The impact of cannabis access laws on opioid prescribing - <AUTHOR> https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhealeco.2019.102273 <comment><USER2> > Analyzing a dataset of over 1.5 billion individual opioid prescriptions > between 2011 and 2018, which were aggregated to the individual provider-year > level, we find that recreational and medical cannabis access laws reduce the > number of morphine milligram equivalents prescribed each year by 11.8 and > 4.2 percent, respectively.

As a former marijuana user this seems obvious to me. I don't understand why federal legalization has been so difficult. There are many benefits despite the potential of unknown risk.

Maybe my beliefs are a little out there. I wish for all drugs to be decriminalized. Portugal's model seems to be working quite well.

[https://time.com/longform/portugal-drug-use- decriminalizatio...](https://time.com/longform/portugal-drug-use- decriminalization/)

<comment><USER3> > I don't understand why federal legalization has been so difficult.

Look into the history of laws surrounding marijuana in the United States and you'll start to understand the politics behind it.

For example, here's a statement from John Ehrlichman[1], Assistant of Domestic Affairs to former president Richard Nixon.

> "You want to know what this was really all about?" he asked with the > bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal > prison, had little left to protect. "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the > Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black > people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal > to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to > associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then > criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could > arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify > them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about > the drugs? Of course we did."

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

<comment><USER4> Pretty sure this quote has been discredited. Some reporter said he said it, but after he died, so it can't be confirmed. His family says that quote doesn't sound like him at all. Even if he did say it, it's one guys opinion and doesn't reflect gov't policy.

<comment><USER5> It's an incontrovertible historical fact that the prohibition of opium and and cocaine was substantially racially motivated.

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

<comment><USER4> Don't disagree, but that doesn't prove racism was Nixon's reason for the war on drugs.

<comment><USER6> One of Nixon's chief advisers admitted in an interview years later that the war on drugs was explicitly targeted at black people[0]. Criminalizing blacks was a primary objective of this policy.

0: [https://qz.com/645990/nixon-advisor-we-created-the-war-on- dr...](https://qz.com/645990/nixon-advisor-we-created-the-war-on-drugs-to- criminalize-black-people-and-the-anti-war-left/)

<comment><USER7> It likely was a motive, but it doesn't necessarily make the quote real. I have trouble believing Nixon or his advisors would give a supervillain monologue like that, personally, even if those were their exact intentions.

<comment><USER8> Well as one of the earlier links said

>Nixon advisor: We created the war on drugs to "criminalize" black people and the anti-war left

so it was more their political enemies in general rather than a race. Not to say it wasn't part racist.

<comment><USER9> read the whole thread man. I don't think anyone here doubts that drug enforcement in America is racially motivated, but you're the third person to cite that very dubious quote.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> A friend of mine served in Iraq and has a lot of health problems related to his time there. He has a shoebox full of medications for various ailments but, when he can use marijuana, he only needs like 5 of them.

So every few months he drives three states over to the closest legal state, stays for a few days and buys enough to last him until his next visit. From what I understand, this experience is not uncommon at all. There are even AirBnB's that cater specifically to these "medical refugees" coming in to buy there because they cannot get the medication they need in their home states.

It is really insane to me that prohibition of a plant continues despite all the evidence of its positive benefits. Especially when drugs that are far more dangerous to you than marijuana can be purchased at your corner drug store without even showing an ID.

<comment><USER11> Imagine being pulled over while traveling.

So insanely risky, especially considering speed traps are not illegal and cops practically camp where speed limit drops by bits.

<comment><USER12> A few years ago, a friend of mine here in Seattle went to visit his friend in Ohio, who wanted him to bring some legal pot. He took a train to Chicago, then rented a car to drive the rest of the way. He got stopped in Indiana, consented to a search where the officer found the pot in the car. My friend was lucky, he only got a warning with the pot seized, he was carrying a bit more than what would be considered a personal stash.

The cop told him that a quarter of the rental cars he stopped on the highway were carrying some form of contraband. Apparently, out of state rental cars on the highway attract police attention.

<comment><USER13> And they were most likely looking for large amounts of cash, Cops love the Seize cash, anyone carrying more than 10K in cash will likely never see it again, perfectly legal under Civil Asset Forfeiture

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Big Pharma once fought rec cannabis, now they are trying to take over it.

[https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable- business/2016/oct/22...](https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable- business/2016/oct/22/recreational-marijuana-legalization-big-business)

[https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-08-12/big-pharma- takeove...](https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-08-12/big-pharma-takeover- medical-cannabis)

<comment><USER15> And they're trying the same thing with kratom: [https://www.kratomutopia.org/real-reason-fda-targeting- krato...](https://www.kratomutopia.org/real-reason-fda-targeting-kratom/)

<comment><USER16> The FDA/DEA war on Kratom is truly heinous. The worst part is certain media outlets (like USA Today) are happy to regurgitate FDA propaganda without even mentioning the counter arguments. There are a few articles I see in other outlets that are fair, but more often than not it's the government-approved line.

<comment><USER17> Kratom is addictive and you can overdose on it, neither of which is generally considered true for cannabis. It seems odd to mention both in the same breath.

<comment><USER16> You can _not_ over dose on kratom. You'll become nauseous and throw up long before reaching a toxic level. It is addictive tho. But so is caffeine, and even sugar, but nobody wants to ban those.

<comment><USER18> This is also similar to marijuana IIRC. You pass out long before you're ever able to reach toxic levels of THC. I'm not sure how true this is though, only something I heard from someone in HS who was a massive stoner.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> _Personal anecdote warning_

Marijuana is a reasonably effective pain treatment which is readily available without prescription. Even without the really scary stuff surrounding Opiates, I'm far more likely to use the pain meds I can pick up at the corner dispensary. The cost of weed is far less and more important, availability and bullshit hoops I have to go through are far less.

About the only downside to weed is you gotta smoke it unless you process it first and making edibles or an infusion with a sous vide is not very difficult at all.

[https://www.sousweed.com/blog/2015/6/13/sous-vide- cannabis-b...](https://www.sousweed.com/blog/2015/6/13/sous-vide-cannabis- butter) [https://medium.com/sous-vide/sous-vide-thc-infused- cocktails...](https://medium.com/sous-vide/sous-vide-thc-infused- cocktails-7689265aa7ac)

<comment><USER20> Sousweed eds are also more potent than store bought ones [1], and deliver more effect that smoking the source. Given I live in a legal state and enjoy cooking, especially experimental cooking, I'm considering very small-scale distributing in 2020.

[1]: IMO, I use top-shelf for my eds; generic ones are probably a lot of shwag, and the "mg THC" ratings are incredibly inconsistent.

<comment><USER19> Largely matches my experience. I make infusions and usually have to cut it quite a bit before sharing, otherwise people get entirely too baked too quickly.

I enjoy crafting more than consuming so I tend to have way more than I can consume and give most of it away.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Anecdotally, I just got out of the hospital after some serious surgery on Christmas (maybe not "emergency", but if they did it on 12/25 it obviously couldn't wait). I've got a Vicodin subscription, my wife filled it, but I don't plan on using it unless I have to. I live in WA, which legalized weed, and I plan to just smoke (well, vape) up. OTC meds aren't quite enough, but yeesh, the next step is Vicodin? Nah, way too much, I think the weed will tide me over.

But if cannabis weren't legal in WA, I'd probably just take the Vicodin because OTC isn't enough. So for my current situation, cannabis falls right in that happy middle I need, and to bring it back on topic, keeps me off the hard stuff.

<comment><USER22> I highly recommend against smoking or vaping marijuana and instead choosing edible oils[0]. These sublingual oils are the safest way to ingest marijuana, and they are just as effective (if not more) as other forms of edibles. Not only that, but you can administer surgically precise doses very easily, since you control exactly how many drops you take.

[0] [https://www.leafly.com/products/edibles/tinctures- sublingual](https://www.leafly.com/products/edibles/tinctures-sublingual)

<comment><USER21> Thanks for the pointer. Looks like the store down the road has a wide selection. I've also been reading the other comments on making butter and the like, which I might give a whirl since I'm not leaving the house for a while. :-)

<comment><USER23> If you have never had edibles I'd proceed with caution. Weed is much more psychoactive when ingested and lasts way longer. If you take too much, you'll be in a bad place for hours instead of 45 min with smoking.

<comment><USER22> Uh, no. This is simply not true with sublingual tinctures where the concentration is very well-defined per drop. This only holds true for brownies and other food-based edibles where you don't know the concentration...

<comment><USER24> I can also recommend tinctures over edibles, but be sure to use a highly concentrated one, so you don't swallow any (this is actually quite difficult if you hold any more than a tiny amount of liquid under you tongue or between your gums and teeth!

For at least the first few times using edibles, I'd also advise the GP to be extremely cautious, and especially so if you don't have a precise source; the effects of vaping/smoking are 1-2 hours, but can be 5-7 with edibles - if you have too much, you're in for something akin to a bad trip (it's not the same, but the closest I can describe it), feeling nauseous, anxious and paranoid. It really is absolutely _horrible_

<comment><USER22> Curious why you are recommending against swallowing tincture drops. I typically swish the drops around in my mouth for 30s-2min depending on how quickly I want the high to onset, then I swallow. There are also times where I _only_ swallow and I still get high.

Sure, drops will last longer than smoking/vaping, but the high is much milder and less intense (holding the amount of THC/CBDs constant). As someone who used to get anxiety and paranoia from weed, I can say that drops are much more benign in that manner.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Could also be because it's getting to be a huge pain in the ass to get prescribed opioids. You have to go to the doctor, often several times, and then you get to pay a pretty penny to fill the prescription. Much easier to smoke a doobie or eat a brownie. Convenience wins every time.

IMO the best strategy for the drug war is to make MJ and other drugs with very low addiction potential (shrooms, LSD) available nationwide, and continue to harshly prosecute the sale (but not possession) of crack, heroin and fentanyl.

That way people who feel like they need drugs to deal with their life situation will choose MJ out of convenience alone.

</comment><comment><USER22> Not surprising that marijuana is a sort of strange attractor that prevents people from using harder drugs. Also not surprising that the federal government doesn't just _execute faster_ and legalize it nation-wide already. I find it mind-boggling that you can be dying from opioids in one state and not another just because the state you're in happens to have banned a benign plant that can help save you and wean you off of opioids.

<comment><USER26> Let's be real, the government was at best complicit in the opioid crisis. The Sacklers did a lot of lobbying; meanwhile "big marijuana" didn't exist until very recently.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> If you're against drug legalization, this is like hearing "allowing people to steal whatever they want is causing less murder". Allowing everyone to do bad things, in order to slightly reduce the number of really bad things is not a basis for legalizing something.

Now I'm personally for the recreational legalization of all drugs in general, but this is a poor argument, just like increased tax revenue is a poor argument. Proponents of legalization should be arguing that anyone should be able to do whatever they want to their own body as long as they're not hurting anyone else.

<comment><USER28> What do opponents of marijuana legalization actually believe?

The only coherent opposition to it I've ever heard is that it's difficult to test for marijuana intoxication on the side of the road. Which still doesn't really make sense when you consider that people are clearly doing it anyway (and now can easily cross state lines with no marijuana in their possession but quite a bit of THC in their blood).

<comment><USER15> They believe that it is a bad thing that bad people do. And that because they're bad people they deserve bad things to happen. Because drugs are bad, m'kay?

Seriously, I can only guess because none of it makes sense to begin with.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> There are parallels to the prohibition of alcohol here. During prohibition you were more likely to find liquor. Even after prohibition for some time liquor was more popular - my grandparents were more likely to have a cocktail than a beer or wine. Today people drink more beer and wine than liquor, there are more options, we don't have to go straight for the hard stuff.

</comment><comment><USER30> It's difficult to buy their causality thesis.

Opioid addiction rates across states (and nations) already varies quite wildly, totally independent of weed laws, which were all quite similar some time ago. And the variation is large, far beyond the 5-10% supposed relationship in the paper.

Organisational, legal, social attitudes towards opioids change quite frequently as well - these would be very hard to normalise for.

If someone can validate how they crack the normalisation to achieve causality I'd love to hear about it.

<comment><USER31> The statistical methods are explained in detail and the article was published in what appears to be a reputable peer-reviewed journal. What kind of validation are you looking for?

<comment><USER30> It seems to me there's a huge range of factors they didn't and can't possibly control for. Particularly availability of black market opioids. And if I'm not misreading - the changing policies of opioid scrips over time, a lot of which is 'trendy' i.e. socially driven as much as policy driven (i.e. individual doctors making changes in their practice because they read something).

More specifically, I'm always wary of 'top down' science that doesn't consider the myriad of real world considerations regarding their thesis; specifically they don't actually _talk to people_ (or even take surveys) to get a feel for what is actually happening.

What if they had a lot of conversations and did a few surveys and found that people tended to not medicate 'en masse' for specific interventions?

I honestly don't understand how researchers can look at such an intensively social and behavioural subject without getting a personal feel for the prevalent behaviours.

I'll bet doctors, social workers on the front line have pretty good insight into what's going on.

So my question was pointed to anyone who understood this paper or issue in detail who could articulate in so many words 'why the correlation is valid'.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Always seemed insane to me that pharmaceutical drugs based on Marijuana are bad but drugs that share a base with heroin are okay.

</comment><comment><USER4> Don't have access to the paper, but would love to see how they controlled for dropping opioid use.

The roll out of marijuana legislation overlaps quite nicely with an overall effort to reduce opioid prescriptions.

I imagine it would be difficult to control for that effect.

<comment><USER31> The link is to the full text of the article. The method (difference in differences) is well-known from the famous study on minimum wage laws (Card and Krueger, 1994).

> To examine the effect of cannabis access laws on opioid prescriptions, we > estimate a series of difference-in-differences models, exploiting the > staggered adoption of cannabis access laws over time ... Following Bradford > et al. (2018); Buchmueller and Carey (2018) and Patrick et al. (2016), we > include controls for [several] different legal changes that may impact > opioid prescriptions in a series of robustness checks ... As described in > detail in the appendix, we test our data for parallel trends between > providers in states that adopted cannabis access laws and those in states > that did not. We are unable to reject the null hypothesis of parallel > trends, which supports the use of difference-in-differences models.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> while opioids are clearly awful when abused, they are at least a controlled substance and a bit expensive. There are MANY more people who manage pain with alcohol due to it's price point and availability.. I'm very interested to see the effects there. a quick search turns up some papers, but nothing recent or with any significant data.. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4700545/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4700545/)

<comment><USER24> I recall seeing a study recently looking at using GHB for chronic pain management (which has similar effects to alcohol, but without the hangover).

IIRC, it did work somewhat, but of course the participants felt "drunk".

I suffer from chronic pain caused by small fiber neuropathy in my arms and legs, and can add a single data point: alcohol does help _a bit_ \- but the way it does so is more by "distraction", whereas opioids really seem to reduce the pain. It's also completely impractical if you want to drive, work, look after children etc (normal life, basically). But I can certainly see why people would use alcohol if they were unable to obtain prescription medicines that helped them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> It is 2020. Just legalize it already. And legalize DMT and mushrooms while you're at it. So many can benefit from these natural and relatively safe remedies.

<comment><USER35> Anecdotally, DMT made me black out and go crazy for 20 minutes. I would not make it easily available.

<comment><USER15> But you got ahold of it despite its legality. Ironic, no?

These drugs should be treated as seriously as any other (know your drug!). Some will fail to do that, but that is how it goes.

The moment I hear "drug X caused this bad thing to happen" I think of how much suffering alcohol consumption does globally on a daily basis. That tempers all associated concerns.

<comment><USER36> "That tempers all associated concerns."

Until you compare the number of sufferers as a percentage of users, there is no tempering of concerns here.

<comment><USER37> One might say the same thing about building a significant degree concern based upon random anecdotes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> One day MDMA legalization will significantly reduce both alcohol consumption and DUIs.

<comment><USER39> If you want it to remain effective and to avoid serious complications (depression, anxiety, loss of verbal fluency) MDMA can't be taken anywhere near frequently enough to replace alcohol for the average individual.

<comment><USER15> That was supposed to be GHB.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> > Information on opioid prescriptions comes from Symphony Health's IDV® > (Integrated Dataverse) dataset ... The dataset includes approximately 90% of > all prescriptions filled at outpatient pharmacies in the United States > between 2011 and 2018 ... Each observation includes the year the > prescription was filled, the eleven-digit national drug code (NDC) for the > prescription, the total days' supply for the prescription, the quantity of > drugs, an encrypted patient identifier, and an encrypted healthcare provider > identifier.

Given what we've learned about data re-identification [1], this sounds like a pretty scary dataset. Does anybody know more about it? Do you need to pay for access? Is access restricted to researchers who can be trusted not to attempt re-identification?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_re- identification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_re-identification)

</comment><comment><USER40> When I see these types of research, I wonder if it is a short-term or a mid- term effect of marijuana legalization. There was a time when Heroin was a legal trade-mark that was available over-the-counter... It was thought that only weak could get addicted to it while short-term effects were recognized.

</comment><comment><USER41> Marijuana legal states are rich or have been gentrified so they use less opioid.

</comment><comment><USER42> "Marijuana laws" are what caused this mess in the first place. The title of this post makes it sound like government is doing something rather than getting out of the way.

<comment><USER43> Recreational Marijuana Laws has generally meant regulating it in a manner very similar to Alcohol. Given what we've seen with black market products being cut with dangerous chemicals that have sent people to the hospital, I'm happy to know my state performs quality control tests on the marijuana products I'm buying.

<comment><USER42> Do you really believe that people would "cut" legal marijuana with "dangerous chemicals" and sell it from their dispensary? This barely ever happens with _illegal_ marijuana. The reason drugs like heroin and cocaine are cut is to increase profit margin, either through dilution with a relatively harmless substance, or (more dangerously) a cheaper, more potent alternative like fentanyl in the case of heroin. Marijuana cannot be "cut" in this way, and it is the black market that incentivizes it with other drugs. I should be able to grow it for myself and my friends and family but that's still illegal most places that have rec laws. These laws are preferable to prohibition but it is not the laws that are helping people. It's the plant itself that is doing so.

<comment><USER12> It's not so much someone cutting pot with dangerous drugs. In the past when you bought from someone, even regularly, there'd be that infrequent time where the guy's supplier didn't come through so the quality or amount was less than the time before.

With pot shops, they print out the THC content on every label so you can buy a consistent product at a regular price every time.

<comment><USER42> You don't need a government agency to test for THC potency. Businesses can and do already solve that problem. That doesn't seem to be what the parent commenter was getting at, regardless.

As an experienced grower I would trust myself and others I know who have expertise. I wouldn't need a lab test before consuming their product. As a frequent user, exact THC content is not really that relevant. Not nearly as much as knowing the strain and growing process, which as the grower, or the customer of a reputable grower or dispensary, I would know.

We're talking about _a plant_. The worst that can happen to you is a Peggy Noonan style freak out. Yet we're setting up a system where rent seekers will squat on grow and distribution licenses and the price will inevitably go up.

<comment><USER44> Cannabis is less likely to be adulterated than other drugs, but it does still happen and legalising and regulating it makes this less likely.

Page 36: [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235912814_CUT_A_Gui...](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235912814_CUT_A_Guide_to_Adulterants_Bulking_Agents_and_Other_Contaminants_Found_in_Illicit_Drug)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> This is not good news for big pharma, they dont want people using less drugs. They want you using more. Its morally bad.</comment>


Freeze date and Freeze Policy for Debian Jessie - <AUTHOR> http://firstname.lastname@example.com

<comment><USER2> What happened to the proposal for always releasable Debian by the way? ([https://lwn.net/Articles/550032/](https://lwn.net/Articles/550032/))

Was there anything done to implement it? Months long (or even more than a half a year long) freezes are really annoying in Debian.

<comment><USER3> Perhaps the plan of keeping testing "releasable" would drive away the users who are interested in fairly stable packages from upstream?

Debian may now have enough users (and use-cases) that it could sustain five branches: stable, release-candidate, testing, unstable, and experimental . I don't know enough about the difficulties with stable to know whether it's possible to maintain a nigh-releasable "release-candidate" with only a few RC bugs.

<comment><USER2> _> Perhaps the plan of keeping testing "releasable" would drive away the users who are interested in fairly stable packages from upstream?_

I'm not sure how exactly, can you elaborate please? The way I understood that proposal, was pushing package maintainers not to postpone some work until very close to the release (which keeps Debian testing messy most of the time), but rather update packages regularly, keeping them always close to "releasable" state. This could reduce potential freeze period significantly and only improve the quality of Debian testing in general.

<comment><USER3> Sometimes, packages can arrive from upstream with desireable features and the occasional nasty bug. Back in ~Woody or so, I switched to testing in order to gain necessary functionality in a number of packages. If testing hadn't had the features I needed, I would have gone to another distro (perhaps Gentoo, at the time).

If some RC-bugs are fixed by the original developers upstream given enough time, then maintaining a continuously "releasable" distro will be more work than the periodic-freeze paradigm, as package maintainers will be forced to clean up upstream's code as it arrives. I don't know if Debian has enough people-power to make that happen.

The alternative is simply rejecting upstream's changes until the RC-bugs are fixed. Once upstream packages become interdependent, I imagine things get thorny fast.

If it's possible to spread the work out over time, without generating significant extra quantities of work, and simultaneously yield more-timely releases, then it'd be better to do that! :).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> X-Istence

      We are happy to announce that we will freeze Jessie at 23:59 UTC on the 5th of November 2014.

Is this a typo and it is actually meant for the 5th of November 2013, or is Debian really another year away from "freezing" for their next release?

<comment><USER4> Not a typo:

[http://lists.debian.org/debian- devel/2013/10/msg00234.html](http://lists.debian.org/debian- devel/2013/10/msg00234.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I really, really hope the Jessie freeze is shorter than Wheezy's. That went on so long it became a problem.</comment>


Organic food 'not any healthier'  - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19465692

<comment><USER2> _Overall, there was no discernable difference between the nutritional content, although the organic food was 30% less likely to contain pesticides._

Reducing their pesticide consumption is important to many people. Also I believe that food with fewer pesticides is by definition healthier.</comment>


An A/B Testing Story - <AUTHOR> https://training.kalzumeus.com/newsletters/archive/ab-testing-story <comment><USER2> "If you work at a software company. . . you should be doing A/B testing for the same reason you have an accountant do your taxes. It is a low-risk low- investment high-certainty way to increase economic returns."

Spot on, and you should 100% support Patrick & Nick and buy their books / videos / etc.

But A/B testing is not as simple as hiring an accountant, running A/B testing as part of your corporate culture requires:

\- Front end developer to install / manage testing engine.

\- UX designer to measure / understand where holes may be in your flow.

\- Competent web designer to execute instructions from UX designer.

\- Statistically sound processes to know when to "call" a test (no Optimizely does NOT do this)

\- SEO / marketing people to make sure that your A/B test didn't just break marketing flow

\- etc

Yes, anybody could go run a headline test.

But running A/B testing with any sort of regularity, scale, and success is a complicated problem.

<comment><USER3> Meh, you make it sound too hard. Here is a perfectly adequate A/B testing regime.

Assign visitors into buckets randomly. Track conversion counts only. Declare the winner of an A/B test whenever one gets 100 conversions ahead, or whichever is ahead after 10,000 conversions. Do this with every test. As long as there are no obvious interaction effects, you can run multiple tests in parallel.

If you wish, you can replace 10,000 with N where N is however many conversions you expect to get in a month. Replace 100 by the square root of N. Real differences below 2/sqrt(N) are basically coin flips. Even after many tests, you are very unlikely to have ever made an error as big as 5/sqrt(N).

If you want to do something more sophisticated than this, you need competent people. But this is worlds better than what most companies do. (And yes, it is better than what Optimizely does for you by default.)

<comment><USER4> I appreciate what you're trying to say here, but you've basically just described the prototypical way _not_ to run an A/B test. Ending a test as soon as you reach significance ensures a high rate of false positives, and doesn't clearly tell you when to end the experiment if there is no effect.

See also: [http://www.evanmiller.org/how-not-to-run-an-ab- test.html](http://www.evanmiller.org/how-not-to-run-an-ab-test.html)

<comment><USER3> You have just pattern-matched to a response without understanding. And you're wrong.

See [http://www.evanmiller.org/sequential-ab- testing.html](http://www.evanmiller.org/sequential-ab-testing.html) for a very similar methodology presented by the very person you are citing. The difference is that I am aiming to always produce an answer from the test, even if it is a statistical coin flip, while he aims to only produce an answer roughly 5% of the time if there is no difference.

<comment><USER4> Maybe I am not understanding your post, but aren't you just declaring a winner after N trials, even if that is not significant? That seems to be a critical distinction here.

<comment><USER3> Right. We are trying to make a business decision, not conduct science.

If you go with whichever is ahead, you'll reliably produce correct answers for wins at that you can't reliably measure. Yes, there will be mistakes, but the mistakes are guaranteed to be pretty small.

If you insist on a higher standard, you'll learn which choices you were confident of..but now need to figure out what to do when the statistics didn't give you a final answer.

I think that the first choice is more useful. Evan prefers to clearly distinguish your coin flips from solid results. But in the end you have to make a decision, and it isn't material what decision you make if the conversion rates are close.

<comment><USER4> I'm sorry, I wouldn't call that framework A/B testing also much as running two experiments and seeing who's ahead after some arbitrary period of time.

<comment><USER5> I think this post summarizes it really well: [http://bjk5.com/post/12829339471/ab-testing-still-works- sarc...](http://bjk5.com/post/12829339471/ab-testing-still-works-sarcastic- phew)

If you have any sort of decent dashboarding the cost of a wrong decision is really not all that bad compared to the cost of being a purist.

<comment><USER3> Oh boy. Let's replace statistics with guesses off of graphs!

That visible "zone of stupidity" is based on how long it takes to make a conversion which has everything to do with how your product works, and nothing to do with how statistics works. There is absolutely no difference between the graph you expect that leads to an accidental wrong decision and one that detects a correct difference - the patterns that you think you see don't mean what your brain will decide they do.

And more importantly, if you stop in 1/4 of the time that you would have been willing to run the test, the potential loss when you are wrong is twice the worst errors that you could make if you put more effort into it.

Have you ever been in an organization that rolled out an innocuous looking change that killed 15% of the business? I have. Over the 10 months it took to find the offending subject line, there was, shall we say, "significant turnover in the executive team".

Math exists for a reason. Either learn it, or believe people who have learned it. Don't substitute pretty pictures that you don't understand, then call it an explanation.

<comment><USER5> I admit I don't know the math well so I am curious to know how to fix my intuition:

Let's say you want to figure out the unknown bias on two coins. You flip both continuously and plot the percentage of heads you see. Due to law of large numbers these percentages will eventually converge to true probabilities (which is how I am interpreting the graphs in that blog post).

The bad case is if the two coins are actually "flatlined" in the wrong order so as a pattern matching human you mistakenly believe the rates have converged prematurely. I don't know how to work out the math on this but let's say a "flatline" is visually 100 points or so with no significant slope. Then this should be pretty rare right?

<comment><USER3> Don't try to do this by visual pattern recognition. Do math. There are plenty of statistical tests that you can use, use them. Any of them is better than looking at a graph and guessing from the shape.

If you want to try to understand what is going on, learn the Central Limit Theorem. That will let you know how fast the convergence is to the laws of large numbers. (There are two, the strong and the weak.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I don't doubt the value proposition that is here, and I don't doubt that the authors of this blog post will make a great video and book about A/B testing that is helpful.

This is fairly well trod ground though and for those that want a cheaper approach, here are some free resources that I like. Some of these are my own blog posts but I'm not selling anything so pardon the self promotion:

1\. "The Pitfalls Of Bias In A/B Testing" \- [http://danbirken.com/ab/testing/2014/04/08/pitfalls-of- bias-...](http://danbirken.com/ab/testing/2014/04/08/pitfalls-of-bias-in-ab- testing.html)

2\. "If You Aren't Doing Basic Conversion Optimization, You Probably Should Be" \- [http://danbirken.com/startups/2015/05/18/conversion- optimiza...](http://danbirken.com/startups/2015/05/18/conversion- optimization.html)

3\. "How not to run an A/B test" \- [http://www.evanmiller.org/how-not-to-run- an-ab-test.html](http://www.evanmiller.org/how-not-to-run-an-ab-test.html)

4\. "Evan Miller's sample size calculator" \- [http://www.evanmiller.org/ab- testing/sample-size.html](http://www.evanmiller.org/ab-testing/sample- size.html)

5\. "ABBA Open Source A/B test calculator" \- [https://www.thumbtack.com/labs/abba/](https://www.thumbtack.com/labs/abba/)

(and a bonus one because the improved sign up flow in the OP still had a password prompt)

6\. "Password prompts are annoying" \- [http://danbirken.com/usability/2014/02/12/password- prompts-a...](http://danbirken.com/usability/2014/02/12/password-prompts-are- annoying.html)

<comment><USER7> Thanks for sharing. It's nice to see most links greyed-out as visited, but some aren't (yet)!

Shameless plug: Two open source libraries for A/B testing I created and use regularly.

AlephBet[0] is the JS library to write your test in (with multiple backend alternatives)

Gimel[1] is an AWS Lambda backend you can run for near zero cost. Even at scale.

The Gimel (minimalistic) dashboard is using the algorithms / code from Evan Miller and others to do the bayesian statistical analysis.

[0] [https://github.com/Alephbet/alephbet](https://github.com/Alephbet/alephbet)

[1] [https://github.com/Alephbet/gimel](https://github.com/Alephbet/gimel)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Hi, I'm the one who's putting together The A/B Testing Manual with Patrick. Gonna answer a few questions (thanks for asking 'em!):

1\. On the difficulty of A/B testing: It is _heavily_ dependent on a lot of different factors in your organization. Developers' ability to quickly generate variant pages is a huge issue: lots of places simply can't make changes to revenue-generating pages. Lots of places deal with politics that keep them from rationally analyzing A/B tests. And c-level support can ram through a lot, of course.

I know that we're all from planet Vulcan and are very hyper-logical about testing, but most orgs don't work that way. 98% of my work involves doing therapy on people who are used to making design decisions by internal debate. Shifting that culture is tremendously difficult in large organizations where lots of smart people have lots of strong opinions.

Put another way: yes, it's easy to run an A/B test. It is hard to ship the revenue-generating design decisions that come from A/B testing.

2\. On where to start: I try to research my test ideas so I know that I'm testing the right things, in the right places. Messaging tends to have much higher impact than specific design elements, so you want to make sure you're communicating to people effectively.

With total blank-slate clients, I get your GA install in order (nobody ever has this), and run heat & scroll maps on all the key pages in your funnel. I also email a survey of your existing customers to see if there are any surprising patterns. And with my bigger clients, I even run usability tests (on usertesting.com) and customer interviews (recruiting through ethn.io) to understand their motivations for purchasing.

None of this has anything to do with actual A/B tests – but it has everything to do with making sure you're not stabbing in the dark when you do test.

Finally, agreed with @gk1 on big, drastic changes. Harder to implement (see point about dev time above) but much more likely to bear fruit – and force the org to really question how they're speaking to customers.

3\. It's a new article. The A/B Testing Manual was launched yesterday at abtestingmanual.com. Videos will be ready in a month or two, tops. Launch discount expires this Friday.

Great questions. Keep 'em coming!

</comment><comment><USER9> A question for Patrick, or for anyone else with experience implementing A/B testing from the early stages of a service/product:

When and where do you start? If you start too early, you don't have enough traffic to be statistically significant.

In the article, Patrick said that he started with the trial signup form in his 3rd year.

Most of the advice on A/B testing that I've found is understandably aimed at people with existing business/products that can massively benefit from it. Does anyone have any more material about how to get started from the early stages?

<comment><USER10> I've shared some thoughts on this previously: [http://www.gkogan.co/blog/test- big-changes/](http://www.gkogan.co/blog/test-big-changes/)

TL;DR - Test big, drastic changes instead of fiddling with button colors and headlines. Examples of drastic changes:

\- Entirely different homepage with different messaging.

\- Change "Features" page to "Benefits" page and change its content accordingly.

\- If you're offering a free download or free product, test asking for an email first.

\- If your SaaS has a long signup form, test allowing people to jump right in with just an email address.

\- If you're sending a robotic "welcome" email, test sending a very short personalized email instead.

<comment><USER11> This has been my mantra as well. Test big and you'll likely fail or win a lot faster.

I'd also suggest making sure you approach testing by starting with a hypothesis and then testing that hypothesis. By voicing or writing down your hypothesis, you will be more likely to avoid the "stupid test trap", a phrase I use to describe running tests like changing button colors -- what hypothesis is changing button colors trying to prove? That people like red more, "for reasons"?

As mentioned above, each A/B test you run has a serious opportunity cost. I'm fortunate enough to have thousands of people going through my sales funnel daily but, even then, a test will still take several weeks or months to validate and anything approaching a change of 5% or less will really eat away at your ability to test more meaningful things.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The "split into two steps" screenshots use the same thumbnail for both images.

<comment><USER13> As I sit here trying to figure out the difference

<comment><USER9> Maybe there was a split test to see how many people noticed. :)

<comment><USER8> We shot a second trailer video on The A/B Testing Manual's site that was the exact same pitch, only with my dog (64lb border collie) in my lap.

Seriously contemplated A/B testing them as a joke, but erred on the side of sanity.

<comment><USER9> I wish you had!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Question for Nick/Patrick (or anybody else w/ experience): what's the accepted 2016 way to do A/B testing in Rails?

<comment><USER10> Have you looked into Optimizely paired with a gem like this: [https://github.com/MartijnSch/optimizely- gem](https://github.com/MartijnSch/optimizely-gem)?

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Or you can do like we do, put an A/B test on a about page. Then set it up wrong so it doesn't even function. Finally fix it and determine nothing useful since there is no measurable item to compare. Watch programmer eyes roll...

<comment><USER10> Let me guess, your company hired a "growth hacker?"

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Is this a newly published article? Or am I likely to have seen it on HN before?

<comment><USER17> Perhaps you saw a slightly different version of the article, which didn't get as much click-through and so was replaced with this one.

<comment><USER18> Now I want to hook up a markov chain generator to some sort of a multiarm bandit setup and test each word individually.</comment></comment></comment>


Peeking Beneath the Hood of Uber [pdf] - <AUTHOR> http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/leonchen/papers/uber-imc15.pdf <comment><USER2> Oh, I'm at this conference. It was really very good, and many of the other talks deserve attention as well: [http://conferences2.sigcomm.org/imc/2015/program.html](http://conferences2.sigcomm.org/imc/2015/program.html)

I'd encourage more operators to publish and submit papers for this conference.

<comment><USER3> Internet measurement is such a cool subfield. It's really astounding how much data is locked up within the nooks and crannies of digital activity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> An article about this was discussed yesterday, I think: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10476882](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10476882).</comment>


[Hiring] London, UK - PHP/Symfony dev needed, 4 day week, at relaxed charity. - <AUTHOR>

We are gemin-i.org, developing http://rafi.ki/ - a monitored and moderated social network type thing for kids/schools encouraging them to learn and talk about global issues and technology.
Our system is mostly php/Symfony/jquery running on AWS with elastic scaling depending on user load etc.
It's a permanent but part-time position in a tiny team, 28k pro-rata for a four day week with scope for home-working after a while at least. We need someone who can turn their hand to anything (coz you won't be limited to just that) but has already done some PHP/Symfony stuff and can write HTML and CSS plus ideally push pixels about in photoshop when needed.
email email@example.com with PROGRAMMER ROLE in the subject heading, including a CV and ideally a link to some code or something.
If you're an agent, get your clients to apply direct coz otherwise you'll be ignored. <comment><USER2> Ridiculously low rate for anyone competent - do programmers in the UK really accept $25/hour USD?

<comment><AUTHOR> Low end rate, certainly.

I have however worked for less, FWIW, and the charity sector is full of low pay all over the place.

Hopefully there's someone around who wants more spare time more than they want more money. I've often been keen to take pay cuts in return for less hours myself.</comment></comment>


Dude, chill out: RIM director goes on angry rant against 'critics' - <AUTHOR> http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/249456/dude-chill-out-rim-director-goes-angry-rant-against-critics

<comment><USER2> Defensive comments like this reveal something deeper about a company. The leadership continues to believe that they couldn't have done anything differently that would change their current circumstance. This is a dangerous indicator that they'll continue doing the same things.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am really happy to not work for RIM. They were a premier tech company 5 years ago but now they are visibly circling the toilet. It must be a very unpleasant place to work.</comment>


Writing Tips from 6 All-time Great Writers - <AUTHOR> http://bighow.com/news/the-art-of-great-writing-60-writing-tips-from-6-alltime-great-writers <comment><USER2> What is interesting about such lists of N writing tips is the total lack of theory of fiction or narration. It like explaining people how to write software by listing formatting rules/code conventions.

<comment><USER3> Careful, that will start a claim that engineers are better at writing fiction than anyone else ;-)

<comment><USER4> Undoubtedly, there exists some engineer who believes that they are as good or better writer than anyone.

I was just viewing at Max Raabe's take on "Oops, I did it again" on YouTube and realized that the song follows to T all of these writer's advice to, "Keep it short and to the point." In just a few repeated sentences, she manages to dramatize a relatable scene of romantic misunderstanding, while characterizing both a femme fatale and earnest friend-turned lover. It's really minimal. (Richard Thompson's "2000 years of popular music" spiel includes his awesome cover of the same song.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Vonnegut used such delicious metaphors (from the article):

 _Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia._

</comment><comment><USER6> For more top-10-list writing advice goodness, see also: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for- wr...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/feb/20/ten-rules-for-writing- fiction-part-one)

And the ur-text of all writing how-to's: Lester Dent's master plot formula for pulp fiction (Dent was the author of the Doc Savage pulp novels):

[http://thelastreveal.blogspot.com/2010/02/lester-dents- maste...](http://thelastreveal.blogspot.com/2010/02/lester-dents-master-plot- formula.html)

</comment><comment><USER7> "Omit <del>Needless</del> Words"

William Zinsser, _On Writing Well_

<comment><USER8> I've never understood that quote as I believe it removes a necessary word. "Needless" describes the type of word to delete. Without it, isn't William Zinsser suggesting we should omit random words?

<comment><USER9> Without an explicit predicate, I would guess that the implicit predicate would default to either "true" or "false" rather than "at random". If it defaulted to "false", then the imperative conjugation would make no bloody sense at all (i.e. "eat up" would parse into "don't eat anything"), so I think he's saying you shouldn't write anything.

<comment><USER8> I disagree, I find "omit all words" to make as little sense as "omit no words". Personally, I find it more likely to default to "omit some words". This, of course, does not describe the type of words we should be omitting, but rather that there exist words that we should omit. Saying "omit needless words" does describe the type, adding more information which is not there otherwise, making it a "needed" word.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> "A writer is somebody for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people."

The ability to put writing in one of the standard forms, novel, story, etc, seems important too.</comment>


Ask HN - Rate my new web app - World Cup Results Calculator - <AUTHOR> http://www.cupcalculator.com/

<comment><USER2> It'd be neat if it pre-populated it with existing game scores (Will it?) Obviously it can't just yet but that'd make it easier to play with.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's what I'm working towards. Unfortunately I haven't found anywhere that publishes XML/JSON feeds of match results for free.

The other thing I'm working on is a the allowing the user to pick winners in the knockout stages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It would be nice to be able to fill in the results without having to press tab or clicking on the input box, by jumping to the next score box as soon as a digit is entered. In this way, one could fill all the results of a group in six keystrokes.</comment>


Show HN: "Pinterest style" search engine - <AUTHOR> http://www.searchboard.co/

<comment><AUTHOR> My friend built this in 30 hours, but he is too modest to communicate about it. What do you think? Is there any improvement he can do?

</comment><comment><USER2> This is awesome! So many questions! \- How do you decide tile size? \- How do you choose the images to show?

Idea - you could include the favicons in tiles</comment>


Ask HN: Ticket tracking systems? - <AUTHOR>

Any recommendations for a startup graduating from emails and Skype chats to a ticket management system for support and keeping track of development?
Desired features:
- Relatively lightweight, this is the "bigger than a couple of people inside each other's heads, smaller than a giant organisation with management tiers" scale. Aiming to reduce busywork, not increase it!
- Integrates with email well for support.
- Hosted, or can be self-hosted on Linux.
- Open source a plus but not a fixed requirement.
Considering but have not yet evaluated:
- Request Tracker http://bestpractical.com/rt/
- Eventum http://dev.mysql.com/downloads/other/eventum/
- Zendesk http://www.zendesk.com/
What else would you suggest looking at (or avoiding)? <comment><AUTHOR> (Last time this came up was here, I think, but nearly 3 years ago: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1331626> )</comment>


Satellite images showChinese construction near site of India border clash - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/25/satellite-images-show-chinese-construction-near-site-of-india-border-clash <comment><USER2> India should plant land mines across line of actual control [https://archive.vn/i4Ui7](https://archive.vn/i4Ui7)</comment>


Humans of New York and the Cavalier Consumption of Others - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/humans-of-new-york-and-the-cavalier-consumption-of-others <comment><USER2> Humans of New York is catered for the "small time media" generation. People don't have attention span of a 20 minutes deep article or photo series. They want to see and read a tiny story in their Facebook feed and feel good about it. HONY serves this purpose.

John Stewart recognized this and started his new show based on this type of media consumption. [1]

[1] [http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/jon-stewart- heade...](http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/jon-stewart-headed-hbo- four-836443)

</comment><comment><USER3> tl;dr: The journalist doesn't like HONY because it presents individuals as simply "humans", without a group-based social critique. He prefers books where the writer sets out to reveal the hardships of the underclass, and where the photos serve as illustrations of that general point. Having decided that that is a virtue, he criticizes HONY for pairing the photos with stories of the individuals themselves.

<comment><USER4> I think your tl;dr is unjust. I read the author as criticizing the imposition of a simple story onto the nuanced experiences of people. I think he criticizes it for the lack of artistic subtlety (pictures are not allowed to speak to the reader by themselves) and also for the effect that ignoring social structure has on the way the art is consumed.

He decries the "read, get emotional cookies, and forget" effect of the simple "uplifting" narratives of every day people. The consumer of the art must think no further than one person's experience.

<comment><USER5> Photography never "speaks for itself"; photography is usually a pretty heavy- handed imposition of meaning through the use of composition, tone, framing, editing.

To call photography subtle is incorrect; it's a violent imposition of meaning onto the subject, by the photographer.

<comment><USER6> I saw three different photos from three different sources of the same scene from the Palestine-Israel conflict. They told wildly different stories.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I was the subject of one of Stanton's photos. While I admired his site at the time and what seemed like a commitment to free speech, I've since watched him sell out when it suits him.

HONY is a sandboxed version of New York and New Yorkers, and the political stands Stanton takes are cheap shots. He is more bond salesman than reporter. I'd be happy to see his credibility in a million little pieces.

<comment><USER8> Could you please give some examples? I understand the cultural criticism in the original post, but it seems extreme to me to wish ruin on someone because of their photography project.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Does the HONY project change the world, or does it help the world stay the same?

Does it increase the empathy of its viewers, leading them to make changes in their lives to benefit the HONY subjects, or people like them? Or does it just feed people's self-satisfaction about how empathetic they already are, by giving them a gift-wrapped simple story to "like" every day, and pretend they really did something?

Is reading HONY an act of consumption or an act of expression? Unlike reading a book, everything about consuming the HONY project on Facebook is publicized to your friends and family. They can see that you follow it. If you like, share, or comment, it gets pushed to their newsfeeds. Like any activity on social media, it's not just shaping who you are, it helps you construct your public identity: the mask you want other people to see.

Even the paper books can be seen through this lens. Are they popular because they provide stories that are notably better or different from what can be read online? Or are they popular because they tell the right story about their owner by sitting on the book shelf or coffee table?

<comment><USER10> Some of each. And increasing empathy has rewards all down the line; not just to benefit the HONY subjects. Its education.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Not one link in that entire blasted article.

[http://www.humansofnewyork.com/](http://www.humansofnewyork.com/)

Come on, New Yorker, get it together.

</comment><comment><USER12> Humans of New York has always reminded me of Jacob Holdt's work, [http://web.archive.org/web/20150811101439/http://american- pi...](http://web.archive.org/web/20150811101439/http://american- pictures.com/gallery/index.html)

<comment><USER13> HONY tends to remind me of Vivian Maiers' work.

[http://www.vivianmaier.com/](http://www.vivianmaier.com/)

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

<comment><USER12> Oh! I love her stuff, her craft reminds me a lot of Arbus but less vulnerable</comment></comment></comment>


Introducing Vdio - <AUTHOR> http://blog.rdio.com/us/2013/04/introducing-vdio.html

<comment><USER2> Rant ahead...

Am I the only one dissatisfied with the way media delivery has played out the past couple of years? We started with a rapidly developing delivery system (the internet) and content makers who couldn't see the value in capitalizing on this sales channel by making movies, TV shows, and songs available to consumers at reasonable prices (read: less than physical media costs), which led to piracy, global dissatisfaction, and decreased industry revenue.

Fast forward to 2013, where we have...

Ecosystems: iTunes, Amazon Video, Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, Blockbuster Ondemand, Android, Cinema Now, and Vdio

Which can be accessed on TVs, web browsers, smartphones, tablets, dvd players, bluray players, gaming consoles, media streaming devices (Roku, Apple TV, etc.), and HTPCs.

... all with different user experiences (most are poor), varying media coverage / depth, and a pricing system that only satisfies bulk consumers that want to watch a bunch of legacy content.

Larger companies that were first to build relationships with content makers have been the most successful, but the entire process still wreaks of bureaucracy, middle-men, and band aids. Netflix seems to be the only one that realizes this, and has started producing their own content (e.g. House of Cards and Arrested Development), and I think this is the only true catalyst that will change the industry for the better.

<comment><USER3> I don't know how Netflix producing content and making it exclusive to their subscription service is a win for consumers.

<comment><USER2> I'm not saying it's a perfect model, but the alternative is having to pay $100/month for a cable subscription to watch garbage you don't want to see, or $10+ to see it in a dirty movie theater, or $15 to "buy" a movie that was $15 in the 90's for a physical DVD. Even if there are 5 Netflixes competing against each other I would rather pay 5 x $7.99 a month to watch content I actually find relevant than pay for junk I don't use.

If anything, merging content with distribution sparks competition to produce content at reasonable prices. Netflix has also resorted to releasing content in a more enjoyable manner (all at once vs. weekly with commercials).

<comment><USER4> > Even if there are 5 Netflixes competing against each other [producing their > own content] I would rather pay 5 x $7.99 a month

You've just described cable. If those subscriptions start to come in packages we're back to square one.

<comment><USER5> The original point was that a "netflix" provides better content than cable to start with.

The argument against it was that the company providing the content would be exclusively providing that content.

The rebuttal is that it would be better to pay 5 companies that all produce exclusive content than to pay for cable, which "provides" mostly stuff you don't want to see (and frequently don't have the option to not watch, if you're viewing any of their content, ie: commercials).

<comment><USER4> And my rebuttal is that paying 5 (or 10, 20, 50) companies that all produce exclusive content _is almost exactly what cable is_ , the only differences are you pay a middleman instead of the companies directly, and usually can't choose individual providers, they come in preset packages.

I'd rather see independent producers distributing their content over various netflix-like providers, otherwise we're just transplanting our current content production model to the web. That will suck for both consumers _and_ producers.

<comment><USER5> "Netflix seems to be the only one that realizes this, and has started producing their own content (e.g. House of Cards and Arrested Development), and I think this is the only true catalyst that will change the industry for the better."

There's a big difference between a company like Netflix producing their own content, making it available for watching uninterrupted, whenever you like -vs- any of the content providers that charge cable companies for their content streams that include commercials and are generally not available "on demand", packaged together through a single company that won't give you just the content you want, when you want it, but charges you for some combination of provider's streams in a package.

Hence the argument of "the alternative is having to pay $100/month for a cable subscription to watch garbage you don't want to see". 5x7.99 is not the cost of cable. The only cable packages you can get for that price are extremely limited. Also, they will require another $4.99 a month for on-demand, on top of your regular cable fee, unless you're paying more than $100 a month, in which case, it's included. ¬.¬

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "only available [...] in the US and UK"

Can anybody think of any geo-tarded service that successfully rolled out in other countries later?

Because as some not in the "chosen countries" I always feel that those services either a) never arrive, b) get beaten to the punch by local competitors or c) have to spend a shitload of money to conquer that market, sometimes by buying the aforementioned competitors.

Also, unless the likes of Google or Apple are behind it, option a seems to be the most common scenario. Not to mention the fact that it fosters a culture where everyone and their grandmother knows how to pirate content.

<comment><USER7> > Can anybody think of any geo-tarded service that successfully rolled out in > other countries later?

Rdio, iTunes Music Store, iTunes Movie/TV Store, Netflix, Amazon's digital services, etc were all unavailable in Canada on launch and successfully rolled out later on.

<comment><USER6> Canada gets serviced fast compared to the rest of the world.

In (most of) Europe, Rdio has little impact. Same goes for iTunes video. Netflix and Amazon digital are still missing.

iTunes Music is the only exception, but only because of the full weight of Apple and the tie-in with Apple's playback devices.

Canadian bitching about US services being unavailable is a bit of joke if you consider the rest of us are still waiting for Netflix _for over a decade_. There aren't even any decent alternatives because the copyright mafia makes it impossible.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I hope this means Rdio is going to be a more sustainable long-term business, and not that Rdio is pivoting away from music; Rdio seems to be the best of a shaky lot when it comes to subscription music services, and I'd hate for it to get worse.

<comment><USER9> Its pretty hard to beat Spotify unless you have some specific taste in music they dont cover well. But overall I have a hard time seing a better service than theirs.

It just works, is fast and has a large db of content.

<comment><USER10> I've tried both and have stuck with Rdio. The social aspect is superior. I love being able to see playlists and recommendations from random people beyond my Facebook friends. Spotify's desktop app is definitely faster, though I find Rdio to be better designed.

<comment><USER11> But there is a BIG difference here if we're talking about the free services of both. Spotify is always free, and rdio is only free for 6 months. Yes it's probably a good thing to pay for a service that you like (I do), but some people don't, and that's going to be where they prefer Spotify.

[http://support.spotify.com/us/learn- more/faq/#!/article/How-...](http://support.spotify.com/us/learn- more/faq/#!/article/How-much-music-can-be-played-using-Spotify-Free-3)

[http://help.rdio.com/customer/portal/articles/187730-rdio- fo...](http://help.rdio.com/customer/portal/articles/187730-rdio-for-free)

<comment><USER12> I'd rather be cut off honestly than hectored into subscribing by having my music continuously interrupted with advertising.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The problem that no one is solving is ownership. If I pay $15 for movie from vdio, what happens if that company goes away? Why can't I switch my collection from iTunes to amazon, etc...

Ultimetly that is the top reason I avoid buying digital content. It's a frustrating issue, and legislation should be passed to guarantee consumer protection on their digital goods.

<comment><USER14> This gets brought up every time anyone talks about any media streaming services, but has it ever been shown that consumers _care_?

<comment><USER15> They don't care pre-emptively, but it only takes getting burned once after sinking hundreds or thousands into a dead platform that they start to get skeptical.

<comment><USER16> I'm sure any customers of Walmart Music are reluctant to fall for this again.

[http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2008/09/wal-mart- latest...](http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2008/09/wal-mart-latest-to- shut-down-drm-key-servers/)

<comment><USER15> Sad to say, but I think it's a simple matter of enough people getting burned for the scales to tip on non-DRM content.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The aspect of Rdio which most appeals to me is their subscription model. Vdio doens't have that, so I'll stick with the Appleverse thankyouverymuch. Has better integration into my life.

<comment><USER18> My thoughts exactly—minus the Appleverse, which to me, is still not good enough.

Not Good Enough—I want a subscription to all TV shows, delivered to my television when they air or after, on-demand, at any price. I will pay over $100 per month for this subscription, if it's a good user experience.

 _No one does this yet._ Pirating is not a cheaper alternative, it is a _higher quality_ alternative. People are still paying to pirate television, not because it's cheaper than cable, but because it is _far better_ than cable.

Come on networks! Get with it. People want this.

<comment><USER17> I'm with you, but given that no one does this yet, if I am going to be paying $3-$6 to watch something, I'd rather do it on my Apple TV.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> So...its another pay per item video service? Odd coming from rdio, which I've come to associated with unlimited streaming. Not cheap either, at $15 to buy a movie

<comment><USER20> $15? I'd rather buy the DVD.

<comment><USER21> How much does it cost to rent?

<comment><USER19> For the ones I've seen, $3-5, which is reasonable enough

<comment><USER21> Thats not bad. I can't wait to try this tonight. If I can rent out a whole season of some show for 3-5, then we have something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm looking up and down here for the differentiator that would get iTunes or Amazon Instant Video customers to switch to Vdio, and all I'm seeing is a lack of living-room device partnerships plus customer library lock-in on the Apple and Amazon platforms. How on earth will Vdio compete?

<comment><USER23> I agree. What is unique here? I really hope they have some advantageous licensing deal that nobody else can get or plans to do something, anything, different... otherwise this is a waste of time and investor money.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I love that there's motion in this industry, but I don't have any reason to use this instead of iTunes via Apple TV. And I _really_ want to, because I love Rdio.

But as others have said in this thread, the main seller for Rdio is that I pay a set price every month and I can listen to anything I want.

I would gladly pay upwards of $10-20/month for full access to more TV shows than Netflix gives me. And maybe a movie rental or two per month.

</comment><comment><USER25> I'm not really sure what this service is. Their explanation was pretty ambiguous, and they never clarified whether this was a subscription service, an a la carte rental service, or just a social layer on top of other content providers. The first two are relatively unremarkable; this is a crowded market and they are several years behind. Social viewing is only attractive is there is something to view, and, at least initially, their library is almost certainly going to be inferior to those of Amazon, Netflix and Apple.

</comment><comment><USER26> Only the US and UK - that's disappointing seeing as how Rdio served Canada early, and that's part of the reason I gave them a shot, and really love them now.

But it doesn't look like it'll be the unlimited streaming variety, so i'm not sure how this can compete with Netflix.

</comment><comment><USER27> Honestly, why would I choose this over iTunes? I love Rdio (I'm a former Zune pass subscriber, and Rdio far better replacement than Spotify), but in what way is this better or different than the competition? The price and catalog appear to be pretty much identical.

<comment><USER28> And why would I choose that over Amazon Prime's pay-per-view services?

It'd be great if they had a subscription plan like Rdio or Spotify (similarly to Netflix), but it seems there are too many copyright and profitability issues involved.

<comment><USER29> I believe where iTunes differentiates itself from the streaming services is offline. The video you get is prefetched, so you don't need access to a large bandwidth pipe in order to view your content, and you can also store them on an iOS device or iPod and view the content anywhere. I'm not personally aware of other digital video services that work like this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> This looks really neat! However, I'm going to echo a lot of other people on this thread and ask if we really need another pay-to-watch video service? Amazon Prime, iTunes and Netflix are already very big players in the market, and though I'd love for Rdio/Vdio to race ahead of the competition, I don't think a pay-per-item business model is the way to do it. A subscription service with unlimited streaming is what got me hooked on Rdio in the first place; I hope they are able to apply the same model to Vdio soon.

That being said, I immediately loved the interface for Vdio. I wish they had the grey/yellow interface for Rdio also, looks a whole lot better than the Blue on White they have right now.

</comment><comment> k-mcgrady The UI is really pretty but I don't see why I would use this over iTunes. It seems about the same price (maybe slightly more expensive for rentals) and I'm locking my content up with a company I'm not sure will be around 15 years from now - I have more confidence iTunes will. I'll definitely try it though with the generous £20 credit.

If they can move this to a subscription model where I can pay £20 per month for full music, film, and TV streaming I will pay in a heartbeat. Netflix definitely has the jump on them though, especially now that they are getting into original content and based on House of Cards, they are doing a very good job of it.

</comment><comment><USER31> Re profile visibility, I think they need to separate Rdio and Vdio. I might want to share the music I listen to, but not the movies I watch. Currently you can set both public, or both private, but not a mix.

Even if you set it "private", the opt-in seems a little "scary". They seem to want you to consent repeatedly that they're not violating the Video Privacy Protection Act[1] regardless of what they do?

[1]: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_Privacy_Protection_Act>

</comment><comment><USER32> I have a hard time justifying TV or Movie prices since I am going to watch once or twice VS music that I will listen to forever. Interestingly enough they offer plenty of music services to stream audio and very few for video where (at least for me) it would make far more sense as I am only going to watch once and I don't care much about owning the rights to it.

</comment><comment><USER33> Just like Rdio, I love everything about the look and feel of the product. Like many others have pointed out, this is different than Rdio's monthly subscription plan in that you have to buy individual items. Though a lot of engineering work seems to have gone into this feature, I hope it isn't set in stone and that the unlimited streaming will come for videos.

</comment><comment><USER34> For those of you with a US or UK credit card who are located _outside_ the US or UK, contact me and I'll set you up with an account on a spare Linode I have in the US or UK so you can use that as a SOCKS5 proxy (via SSH). I'll let you kick the tires for a bit and after that it's $20/yr. otbdto [at] gmail. Please include your SSH public key.

</comment><comment><USER35> Definitely an impressive selection. And I love Rdio's interface, so porting it to video is pretty cool by me.

All the interviews I've seen say they want to get to the subscription model in the long run, but for now content selection was more important.

They seem to be having some load problems though :-/.

</comment><comment><USER36> > Vdio is only available to Rdio Unlimited subscribers in the US and UK

I'm tired of this crap. This is the internet, why does my country f __ __* matter? I pay in dollars like everyone else.

You need to weave better partnerships with your content providers, or you lose me to The Pirate Bay.

</comment><comment><USER37> I think this is great!

I'm getting this <http://d.pr/i/UqZn> every time I try to play a preview though.

Hopefully this will also be available on mobile!

</comment><comment><USER38> The MPAAfia can't complain about piracy in "all those stupid little countries out there" (i.e. everyone but US, Canada, UK) until they can actually make these paid services available to everyone.

</comment><comment><USER39> The reason I like this is because it is browser-based (vs itunes must be used as an app). At the very least, if you are a Rdio subsciber, you get $25 free credit for Vdio.

</comment><comment><USER40> Looks like they beat Spotify's rumored service to the punch. I am curious how Spotify will one-up this, and how this service will do compared to existing competitors.

</comment><comment><USER41> Oh, thanks again for limiting region availability. I think I'll have to stay in permanent vpn state:(

</comment><comment><USER42> Sigh, I'm on Ubuntu and it's not loading video. Why does this not surprise me.

</comment><comment><USER43> If this were a Netflix of Hulu price model they could really be a threat but I don't really know what to say about this. I'm an Rdio subscriber, I bought subscriptions for my family for Christmas but I'll never use this.</comment>


High-Performance Infinite List in JavaScript - <AUTHOR> http://roeierez.github.io/infinite-list/

<comment><USER2> Rendering to the DOM only what the user can see unfortunately breaks the browser's "find" feature. I hope that this technique does not become more popular than it already is. That way the rest of the web, other than Facebook's news feed, can continue to be searchable.

<comment><USER3> I wonder how you plan to support the browsers 'find' feature on an infinite list.

<comment><USER4> This is also a problem on mobile wikipedia. I wonder if a feature for this shouldn't be added to browsers

<comment><USER5> Finally, a use for the HTTP SEARCH method?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This seems neat and advanced. Didn't try it since I'm not on a mobile device at the moment though.

The submission could have used the word "scrolling" to make it clear this is about UI lists.

I thought it was about an infinite list _data type_ , some variant of a generator or something.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Very High performance infinite list for mobile devices that besides GPU acceleration uses concepts like recycling DOM elements and minimize rendering tasks on low frame rate. All for the purpose of smooth scrolling.

<comment><USER7> I don't know much about html, what do you do in html for GPU acceleration? Is not it enabled by default? Or there are some things that the programmer should be aware of that highly impacts rendering due to GPU?

<comment><AUTHOR> This refers to a technique where each item is rendered on a different layer in the page. Because of that, when moving an item to a new position it does not require 'painting' the affected area. There are some style attributes that causes the browser to create new layer for the HTML element like 'translate3d'. Tests proves that browser uses GPU for Compositing these layers which is a lot faster when the CPU does this job. explained here more briefly: [https://www.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/gpu- acc...](https://www.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/gpu-accelerated- compositing-in-chrome)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> All the demos items are the same height. A big problem I have seen in the past has been with items with varying height. This makes it difficult to swap in new content because you don't know the height ahead of time. It might make for a a more impressive demo if you include random text in those cards. I haven't looked through the source yet since I am on a mobile device, but if you managed to solve that pain point, great work!

</comment><comment><USER9> Just this morning I released a Mithril infinite list. It supports flexible heights, list/grid, and handles batches of results (basically "pages"): [https://github.com/ArthurClemens/mithril- infinite](https://github.com/ArthurClemens/mithril-infinite)

</comment><comment><USER10> So this is only for touch-based devices? Trying scrolling with the mouse/trackpad, nothing happens :(

<comment><AUTHOR> for now yes. If you say you need it for desktop I am willing to add this support, it should be easy. to see the scrolling effect now you can simply drag or flick the list even from desktop.

<comment><USER11> Small recommendation - make the demo more obvious. I skimmed through the article looking for it and couldn't find it until I hit Cmd + F

<comment><AUTHOR> got it, thanks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Well done. Thanks for posting.</comment>


Which lines of longitude and latitude pass through the most countries? - <AUTHOR> https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2929721.html <comment><USER2> This line passes right on the Delphi, Greece. Known as the center of earth (Ομφαλός της γης), named by the ancient Greek people. coincidence? I think so.

<comment> racer-v I'm trying to identify exactly what the borders of "the Delphi" are. UNESCO identifies it as "between two towering rocks of Mt. Parnassus". Liakouras is said to be the highest peak of Parnassus - would the Delphi be between there and the second highest peak?

[http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/393](http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/393)

<comment><USER2> Trying to get directions of the Delphi like the ancients is pretty fun there is a 'Maps' link on the page, [http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/393/multiple=1&unique_number=4...](http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/393/multiple=1&unique_number=453)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I wonder what great circle or small circle passes through the most countries. Looks like a fun optimization problem.

<comment><USER4> I'm not sure if you have seen this: [https://marcinciura.wordpress.com/2015/11/17/slicing- earth-c...](https://marcinciura.wordpress.com/2015/11/17/slicing-earth- carefully/) — loading country polygons instead of land polygons and changing the LengthOfIntersectionInKm() function should be enough to answer your question. Be wary, however, that parts of France lie in Africa and the Americas ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_department](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overseas_department)).

<comment><USER5> just count the mainland.

<comment><USER4> Doesn't work for island countries. Think Japan, Philippines, or Indonesia.

<comment><USER5> then just use the biggest islands.

<comment><USER6> Then you would ignore 98% of the territory of the Republic of Maldives.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Reminds me of this app. Showing what lies directly across the ocean: [https://ranlot.shinyapps.io/coastlinetrip/](https://ranlot.shinyapps.io/coastlinetrip/)

<comment><USER8> Enjoy! [http://andywoodruff.com/blog/beyond-the- sea/](http://andywoodruff.com/blog/beyond-the-sea/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> That reminds me of this fun question: what is the only U.S. city such that going in all four cardinal directions enters the same neighboring state?

<comment><USER10> City of New York and the neighboring state being New Jersey?

<comment><USER11> The southernmost tip of Staten Island works if you count the part of the bay that belongs to NJ.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> So Chad and Sudan would be the only countries that are in both lists of countries?

<comment><USER13> On account of the vastness of the Pacific ocean, there's broad scope for the antipodeal intersection to be outside of any nation state.

Someone (Charles Darwin's son George?) proposed that the Pacific basin was a consequence of the moon being spun off from the Earth, but plate tectonics put an end to that theory.

[https://imgur.com/r/Mapporn/QDeiIpc](https://imgur.com/r/Mapporn/QDeiIpc)

[http://lunarorigin.com/lunar-origin-models/](http://lunarorigin.com/lunar- origin-models/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I didn't realize latitude and longitude lines have width.

<comment><USER15> The fine article says:

"In fact there is quite a wide band, between the westernmost point of Bulgaria at 22°31'35.2"E, and the easternmost point of Slovakia at 22°33'32.1", which passes through no less than 26 countries. This is 22 km wide at the equator, but obviously narrows as you get closer to the poles."

<comment><USER16> yes, I think the idea is that there's an infinite number of infinitely thin lines between 22°31'35.2"E, and 22°33'32.1"

<comment><USER17> That idea sounds somewhat derivative.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Did I miss the point of this?

<comment><USER19> That it's an interesting question?

<comment><USER20> No. Yours was.</comment></comment></comment>


Facebook's Giant Internet-Beaming Drone Finally Takes Flight - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2016/07/facebooks-giant-internet-beaming-drone-finally-takes-flight/ <comment><USER2> How is this practical & cost effective vs. satellites?</comment>


This Book Could Remove The Myth About Vim Learning Curve - <AUTHOR> http://www.jovicailic.org/2014/07/vim-learning-curve-myth-book/

<comment><USER2> This is a promotion for the book.</comment>


Why good governments should embrace open data - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2014/01/04/5-reasons-why-good-governments-should-embrace-open-data/

<comment><USER2> I'm a programmer in the medical field, and have heard complaints that some state medical boards keep important information behind pay-walls, like which doctors are sanctioned. (I wish I knew the details, but don't work directly with state medical boards.)

Did you new doctor just move from another state? Do you want to know if he was declared incompetent by the other states medical board? Then pay up.

I wonder if they do this out of greed, or they consider it genuinely expensive to give this data out. It makes me think of all the large corporations; often they make tasks I could automate with a few lines of Python sound nearly impossible.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> This is an excellent article to read. I am very impressed with the thoughts. Here are some of the best quotes(for those who r in hurry or that TL;DR): We're a long way from where we need to be — and end that will require governments to change, too. "No one tries to judge what uses people will have for it," he said, "but having the information enables people to derive whatever they need." 'Are we saving money with open data?' The only question I would suggest public agencies should focus on is 'Are we doing the right thing? Are we making our data available and machine-consumable to our communities?'"

</comment><comment><USER3> Take the Courts... want to know which attorneys have received court sanctions? Which routinely make cases drag out the longest? Who has the most aggressive motion practice resulting in denied pleadings? Which Judges are often overturned? In short, which attorneys/judges are regularly in disservice of the process? Well you can't in State jurisdictions. No meta-data, no detailed data online. Billions of dollars wasted on unnecessary litigation, backed up courts and prolonged dispute resolutions that could be saved.

</comment><comment><USER4> It seems like the current state of the industry is that open data is more of a privilege than a right. I was at a conference where a prominent figure of a large US city stated that he "doesn't support open data because these programmers take the data, repackage it, and sell it to other people." As a developer, it is hard to eradicate these fallacies, especially from people who are performing a duty where stubbornness and unwillingness to change are part of the job description.

</comment><comment><USER5> The team I'm a part of designed and built the platform Palo Alto uses to publish their financial data, OpenGov.com.

I don't generally put in plugs on HN but we're always looking for people interested in making a difference with the intersection of good government and tech. Drop me a line if you're interested firstname.lastname@example.com.

<comment><AUTHOR> OpenGov is a very nice initiative. I did not know any such project in existence at all. One thing is for sure that in order to build trust one need to be transparent and accountable. Who says modern technology won't solve into Govt. related issues? This great initiative is a perfect answer. Keep up the good work. Thanks for sharing with us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Three words: no thanks NSA. How about the government fix potholes and explain where the gas excise tax revenues actually go...</comment>


Ask YC: Founder agreements - <AUTHOR>

The legal docs (http://www.ycombinator.com/seriesaa.html) are a great resource provided by YC.  I was wondering what initial founder agreement documents people use.  Also is there any specific things that should be avoided including types of companies, specific agreement clauses, etc. <comment><USER2> i do tech, while my "parnter" does business. at the beginning he tried to convince me to incorporate right away and investing money (eg, 5k each) in a company bank account from which we would pay ourselves (eg, 10% of initial/mo). the problem is that as a developer i'd invest huge amounts of time in a product while he used the money to 'travel' for business meetings. if things flopped i'd come out with 0 compensation and opportunity loss, while he'd have used our money to network (and possibly use the product in consulting gigs to boot!).

he's actually a good, honest guy (just because a businessman is strategic doesn't mean he isn't honest).

anyway, the plan we went with instead is to stay separate and retain complete ownership of our work and costs until we each meet our goals. then we join forces. my goal is to build the demos, while his is to raise venture.

having a good business partner is crucial for success. someone who knows the market, users, customers and can sell the product. no reason why he shouldn't prove himself useful just like a developer. my main point is that developers tend to be naive and agree to proposals out of respect for teamwork and simplicity. don't give up ownership too easily.</comment>


Node Docker image broken - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/nodejs/docker-node/issues/649 <comment><USER2> Never ever use :latest unless its in your docker-compose DEV file. Try to treat docker images like you would dependencies.

We always lock down to specific versions, but we also use a self hosted docker mirror to cache everything anyway.

<comment><USER3> other labels are mutable too though. That's why this broke for other tags beside latest. Use the hash instead for a hard link, but obviously won't get any security updates.

<comment><USER4> Security updates should be vetted and not auto-accepted.

There's no problem here.

<comment><USER3> Sounds like a problem that should be solved on the ci/cd level and not the underlying container registry. People use containers in different ways.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is one of the reasons I never use the latest version of any docker image, so I don't repeat my constant struggles with npm packages breaking on minor version changes

Edit:

I see they were overwriting current tags.... well that's even worse

<comment><USER6> Latest should only be used for hackery / development, but please fix it to a stable version before release.

Overwriting tags should honestly not be possible, ever. Node / NPM did that (I think) with one of their versions too. Or was it a npm package?

<comment><USER7> > Overwriting tags should honestly not be possible, ever.

How do you propose to withdraw a release if it's broken/contains secret keys/etc.? Delete the image itself and leave the tag dangling?

<comment><USER8> If secrets are published, there is no way to 'unpublish' them. Consider them burned.

But they mean: images can be removed, but you should not be able to publish 2 different images with the same tag. Then you never know which version of those two you got.

<comment><USER7> "Published" doesn't always mean "public." You can publish something to an internal company repo, and still want to remove it in case an unscrupulous coworker ever joins and digs through your history.

Also, consider "secrets" in the "Personally Identifiable Information" sense, or the "confidential information shared to you by a third party" sense. If these are published, someone might see them; but the longer they _stay_ published, the _more_ people might see them, so you have an obligation to remove them.

Also, re: reusing a tag, what about having already announced a release version number, and tagging the release with it, only to find out the release is broken? It's kind of problematic to have to bump the version again when the previous version didn't even go out to anyone.

I would propose a slightly more relaxed rule: you shouldn't be able to erase/overwrite a tag once there exist other tags in the repo with creation or signing timestamps newer than those of the targeted tag. So you can overwrite something you just created, but not something that's "history."

(An alternative to this would be if tags had nicknames or "object versions", like in an S3 bucket. If you could have a v1.0.0 "tag" that first pointed to a static v1.0.0+1 ref, and then to a v1.0.0+2 ref, where clients don't see the static ref tags but can still check them out using some special syntax in combination with the visible tag—and where you can revoke a static ref, but not overwrite it—that'd probably make everyone happy.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Ah yes, this happens from time to time when you use somebody else's repositories with somebody else's package retention. That's why production should only use repositories that change in ways that are predictable to you (OS upstream, your own, and usually nothing else).

<comment><USER10> huh? so like, don't use open source libraries?

<comment><USER11> That's not what the OP is trying to say, though they have a hard time coming out and saying it, and their reply to you doesn't help matters.

Instead, what they are saying is that you should 1) use a specific version, and 2) host that version in a location you control. This way, updates don't impact your build just because you clamp to the latest (which is a moving target). Also, if they happen to rerelease a tag which worked for a previous build you made and now doesn't, you are still pulling in the same thing.

Basically, if you depend on something, host it yourself. Otherwise, you are asking to be bit by this.

<comment><USER7> > host that version in a location you control

I don't see how this is implied or required by what the GP said. Lockfiles exist; docker-image and OS package hash-refs exist. Heck, nix exists. Getting what you expected to get is a solved problem, and does not require "host[ing] it yourself."

Now, _availability_ of your deployment might require hosting it yourself. (Though more often your availability figures will be far worse than those of Docker Hub or launchpad.net.)

<comment><USER12> I mean, up until last year someone could permanently depublish entire packages from certain package managers without restriction. No amount of hash-refs are going to ensure you have the right package if it just doesn't exist anymore.

I think availability is exactly what dozzie was getting at by specifying 'production'.

You want your production systems to be robust, not reliable at the whims of half a dozen different ecosystems all with different policies, procedures, humans, support agreements, etc. (This is without even touching on infrastructure availability.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Was this untested or something?

I certainly don't see any unit tests as part of the commit that triggered this issue

(Yes, even, or perhaps especially, command line commands should be tested, somehow.)

</comment><comment><USER14> well i mean it's broken if you use yarn. which isn't a standard part of node, so like, not really?

<comment><USER15> It's not standard, true, but it's also not an experimental feature, so one still wouldn't expect them to do wacky things like overwrite tags. I think many people expect version tagged code to not change, unless the developers specifically say they are nightly/experimental (there is a comment to that effect on the issue link).

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> How comes a 7 hour old, now closed, bug report on some dead simple bridging tech that abuses tags in their SCM is news?</comment>


US dating site has no 'goodwill' trademark rights in UK - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10/18/plentyoffish_trademark_ruling/ <comment><USER2> Am I reading this right? Plentyoffish is supposedly the 2nd most traffic'd dating site from UK visitors, but it doesn't have EVEN ONE registered member from the UK?

Do they block UK members? Why would they even care, then?

</comment><comment><USER3> Ahhh. POF isn't American. It's Canadian.</comment>