peak-Inside- the-T...](http://news.softpedia.com/news/Researchers-Peak-Inside-the-Torpig- Trojan-Infrastructure-110768.shtml)

Not quite as entertaining, though, without the line "In under 75 summary, thе program wаѕ аblе tο renovate уουr health 40% through dictionary attacks."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> FWIW: The original paper is from 2009 and can be downloaded at <http://www.cs.ucsb.edu/~seclab/projects/torpig/>

edit: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=593246>

</comment><comment><USER5> "Let's run an article through a computer translator and back and see what we get..."

<comment><USER6> What is the story behind the source code at that site? It looks like letters have been randomly replaced by look-alike HTML entities, but to what end?

<comment><USER7> would it throw off adsense, making other terms stand out?

<comment><USER8> I was thinking they were trying to fool duplicate content detection algorithms. Make it look unique and you might get higher search engine ranking.

<comment><USER9> That's exactly what they're doing, this is most likely an autoblog. Its an older content spam technique that works surprisingly well

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm wondering what the legal and ethical stances are on accessing botnots?

Technically, the researches didn't "hack" into the infected computers because they registered a domain they calculated would be next up on their flux algo.

But none the less, they were receiving all kinds of sensitive.

Finally, I also wonder whether they didn't shut down the bot net (or change the flux algo, to prevent the gang regaining control)?

<comment><USER11> The article mentions that the botnet's owners regained control after ten days. So it seems they did not get the chance to destroy it.</comment></comment>


Newly Unsealed Redacted Lavabit Case Filings - <AUTHOR> http://www.plainsite.org/dockets/29hpeuufl/virginia-eastern-district-court/usa-v-in-re-information-associated-with-an-email-account/ <comment><USER2> Worth noting the date at which these filings commence --- early August 2013, more than month after the initial court order was generated for Snowden's account on Lavabit.

I'd really like to see the court orders that preceded this one. According to the timeline in the Appeals Court ruling on Levison's contempt charge, the demand for SSL/TLS encryption keys followed a month of Levison more or less baiting the FBI.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7774158#up_7774823](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7774158#up_7774823)

<comment><USER3> Would you speculate on Levison's motive in your sequence of events? It's a solid analysis, but why would Levison do all of that?

Your analysis changed my view about Levison. I think people mostly equate Levison's actions to Snowden's without really thinking about the differences. Thought experiment: what if a mole was selling US secrets to other countries? If Levison would respond in the same fashion as in this Snowden case, then that obviously would be detrimental to the US's interests. But would he?

Here's where it gets tricky. It's my understanding that Levison complied with past US orders. So that begs the question: why did Levison choose that moment to be rebellious? Was he trying to protect Snowden? (Did anyone even know who Snowden was or what he did at that point? My memory is hazy on the timeline.)

It's certainly a convenient excuse to say that Levison was protecting Snowden. But if it's true, how would you feel about his actions in light of that fact?

If Levison wasn't protecting Snowden, then why did he choose that particular hill to die on, and not any of the past compliance orders? It seems like Levison had _some_ knowledge that prompted him to act the way he did. But if this all happened before Snowden became public knowledge, then what knowledge could have possibly converted him from someone who obediently follows government requests into someone who would "bait the FBI"?

Beyond all of that, I'm interested to hear your thoughts on whether there's any possible excuse for Levison's actions which you personally would find redeeming.

<comment><USER2> I don't know how to answer this, but if you want a handy rule of thumb for how I think about controversies in tech: I generally favor the most boring of all speculations. Snowden isn't an agent of the FSB. The NSA isn't a secret ploy to enforce the Comics Code Authority. Levison was simply opportunistic and inept. The Truecrypt developers got bored and gave up. NIST p-224 isn't a good curve but it isn't a backdoor. And so on.

<comment><USER4> >Levison was simply opportunistic and inept

Actually, by far the simplest explanation in this case is that Levison supported Snowden's actions and wanted to back him up.

I mean, he sacrificed his company -- his baby -- for this case, even though he had complied with multiple prior government requests (usually relating to child porn, from what I recall).

Clearly, Levinson went through a period of fear and doubt, but the only consistency was his refusal to give up keys that would reveal Snowden's communications.

Can you explain why you are convinced it's opportunism and not idealism? Because unless you know something we don't, Occam's Razor in this case says that Levison was simply being a Snowden supporter, to the point of sacrificing his livelihood. In my book, that makes him a patriot.

Sillysaurus: yes, he knew the court order was for Snowden, since it specifically mentioned him by name. Also, I believe that an edsnowden@lavabit address (or something similar) was on GPG keyservers everywhere. So it wasn't hard to guess. And in fact, that address was soon revealed to be Snowden's in a public document from his lawyer sent by Wikileaks (accidentally).

<comment><USER2> The opportunism I'm referring to was setting up Lavabit in the first place, as a web-based email provider that made expansive claims about security that it couldn't possibly back up.

It's easy for me to understand why people think Levison is a hero. They think Lavabit was a noble, useful offering, and that government intervention is the only reason it failed.

To understand my position, you need to know that Lavabit's architecture was almost comically unsound; it claimed to protect the privacy of thousands of users, but all the weight of that claim was borne by a set of keys Lavabit's operators had total control over.

Online privacy tools don't need to work like this. They often do, though, because transcending this pitiful security model requires that users install software. Nobody wants to install software. Not to mention, most of the people who want to build and offer these tools don't really know how to build locally-installable software.

There's nothing wrong with lacking the competence required to build secure messaging software. Most people do. Observe that for all the nitpicking about crypto that I do on HN, I haven't launched a tool like this either!

But there's something very wrong with lacking competence but then going ahead and releasing something that users will stake their freedom on anyways.

<comment><USER3> Thank you for the insights. Why would Levison refuse to comply with the government order and shut down his company? If he was an opportunist, the opportunistic action would've been to comply with the secret order while keeping his compliance secret. Users would've continued to trust Lavabit.

<comment><USER2> Because "opportunism" and "principle" exist on spectrums. Opportunism prompted Levison to release a dangerously flawed privacy tool. But once that flaw threatened to compromise Snowden, circumstances crossed the threshold where principle required him to contain the damage he'd done.

<comment><USER5> Are there NO alternatives to what Lavabit provided? Even if it required software installation on the client?

I have to assume Snowden understood the architecture of a "secure" webmail provider but still went with it. Better than Gmail I'm sure but far from something to rely on.

<comment><USER2> There are lots of alternatives, but none of them involve signing up for a web service and not installing any software.

And no, I don't think Lavabit was likely to have been safer than Gmail. Lavabit doesn't have one of the industry's best security teams and largest software security budgets trying to make sure there aren't horrible vulnerabilities in it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It's always fun reading court documents where the censors go totally overboard. Here, there are a few spots where that happens, such as where they black out the publicly available telephone and fax numbers for the various attorneys. In other spots (page 55) the attorney names are blacked out, but I'm pretty sure they're visible on the very next page (page 56).

</comment><comment><USER6> These documents seem to back up the story that Levison, whilst obeying in past orders, did so begrudgingly.

"..in light of Lavabit LLC's history of failing to abide by court orders...the US needed order to compel before they complied with legal process. In fact they have incurred fines of $10,000...associated with its failure to comply with those court orders." edited - page 14

<comment><USER2> They'd have to, right? The narrative about Levison resisting court orders is established in a detailed opinion from the 4th Circuit, written by a judge who was confirmed unanimously by the Senate in 2008.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I find the oral argument on pdf pages 61ff. very intriguing... Under the assumption that the case is about Snowden (which is not known, really, 100%), it seems like the gov't lawyers were worried about revealing that the gov't is looking into "coconspirators". The only reason they'd want to hide that is not to tip off those hypothetical coconspirators, who would necessarily work for NSA/other intelligence org, or else would be journalists whose identities we're already familiar with.

In the latter case, US seems to feel some shame in targeting journalists, or at least understands that the general public would not be pleased to hear that the gov't is targeting journalists in particular, especially with charges of espionage or what-have-you. But in the former case, we would be looking at a very big-brother-esque instance of the gov't being paranoid that members of the "inner circle" don't have the gov't's perceived best interests at heart, which is a legitimate concern, but also we have the gov't watching those inner circle members most closely, which is a major theme of 1984, e.g.

On the same note, there is something of an acute irony, or perhaps subconscious characterization of the gov't viewpoint, in the argument on pdf page 64: "because it puts those individuals ['other individuals who may now be known or unknown to the government'] on notice[—]other people who may not be the specific user of the account[—]that they should take steps because they may be within the scope of the governement's investigation". The irony here is that the government acts like it believes that _everyone_ is "within the scope of [...] investigation", and it would be quite detrimental to the gov't's mass surveillance efforts if "other people" become aware that they should "take steps" to mitigate surveillance.

That being said, I'm not 100% confident that Snowden is the target of the Lavabit investigation, and I'm wondering if anyone is aware of any alternative speculation?</comment>


Does new physics lurk inside living matter? - <AUTHOR> https://physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/PT.3.4546 <comment> scott-smith_us There seems to be a belief among a small percentage of otherwise non-magical- thinking scientists that life or intelligence requires some extra ingredient that isn't covered by chemistry or physics in general.

They assert that no machine can ever be truly self aware or try to draw a fundamental (quantum) distinction between inanimate and "living" matter, or assert that probabilities don't collapse into a single reality until a HUMAN looks at them.

To paraphrase Charles Babbage, "I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a [notion]."</comment>


Ask PG and YC Founders: Feedback from YC if Not Accepted? - <AUTHOR>

This is my first time applying to YC. For startups that don't make the cut, do they get any kind of feedback from PG/YC, written or otherwise, on what they could do better? <comment><USER2> If you are not accepted you get an email saying something like [1]:

 _We're sorry to say we couldn't accept your proposal for funding. Please don't take it personally, because most of the proposals we rejected, we rejected for reasons having nothing to do with the quality of the applicants. For example, we were very reluctant to accept proposals with only one founder, because we think starting a startup is too much work for one person. We also had a higher threshold for applicants who were still in school, groups where one or more members planned to keep their current jobs, and groups that couldn't all move to California. We rejected a lot of proposals simply because we couldn't understand them, or didn't understand the problem domain well enough to judge them, or because the project seemed too big to start on only three months of funding. Sometimes we even rejected good ideas, because another group proposed the same idea and seemed further along.

We realize this process is fraught with error. It's practically certain that groups we rejected will go on to create successful startups. If you do, we'd appreciate it if you'd send us an email telling us about it; we want to learn from our mistakes.

Thanks,

Y Combinator Staff_

Additionally you can also see some feedback here - <http://ycombinator.com/whynot.html>

[1] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=70062>

<comment><AUTHOR> Awesome, that's what I was looking for. Thanks for the info/link.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It has perhaps been said numerous times before, but you may want to not worry about the negative aspects of something.

You know what I just did? I just wrote down my "To Do List" for my y combinator interview. Book flights, book hotel, design printed handouts....etc. Put it out into the universe that you _will_ get invited out for an interview. Believe that you will get it and you'll be more likely to.

I can't back this up with any sort of scientific or market data but it has often worked for me and other successful people I know.

Maybe even put that to do list under your pillow.

<comment><USER4> If you're writing to do lists after Y Combinator, you're probably writing them before too - which means you're already ahead of a lot of people (motivationally speaking).</comment></comment>


Gardeners' Gems: Designer Crops That Will Wow The Neighbors - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/05/13/310459918/gardeners-gems-this-years-hottest-edibles-will-wow-the-neighbors?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20140513

<comment><USER2> Hey, this seems an opportune place to ask: Any other HNers interested in food gardening?

<comment><USER3> There have been threads that pop up where vegetable and fruit gardens have been discussed. Any specific topic?

<comment><USER4> I'd be interested in methods for monitoring the soil to be able to automatically add the nutrients the plant needs.</comment></comment></comment>


Need Money For Your Startup? Being An Attractive Male May Help - <AUTHOR> http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/03/22/292467848/need-money-for-your-startup-being-an-attractive-male-may-help?utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=npr&utm_campaign=nprnews&utm_content=03222014

<comment><AUTHOR> no comments? wow.</comment>


Show HN: Learn English vocabulary effortlessly on Twitter, 30+language - <AUTHOR> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/burning-vocabulary-highli/ljfjnlcnpmabfcgcmffkmgainghokdpl <comment><AUTHOR> Hi there,

We launched a project to help language learners learn vocabulary effortlessly last year.

You can mark and save the words you don't understand, the saved words will be marked automatically if it appears on subsequent web pages, thus you can review these words in different context and repeat, repeat and repeat. One year later, the reading becomes easier. For example, English learners can mark words on twitter while they surfing the twitter.

Vocabulary calendar, Vocabulary flashcards, Sentenct snapshot, etc.

Our official website: [https://burningvocabulary.com/](https://burningvocabulary.com/)

<comment><USER2> sounds quite interesting, will try. thanks!

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, it's very easy to use and helpful. I am also a English learner.</comment></comment></comment>


Details of Morotola Mobility(Google) patent lawsuit - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/20/motorolas-new-patent-lawsuit-against-apple-the-details/

<comment><USER2> So one of the things I've been doing to amuse myself during patent-a-geddon is looking at the filing/issue dates of the patents in question. This is because its my assertion that technology 'got ahead' of the patent examiners around 1997 and then didn't catch up until approximately 2005.

These patents were filed between 1998 and 2002 with issue dates in 99,02, and a couple in 06.

My belief (which clearly isn't shared by a lot of folks) is that during the late 90's a lot of 'obvious' stuff got patented because the examiners didn't have the technical chops to know better. And then a lot of that same stuff got built into systems later because people coding them made the assumption the stuff was obvious and thus not patentable. And we ended up here in infringement city.</comment>


We'll be stuck in this recession for years, economists say - <AUTHOR> https://www.erienewsnow.com/story/42532778/well-be-stuck-in-this-recession-for-years-economists-say <comment><USER2> The grandstanding against economists is disappointing.

Let's say you were driving at night with someone in the country, and because they either knew the road or could see farther ahead they said, "There's a boulder in a road ahead, we're likely going to hit it if you don't slow down and turn to avoid it."

And you do slow down and it allows you to turn to avoid a crash. How do you respond? Mock them for always being wrong about predicting a crash?

People mistake warnings about possible recessions, which have a probability attached, with forecasting an inevitable doomsday recession. There's no credit given to economists for the recessions or depressions avoided.

Often the warnings are about the risk of a recession with no intervention, and in an overwhelming majority of cases there is some action taken in fiscal and monetary policy to soften the blow or avoid the worst outcomes.

<comment><USER3> > There's no credit given to economists for the recessions or depressions > avoided.

I don't think we have avoided any recessions, ever, based on the advice of economists. They just aren't that good at forecasting. They don't even agree on the policy that is appropriate to fight recessions when we know there is one.

The "grandstanding" against economists in this thread is entirely justified.

<comment><USER2> Public policy, monetary policy, and fiscal policy all have empirical evidence in support of them, demonstrating the usefulness of the field. Your comment does not.

<comment><USER4> Backing you up here. There is a clearregime change in the data before and after the advent of central banking. Recessions and financial panics are less frequent, and less severe. Just looking at the US, there were ~15 recessions since the adoption of central banking in the 1910's. In the same time period during the 1800s there were >25 recessions, and that's not even comparing for severity. You can see the Wiki[1] for an overview.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_Unit...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_States)

<comment><USER5> It's also worth mentioning that older folks alive during the Great Depression had a perspective on it vs the panics during the 19th century. Many observed that the Great Depression, which was the worst in a generation, was tough but manageable compared to the Panic of 1983 where people literally could not buy food.

<comment><USER4> Yup, there is a lot of interesting perspective you get from reading journals and correspondence from the period. Sources from the late 1800s will include bits from the lives of every day people, almost always along the lines of: John opens a store, panic occurs, his business fails and he moves to a different town; becomes a partner in a canal shipping company, panic occurs, his business fails and he moves to a different town; etc.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Skip to the actual survey of economists:

[https://files.constantcontact.com/668faa28001/65165cb5-5c8f-...](https://files.constantcontact.com/668faa28001/65165cb5-5c8f-468d-8f5a-e80afc952435.pdf)

Summary "Nearly two-thirds of the National Association for Business Economics members who participated in the August 2020 NABE Economic Policy Survey believe the U.S. economy continues to be in a recession that began last February," said NABE President Constance Hunter, CBE, chief economist, KPMG. "Almost half the respondents expects inflation-adjusted gross domestic product to remain below its fourth-quarter 2019 level until the second half of 2022 or later. And 80% of panelists indicate there is at least a one-in-four chance of a 'double-dip' recession. "The panel is split in its view on Congress's fiscal response to the recession, with 40% calling the response insufficient, 37% indicating the response is adequate, and 11% saying it is excessive," Hunter continued. "Nearly three out of four panelists believe the optimal size for the next fiscal package to be $1 trillion or greater, compared to 17% who favor a smaller package." "More than three-quarters of panelists believe that the current stance of U.S. monetary policy is appropriate, the largest share holding this view since 2007," added Survey Chair Gregory Daco, chief U.S. economist, Oxford Economics. "The majority of panelists—58%—expects the federal funds rate range to remain unchanged at 0-0.25%, or even drop lower, by the end of 2021. Most participants—84%—expect that the funds rate target will be higher by year-end 2022, but still within 100 basis points of where it is currently.

</comment><comment><USER7> Economists are as effective as astrologists at predicting the future. For some reason otherwise smart people don't realize this? I think it's something about economists being associated with the university system.

I see this assured economic doom repeated so much without being questioned as anything but guaranteed I wonder where this incredible confidence is coming from? We have literally no idea what 2021 holds for us, in the same way we had no idea 2020 would be so uh unique.

<comment><USER8> > _Economists are as effective as astrologists at predicting the future._

[citation needed]

> _I see this assured economic doom repeated so much without being questioned > as anything but guaranteed I wonder where this incredible confidence is > coming from?_

All the stock market gains are from big tech. Any other markets are flat or down. ( [https://finviz.com/map.ashx?t=sec&st=ytd](https://finviz.com/map.ashx?t=sec&st=ytd) )

<comment><USER7> Quick Google search, nearly top result. Committing the sin of just reading the headline but man this is not hard to find evidence: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-28/economist...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-28/economists- are-actually-terrible-at-forecasting-recessions)

Or maybe? [https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/economists-are-bad- at-p...](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/economists-are-bad-at- predicting-recessions/)

"All of the gains are from big tech". All of the gains are always from some companies and all of the losses are always from others. This is just how the pie got sliced 2020. I don't think it has any special meaning we can divine from it?

<comment><USER9> Economics isn't a sliced pie like that.

<comment><USER7> I just used that as an expression, no special meaning intended.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I wish people would stop calling the CARES Act a 'stimulus package'. It was a relief package. Stimulus refers to creating a secular demand in an economy that is not operating at full employment to prime the virtuous cycle of employment and demand. Relief on the other hand means to replace lost income due to the natural disaster of the pandemic and the necessary public policy response. I think conflating the two could end us down a bad path.

</comment><comment><USER11> If only there was a term for a prolonged economic retraction, like a recession, but longer and worse.

<comment><USER12> A really long and protracted economic contraction is just _depressing_ to think about.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> A recession that last years is called a depression. It's not like not saying the D word will avoid anything ...

<comment><USER2> Within the field of economics, depression is not a well-defined term. When phrasing survey questions it's ^not desirable to have the meaning of the question itself subject to variation if you want the responses to be useful.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I think we've reached the point where politicians shouldn't pretend that they want to prevent recessions.

It's like with day trading: once you realize that volatility is all that matters, it explains why key players are in favor of recessions and even actively work to cause them.

Some of the biggest fortunes in history started when someone had a little extra money to buy undervalued revenue streams when the economy was down.

So yes, there will be a recession, but it won't be triggered by fundamentals. It will be due to things like politicians politicizing mask wearing. And killing the financial regulations that smooth out economic highs and lows. And removing the social safety nets that help people get back on their feet again by avoiding long-term unemployment.

This basically all comes down to spite. The powers that be can't stand that FDR instituted the New Deal, starting with the Glass-Steagall Act in 1933, resulting in almost 70 years of relatively stable economic growth. So they repealed it in 1999 with the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act. That along with telecom deregulation and countless other things put us back on 10 year boom-bust cycles so that the elite could amass fortunes again.

We've already had the dot bomb, housing bubble pop and now the looming COVID-19 recession (caused by the Trump administration's hands-off approach to governing) in just the 20 years since I graduated college. This is so not the future I signed up for. My finance friends think it's great. But it's pretty much the worst possible outcome for makers. Which is why I consider the 2000s and 2010s to be lost decades, with another one looming.

</comment><comment><USER15> Are we actually in a recession right now?

<comment><USER16> Considering the unemployment rate, yes. Considering the stock market, no.

<comment><USER17> It seems like we have 2 economies now. One that works, and one that doesn't. The one that works seems to be much more exclusive.

<comment><USER18> It's been that way for decades. Top two quintiles and deciles have been far outpacing the rest, who are basically flat or in decline. Last few years were a little bit better for them, but that came to an end of course.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I see so many bear cases and they all play to my expectation. What I would like to see are thoughtful arguments why this won't be the case.

</comment><comment><USER20> Many businesses will not come back or be replaced because they were marginal - worth keeping open, but not worth starting. Restaurants that weren't all that great, small clothing shops, old hardware stores hanging on - gone and won't be replaced.

</comment><comment><USER21> It won't be just a year or two. This is going to have long term repercussions. Basically everyone from the age of 5 to 22 will have a year or two of missing education. We're losing tons of immigrants and non-immigrant foreign workers, of the latter many of which are doctors or advanced degree holders. Many Chinese are simply leaving the U.S. on their own accord, even if they aren't caught up in the travel bans or other such issues, because life is better for them in China right now. Many businesses are gone and won't come back. Nearly everything in the U.S. is happening in slow motion. Everything takes at least twice as long as it did.

People act as if even if Trump is voted out and a vaccine suddenly appears, that everything will turn back on. No. Not only have things been delayed during Trump's presidency and during the pandemic, they have explicitly regressed. The government has basically been shutdown for the past four years, just bleeding money and limping along, and that's especially true for the past eight months or so. This is not a one or two year thing. We're talking multi- years if not decades of reverberations.

<comment><USER22> If and when Trump gets voted out of office or finishes his second term, we will have another Trump-like candidate. His cult of personality is here to stay for generations to come.

<comment><USER21> I think what Trump's presidency has shown, if only because he is a catalyst for hate and ignorance and little else, is that the sentiments that drove the civil war never actually went away and have probably gotten worse and drifted even further apart. His presidency gave a conduit for these things to bubble up to the surface. And there's a certain political party that partially shares the more hateful sentiments but also just wants to profit from them and manipulate the very people who are a subset of people that their policies hurt.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Asking an economist to diagnose is to ask the doctor who operated on you and removed a kidney when you were just there for a root canal to fix the problem. He goes in and performs a lobotomy but you are so taken by their lab coat and academic credentials and best paper awards and citations that you ask them to fix it. They go in and install a stent. A few days later you are dead because your forgot to take your anti-rejection drugs because of your lobotomy.

Obligatory Nassim video dunking on Economists:

[https://www.newyorker.com/video/watch/nassim-n-taleb-and- rob...](https://www.newyorker.com/video/watch/nassim-n-taleb-and-robert- shiller)

</comment><comment><USER24> Wait, are you saying we left the 2008 recession already?

</comment><comment><USER25> We can soothe ourselves with the thought that Economists are usually wrong.

<comment><USER26> I'm a bit shocked that that seems to be the take here.

You don't need to have a background in Economics to see what has been happening even before the pandemic, and what is certainly to come. What is happening in the bond market? What has the Fed been doing for about a year now? What is the normal rate of zombie firms? What is it now? How many companies simply won't reopen? I could go on for hours.

This isn't tea-leaf reading. The signs are 100ft high and in neon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> always remember: social science isn't science. no matter how bad they want it to be

</comment><comment><USER28> .

<comment><USER29> But employers aren't in business to supply jobs, though, right? If the revenue and profits aren't there they can't print up their own money.

EDIT: parent comment now empty initially said that companies should hire more people to help keep the economy going.

<comment><USER30> This is essentially the reason behind Keynesian stimulus, isn't it? Something's gotta bootstrap the recovery.

<comment><USER29> Exactly. Like in the 30s the government should step in and hire people. Companies can't do that in a recession/depression. However, the other side of Keynesian economics that's not as often cited is that during the good times the government saves up for the inevitable bad times - we haven't done that for a long time.

<comment><USER31> >Like in the 30s the government should step in and hire people

What does the government usually hire people to do in this situation?

<comment><USER32> In the 1930s, it was the PWA which built tons of long-lasting infrastructure including the Hoover Dam and many substantial other projects;

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

That was probably the best use of funds at the time since there was broad based unemployment among a largely unskilled population. This time around, it seems like it's mostly service businesses that are struggling so it's not so clear what the best use of labor would be..

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I trust this about as much as I trust my horoscope. There is a reason economists are scolded left and right, and it's because of ludicrous claims like this.

<comment><USER34> > There is a reason economists are scolded left and right, and it's because of > ludicrous claims like this.

Ludicrous? Not at all. With evidence of people re-infecting themselves with different strains of coronavirus appearing ([https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-reinfections-confirmed- in-...](https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-reinfections-confirmed-in-the- netherlands-belgium/a-54688064)), we are looking at years of dealing with a deadly pandemic - which means that anything regarding travel and major events is out of the question for a _long_ time, and that assumes that people religiously vaccine themselves (a bold assumption given the rise of conspiracy myths about "vaccines being used to implant mind control chips" and further absurd).

That in turn has many effects: economies like Croatia which are dependant on foreign tourism will be straight fucked, they will not survive without massive aid - while the EU may prop up at least their governments, the situation for other primarily tourist economies is even worse. The effect will also hit many industries and their supply chains - most obviously plane makers and car makers, both of which are huge cash cows and mega employers, as demand from industry (airplanes) and private consumers falls to rock bottom (people will hoard all money they can).

To make it worse, Chinese demand of its rising middle class has been the thing that propped both their and our economy - in fact, depending on manufacturer, anything from 24-40% of cars sold in 2018 went to China. And that's just cars. With the trade war looming to escalate (which is one of the few things of Trump that were an actually good idea) and that no matter if Biden or Trump wins, China won't prop up the world economy again, Europe is too busy to save its own butts, the US is too much in debt plus its social construct is falling apart left and right...

<comment><USER35> Reinfections aren't a serious concern. Symptoms tend to be much less severe the second time due to the actions of immune system memory cells. SARS-CoV-2 is just like every other coronavirus in that regard. For example see the natural history of the OC43 coronavirus.

<comment><USER34> > Reinfections aren't a serious concern

They are, because reinfected people can infect people that have not had corona before and it makes vaccine success rates lower (similar to the seasonal flu).

In the essence it will lead to yet another attempt of "herd immunity" and a shitload of deaths.

<comment><USER36> Experts and health officials were already expecting vaccines to be only 50-75% effective, so this isn't new information.

That's what's so frustrating to me about the "herd immunity" discourse. Health officials have consistently said there's no way the disease is going to be eradicated, but because of the way it gets discussed, a lot of smart people have become convinced that the goal of a vaccine is to make sure nobody catches it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I'm inclined to believe the upcoming economic doom simply because anecdotally, I hardly know anyone who is against continuous lockdowns for as long as needed.

In fact, people even seem to believe that the dead economy brings positive change: no more pollution from aircraft, no more racist tourism to other countries, and so on.

<comment><USER10> > I hardly know anyone who is against continuous lockdowns for as long as > needed.

I'm sure that comes up a lot in conversation on line at the food bank.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> We aren't "stuck" in a recession. It is entirely man-made. In the past, a recession was significant because it was a market indicator. Now, however, this recession is artificial, so it does not indicate any market defects.

I believe we will have a V-shaped recovery and we will get back to normal soon. In a market-based recession, the fear is how to get back to normal. In this artificial recession, there is no fear, we just end the lockdowns. The only issue is when.

It's like growing your lawn. If your lawn starts dying, and you don't know why, that is like a market-based recession. However, if you turn off the irrigation and the lawn starts dying, all you have to do is turn the irrigation back on.

<comment><USER39> If we get rid of all of the lockdowns, and force people to act as if everything is normal (they won't) how will we handle the millions of people dying?

<comment><USER3> Do you honestly think that the lockdowns saved lives, rather than simply delaying deaths for several months? Keep in mind that the lockdowns are merely a rate limit, not a cure.

We are already in an uncontrolled situation re: covid. We are not seeing millions of deaths. In most parts of the country literally nothing is being done, yet we are not seeing bodies piled up in the streets.

<comment><USER11> Lockdowns prevent disease spread when actually implemented. The US never bothered with an actual lockdown, and instead did arbitrary, self-enforced partial closures. These half-measures predictably slowed the spread, but did not stop it. US is at 181,000 deaths total and 1500 deaths per day (which is increasing). Canada fully locked down for two months, and is at 0.8 deaths per day, and decreasing. Canada will have saved lives. The US did not.

As for "no bodies in the streets": This is a long-lasting disease, you're sick for days before you die. People don't die in the streets, they die in hospitals and they die in their homes. The bodies are piled in morgues and refrigerator trucks.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Eight features Windows 8 'borrowed' from Linux (and improved?) - <AUTHOR> http://www.itworld.com/open-source/248654/8-best-innovations-windows-8-borrowed-linux

<comment><USER2> I think this is more of a case of Microsoft validating these ideas from open source (X11 dialogs are not exactly "Linux"), rather than "stealing" or "borrowing" them. Wow, extent-based filesystems not exactly the most resilient... the real question here is why Cutler and Co. "borrowed" ODS-11/Files-11 wholesale?

In a larger sense, the article has a clickbait title, and I fell for it. If it had read "Microsoft validates a few open source software choices", hardly anyone would have bothered reading it, I guess.</comment>


Ask HN: Tell us about your experiences of pitching to people who "got it" - <AUTHOR>

When pitching my ideas/apps/products to people (friends, relatives, people at tech meetups, etc) there are people who don't like the idea, people who are lukewarm about it, and then there's the third category.
These people "get it". They see the big picture you see. They go there with you. They see all the use cases you envision and add more, usually enthusiastically. It's just pure elation talking with one of these people, especially after some lukewarm responses from others.
Of course, these people may be as wrong about the potential of your product as you are, so finding such people is no guarantee of success by any stretch, but it truly replenishes your energy after you talk to one of them.
What have your experiences been pitching to such people, especially when you were just starting out? Did their thumbs-up and feedback help more or less than the feedback from people who were lukewarm or negative about your idea or product? <comment><USER2> I get same reactions, and I would disregard all of it... part of being an entrepreneur is faith in yourself that what you are doing is right. I think your only concern should be validating the idea and business. The people that say they get it, question them and try to validate assumptions. Figure out how to experiment cheaply, and build a mvp.

<comment><USER3> I couldn't agree more; I've gone through the phase of accepting the 'excited' people's input as valid and can testify that you need to qualify your assumptions - derive facts by which to make decisions.

Read more on these topics with Steve Blank (read his The Four Steps to the Epiphany!) and Eric Ries.

<http://steveblank.com/> <http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/>

You won't regret educating yourself based on the experiences of others. No matter what you think, you're not smarter than the market; you need to understand the market, and that means having the humility to prove your assumptions.</comment></comment>


The charm of traditional alphabet blocks, enhanced with interactive apps and games - <AUTHOR> https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1871927434/alphatechblocks-learning-a-b-cs-thru-tech-and-touc <comment><USER2> I am a parent.

When I buy toys I want to be reassured that the manufacturers know about, and understand, the various safety regulations that exist for toys, and that their toy complies with the regulations. Often a small scale design agency will design a toy, and it will look lovely and be fun to use, but will not be compliant with EU safety standards.

When a toy manufacturer claims a toy has educational benefits I want them to list those benefits, and the research they're using to justify the claims that their product achieves that. (As well as any research that shows it is a benefit.)

I'd like them to show that this toy can help children learn the alphabet, and the research they've done to support this. I'd also like to know that it's compatible with the alphabet used for synthetic phonics. It's a shame to teach children to say "Bee" when they're going to have to learn to say "buh".[1]

But it looks cool, much better than a lot of the education app toys, and I wish them luck.

I love the dual language aspect too. That's a nice touch. Maybe in future they can offer other additional blocks for the EU countries?

[1] I know "buh" isn't accurate for the b sound used in synthetic phonics.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Alum from my school have designed AlphaTechBlocks! They look and feel like traditional alphabet blocks, but they work interactively with mobile apps to create fun learning experiences and games for toddlers and preschoolers to learn letters and words in ENGLISH and SPANISH.

I think this is a really cool idea and a perfect example of technology improving upon traditional learning mediums.

</comment><comment><USER3> Finally kids can actually learn and play on iPads at the same time. Great solution and a game that they can keep playing as they grow.

</comment><comment><USER4> This product will transform the way kids learn forever!</comment>


Planning to hack over the holidays? Heroku & Indextank Search contest - <AUTHOR> http://blog.heroku.com/archives/2010/12/20/hacking-over-the-holidays/

<comment><AUTHOR> Based on feedback we put together a tutorial for using IndexTank from Ruby:

<http://indextank.com/documentation/tutorial-ruby>

I would love to know if it's useful, or what's missing from it.

<comment><USER2> This is awesome.

Here's the biggest thing that seems off to me: these indexes need to be fully populated by the programmer, right? I saw a bunch of "You could search Twitter, think about the Sunlight foundation, here's some firehoses" but then this (and the rest of) the tutorials seem to be all about me feeding it data directly.

If I wanted to search the Twitter firehose, say, I'd have to do all of the scraping and insertion myself, right? I can't just hook it up and head off? That's what makes sense, but some of the marketing seemed to imply otherwise.

<comment><AUTHOR> First off, thanks! To answer your question: what we'd like to do is have some readily available data sources that you could select from a directory/list (a lot of people have asked for that). Right now you have to write your own listener to connect a source with our api.

I'll take a look at our docs, I want to make sure this is not misleading.

<comment><USER2> No worries. It makes sense, really.

I just tried to look for the copy that made me think this, and I can't find it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> _This Contest is open to software developers who are 18 years of age or older at the time of entry and who are legal residents of the United States._

Why only the US, really?

<comment><AUTHOR> Because our lawyers say so, I believe it's boilerplate for these contests. I'd be super happy to open it to everyone in the known universe but I don't know the legal implications. Happy to hear your thoughts.

<comment><USER4> I think that is to prevent money laundering.

How about a special mention for non-US contestants.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> i wonder if anyone is going to build the wikileaks search engine? that would be pretty interesting...

<comment><AUTHOR> You'd have to decrypt the Wikileaks insurance file first. That contest entry would be hard to top, I would be impressed :)

[http://www.zerohedge.com/article/who-will-be-first- decrypt-w...](http://www.zerohedge.com/article/who-will-be-first-decrypt- wikileaks-insurance-file)

</comment></comment><comment><USER2> Previously: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2013777> 15 comments.

Including mine about using non-Rails frameworks on Heroku: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2013919>

</comment><comment><USER6> adding indextank is on my todo list...this week hopefully.</comment>


Appeals Court Reverses Andrew Auernheimer's Conviction for "hacking" AT&T - <AUTHOR> http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/11/court-overturns-conviction-of-att-ipad-hacker/?_php=true&_type=blogs&hpw&rref=technology&_r=0

<comment><AUTHOR> The "hack" in question was just looping over a publicly accessible REST API for iPads that would reveal the email of a user with a given ID. This was trivial, as IDs were assigned sequentially by AT&T.</comment>