Why I Work for Jason Calacanis (and Freakin' Love It) - <AUTHOR> http://travisfischer.com/2010/12/05/why-i-work-for-jason-calacanis-and-freakin-love-it/

<comment><USER2> "We take afternoons off to play at the beach, play ultimate Frisbee in the park, go to the movies as a company, have Starcraft 2 nights, etc…"

Spoken like a true "jr engineer" the poster claims to be :) At some point in your life, that stuff just isn't very enticing.

Can people just go home and chill with their family while the rest of you go play frisbee, or will they be ostracized as 'not a team player' if they 'opt out' of afternoon movies/starcraft? A danger in that sort of activity is anyone who _doesn't_ join in may (or will) eventually be left out of key business information.

Glad you found somewhere you enjoy working - keep it up!

<comment><USER3> I doubt Calacanis take parts in the above activities, and likely, they segment by group, as you say.

If something universally appealing, like going to a nice restaurant or seeing a popular movie like The Social Network, you decided to opt-out of, I would be pretty put-off as an employee, or manager, if you chose not to attend.

Few things happen for individuals - if you declared that you didn't want to spend time with your company, socially, that says you don't really _love_ your job - because the people, and the committed, single vision that comes with it is what makes that adoration arise. If you don't _love_ your job, I question what great things you can truly do, given that non-commitment.

So, sure, you can be OK and opt-out. But if you do, I'm pretty certain that's exactly all you can be.

<comment><USER2> Seeing "the social network" is not universally appealing - sorry.

Restaurant, yeah, I get that. And _now and then_ group activities - sure. But weekly frisbee outings at the beach, etc - too much.

I'm a bit wary of people who _love_ the idea of working for someone else, period. If you _love_ a _job_ , I question what great things you can do.

Of course, many people from all walks of life _do_ accomplish great things in all capacities, so perhaps judging someone based on your own view of what they should and shouldn't love is a tad short-sighted.

BTW, if JC isn't participating in all those group outings, what message is that sending to everyone else? They're socially pressured in to company rah- rah BS while he's above it?

EDIT - just saw a JC reply re: activities. Cool enough - no t everyone can make everything. Got it.

<comment><USER4> _Restaurant, yeah, I get that._

Depends on the restaurant. If I don't like, for example, italian food, and the company goes to an italian restaurant, I may want to opt out. What if everyone else loved italian food and always wanted to go there? I would argue that there really isn't very much that is universally appealing.

<comment><USER2> Agreed, even that. I was trying to be charitable. Similar situation - had a group that loved seafood. I hate seafood. I'd go now and then, but angled for non-seafood places to balance things out (and it worked). Had they insisted on seafood all the time, I'd have bowed out of those gatherings (as politely as possible).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Some people are very good at recognizing talent and using it. It is a common attribute of many top CEO's in any industry.

As an outsider looking in, I perceive Jason's value to a company may be found both in his skill to identify valuable people and to market the company he is involved with through his personal exploits. Sometimes, companies work well in spite of the leadership they have as staff comes together to form and execute ideas.

At Weblogs, Brian Alvey and a slew of talented people pushed both the platform and the content to form a successful company. At Mahalo, iteration after iteration drives the product while a revolving door of staff comes and goes. Jason's latest projects including his video podcast network and independent startup conference are further examples of time and trial. On the surface, Jason's value has been to identify the right people and use each company as a platform to market himself and then his role within the company.

This history is somewhat unusual and confusing when compared with traditional employers. Especially for those that Jason prefers to hire. Young, fresh out of school, energetic and bright, Jason leverages his abilities to identify talent in order to "scoop" people who can trade their time for the chance to work for a true online legend. In many cases, it's a fair trade. However, when looked at from afar, Weblogs, Mahalo, This Week In and TechCrunch tell an interesting story that may make those with more experience, knowledge or connections think twice. "To each his own" is a valuable sentiment conveyed well by Travis in the original post.

Beyond history, I have learned to judge powerful people with a simple measure of good vs. evil. When given the opportunity, some people unknowingly make decisions that have a positive impact on the people and processes around them. Others feel more comfortable operating somewhat negatively while justifying their path by saying things such as, "I make the hard decisions" and "I'll fight until the last breath". There is no right or wrong way to make decisions but the impact of those decisions on the people and processes around them uncover what type of person they are.

With my definition of good vs. evil above in mind, and using Mahalo as a specific example, Jason can be viewed as evil. It's not always easy to do, but I strongly believe that working with people who are fundamentally good produces happy, healthy, engaged employees who truly care about the success of their company, it's culture and their leadership. Working for people who are evil produces a turnstile of employees who typically last less then 3 years at their desk and require regular additional extra curricular motivation in order to offset their frustrations.

<comment><USER6> One correction: Mahalo has had close to zero turnover in the past year. It is far from a revolving door... more like a line of folks out the door who want to get it!

Now, you are correct that my skill is in finding talent....... and developing it.... and finding markets....... and attacking them.... and raising capital...... and then more capital... and in marketing products....... and in branding/naming.... ... and motivating folks... and creating company culture.

I've basically gotten lucky like six times in a row... the streak will be over shortly.

Pure evil.

<comment><USER7> To correct Jason, I think our near zero turnover has been closer to 8-9 months long. But it's certainly improved significantly over when I started at Mahalo about a year and a half ago. I would attribute that to Jason's hiring of smart people, recognizing those with skills in areas he may be weak in, and putting them in positions where they can do something about it.

I'd say this is far from evil.

<comment><USER5> Just to be sure that I haven't misspoken: I'm not using the word evil to say that Jason is in some way similar to the devil. He's a smart guy who I'm sure has done some really nice things. I'm using evil in the context described above.

As for the turnstile of staff at Mahalo... I don't necessarily think that this is a bad thing either. I bet that without planning, groups of staff have naturally come and gone as the product has iterated. If you're in a long iteration right now, that's great news! Maybe this is the one that will "hit". The problem with turnover like this is that eventually, products start to evolve in circles. I think that Mahalo itself is a good example of this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm sorry, but every time I hear the name Jason Calacanis, I'm reminded of this sordid episode: <http://pastebin.com/u7vddNg0>

</comment><comment><USER3> Even if he absolutely hates working for Calacanis, this is a pretty brilliant kiss-ass on his part. I would've liked it better from someone who worked _previously_ for the company - those working _for_ it are a pretty biased view of what might be a blackened company culture.

Surely, having Calacanis on their side is worth this kind of post/long term commitment even if many other factors are absolutely torrid - and that kind of node-network-connection occurs in many other places, too - where the sole connection to a very influential person is pretty much the only factor holding a person at the job.

<comment><USER9> Was a little worried people would see this as me trying to win over Jason's favor. Trust me, a blog post isn't going to do that. He sees my work all day every day and if I'm not delivering, a blog post isn't going to help my relationship with him. He has a pretty good sense of "sucking up" and from what I've seen it doesn't get you far with him. :)

The purpose of the post was 1. to have a discussion about the level of commitment founders should expect from employees and 2. brag about the fact that I love my job and Mahalo it is actually a really cool company.

While I agree that hearing from previous employees would be less "biased", Mahalo has never been healthier than right now. The only people who know what Mahalo is like are those that are currently working there.

That being said, there are obviously a ton of people who have worked with Jason over the years who each have their own experiences. I can't and don't want to speak for them. Just sharing my own personal experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'd say this post is fair and balanced, but that wouldn't come out quite right :-)

<comment><USER9> It's difficult to not be "biased" when I am working for a company that I love working at. I'm not trying to give any kind of assessment of Jason Calacanis as a person over the course of his life. I'm not qualified to do that.

What I am qualified to do is share that I honestly love working at Mahalo under Jason Calacanis. I knew I would take greif for that but I wasn't going to let that stop me from just being honest about the fact that I love my job.

Thanks for the feedback.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for a nice post Travis.

<comment><USER11> The only bad thing about the post Jason, Travis..is that 99.9999% of all startups do not have enlightened people like JC running them.

In non SV cities its even worse in finding a 'JC' boss to work for as far as prospects..</comment></comment>


Android Makers Being Eaten Alive - <AUTHOR> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/19/smartphones_its_the_economics_stupid/

<comment><USER2> Commodity software, commodity hardware.

Apple have always had low volumes and fat margins built into their business model. For many years, Apple have represented about 5% of the PC market by volume but about 50% by profits. Only by locking down the entire stack can they achieve this; If you want OSX or iOS, you have to buy Apple hardware. They sell a strongly differentiated luxury product at a premium price and reap the rewards.

The Android handset market is simply following the same market forces that have shaped the PC hardware market. Acer and Asus entered the PC market at the bottom and applied relentless margin pressure on the existing players. Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo are doing the same to the smartphone market. Bad news for the established manufacturers, but great news for the consumer.

The Android market is a wonderland of good handsets at silly prices thanks to Rockchip, Mediatek and the white box brigade. Google are seeking to commoditise the market even further with Android One, by creating a mass- market of handsets with near identical specs for consumers in newly industrialised countries.

I'm reminded of Société Bic, a company I deeply admire. They took expensive consumer durables (cigarette lighters, fountain pens, safety razors) and figured out how to churn them out in plastic for pennies a piece. They made these products into utterly unremarkable commodity items, and in doing so made them accessible to the very poorest.

Within a decade or two, I fully expect there to be a powerful internet- connected computer in the pocket of every man, woman and child on earth. That is a triumph of engineering, a beacon of hope for humanity, and an opportunity for software developers that will make the dot-com boom look like a yard sale by comparison.

</comment><comment><USER3> This isn't an Android problem, it's an industry problem. Just like Samsung, Apple relies on a huge amount of marketing to push its phones, and at some point that's going to outweigh its profits.

But it's a problem only for the manufacturers, and it's the same problem as many industries - commoditization. Smartphones are becoming a commodity, just like everything, and they'll be made cheaply in volume by no-name manufacturers with razor-thin margins. Which is great for customers!

<comment><USER4> > Just like Samsung, Apple relies on a huge amount of marketing

I'm not sure "just like" is warranted there since Samsung spent $12-14bn on marketing in 2013 and Apple spent $1.1bn (Asymco numbers).

> at some point that's going to outweigh its profits

Which were $37bn in 2013. They'll be ok for a good few years.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> This editorialized article reads like it was written by a Apple appologist. I highly doubt that the iPhone 6 will single handedly cause the demise of the Android platform.</comment>


Ask HN: 32 bit Windows server VS 64 - <AUTHOR>

I currently have a 64 bit server on Rackspace.  I am noticing that there are just too many limitations to using 64 bit Windows Server, like not being able to install php, and other things.
My question is are there any reason I should keep the 64 bit server?  I can quickly spin up a new server instance in 32 bit and transfer over the current sites.  I figure it would only take a few hours to do so.
Thanks in advance. <comment><USER2> And other things? If you are trying to run a bunch of open source stuff then perhaps you are going to run into compatibility issues - I don't have much experience trying to do this on windows. Presumably with IIS 7 and it's built in fcgi support PHP should be doable. If you are looking at hosting any of Microsoft's server products like exchange, sql server, SharePoint, or basically any new server they come up with, the 64 bit version of the OS is recommended if not required (for instance with exchange 2007+ you can't use a 32 bit OS) Even the .NET stack for web I would go with a 64 bit OS. Server 2008 R2 is a really awesome server if you are in windows land.

EDIT:

How to enable fastcgi and fix some issues running PHP.

<http://tinyurl.com/278ra9l>

The fix from MS for windows 2008 64bit:

<http://tinyurl.com/2685nmz>

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm sorry I should have clarified it is a Server 2003 instance.

<comment><USER2> What specific apps are you having problems with besides PHP? This may help for server 2003 and PHP. <http://www.iis.net/download/fastcgi>

<comment><AUTHOR> I attempted to install Ontime but it relies on a 32 bit dll to run.

<comment><USER2> If you just want to host some bug tracking software then I don't suppose it matters if you use 32 or 64 OS. Though, frankly I would look to someone else to host and maintain that kind of stuff so you can concentrate on development. I also never install that on a production server that is hosting your site.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you, I will do the php install on my current x64 server and not worry about 32 bit dlls until the time comes up again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> 32-bit Windows is deprecated. Windows 2003 is on its way out.

If it's easy to spin up a new server instance, move to Windows 2008R2 x64 as soon as possible, and save yourself the pain.

</comment><comment><USER4> If you are using PHP, then why do you need Windows? Any Linux based VPS will do the same task and at a lower cost.</comment>


Ask HN: How to display Different version of Same Website for Different Users - <AUTHOR>

I was wondering if it's possible to create a website which acts like this :
Person X goes to example.com and sees one version Person Y goes to example.com and sees another version of the site ( which might differ thematically or functionally as well ).
How easy or hard is it to achieve this? I know some websites use ISP information to redirect customers away (eg: Pandora) - but it's only a static webpage. Is it possible to have two fully functional sites running simultaneously for different sets of users? <comment><USER3> Once you can distinguish person X from person Y, showing something different is the easiest thing.

And yes, it is of course possible to do what you want, once you can figure out who is visiting your site: X or Y? That's the harder part.

</comment><comment><USER4> The big question is: what rules/logic are you using to show each version? Do you want it randomly displayed or based on some parameter?

<comment><AUTHOR> Well, it could be as simple as modifying the theme based on the location - <USER2> even modifying functionality (say, provide extra features to people in particular regions).

<comment><USER5> You have access to a number of different data points -- cookies, IPs, language accept sets, etc. The difficult part is deciding what you want to pivot on. Also helps to know the limitations of each of those methods (e.g. IP addr isn't always accurate, especially not withing 15 miles or so, but it's decent at guessing countries).</comment></comment></comment>


Why The Founders of PayPal And HotorNot Helped This Dropout - <AUTHOR> http://mixergy.com/jared-kim-wegame

<comment><USER2> Really great interview- this is actually my favorite on Mixergy so far.

As an aside, I don't know why there's always a bunch of hate on Andrew and Mixergy when these threads come up. Personally, I appreciate it when his interviews are linked on HN, as this is how I hear when there's a particularly good one live.

<comment><USER3> I think it's really the smug air that surrounds Mixergy and Andrew. (Disclaimer, haven't met the guy, but from his site, I'm afraid I don't really want to.)

You have an excellent point though that selective HN highlighting of half- decent content actually minimises exposure to the site.

<comment><USER4> Jennie, could you be more specific? I know I have a lot of room to improve. That's why I ask for feedback at the end of most of my videos.

I know you work. You have a good sense of style. I'll take all the advice you're willing to give. mail at awarner dot com is my personal email address.

<comment><USER5> I had a similar feeling until I read about your own personal experiences and saw what a hustler spirit you have.

Not smug though. But too polished.

This may help: [http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/03/its_how_you_...](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2006/03/its_how_you_tel.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> brown9-2 _If you like this interview, could you vote for it on Hacker News? --Andrew_

I really wish people wouldn't do crap like this.

<comment><USER6> Why? Because he wants to reach an audience? He didn't say "If you want 5 bucks, could you vote for it on Hacker News?". If don't like it, don't vote for it.

<comment> brown9-2 Well, I didn't, but I didn't think begging for votes was really accepted behavior either.

The goal around here, AFAIK, isn't to get the most votes but to have a quality discussion. This guy is just begging you to get links to his site voted up, probably so he can get more eyeballs/ad revenue.

<comment><USER6> _...but to have a quality discussion_

Some articles & videos speak for themselves. See <http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html> .

 _What to Submit

On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity._</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Zoom Sued for Fraud over Privacy, Security Flaws - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-08/zoom-sued-for-securities-fraud-over-privacy-security-flaws <comment><USER2> I don't understand this. Using Zoom isn't mandatory! If you don't like it, switch to another product.

</comment><comment><USER3> Zoom is getting so much bad press last weeks, and still people keep using it more and more. lol

Any exposure is good exposure in the PR/Marketing world I guess.

<comment><USER4> And the stock is not even really dipping.</comment></comment>


2 Montessori schools in NYC accept Bitcoin payments for tuition - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/business-40447963 <comment><USER2> Unrelated to bitcoin: I know very little of what montessori schools are like abroad, but I went to a very good, small montessori school in Europe, and I firmly believe (well, as firmly as I can without repeated controlled trials) that I would not be half the hacker and tinkerer without it.

Allowing childrens natural curiosity fuel their learning, and providing the physical aids to stoke that fire is probably as good as it gets within the framework of hey-we-have-these-things-called-national-standards-our-kids-must- meet.</comment>


Train Your Subconscious Mind to Think Positive - <AUTHOR> https://mindfulnessquest.com/how-to-train-your-subconscious-mind-to-think-positive/ <comment><USER2> There are many resources to discover mindful meditation. A trite blog article stuffed with ads, email plugs, and reseller links is not the place to start.

</comment><comment><USER3> To the submitter of this article-- thank you!

These are great days to work on positive thinking.

</comment><comment><USER4> If anyone is interested in getting into meditation, I can highly recommend Sam Harris' app Waking Up.

I've tried many techniques during the years, and attended a ten day Vipassana, and haven't ever experienced such clear instructions, without the spiritual voodoo bullshit as Waking Up.</comment>


The Atlantic posts sponsored Scientology story, moderates comments - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/scientology/archive/2013/01/david-miscavige-leads-scientology-to-milestone-year-/266958/ <comment><USER2> Without delving into the specifics of Scientology, I am reminded of a grellas quotation: "The most valuable asset of a lawyer is his reputation."

This applies to some journalistic endeavors as well. In some cases, I seek out the thoughts of those whose facts are unreliable, because their opinions are interesting or novel. But just as often, I seek out long-form, descriptive pieces to learn what reliable people believe is true. I cannot validate every aspect of the outside world, so I trust others to do this. When they are frequently right, like Nate Silver, say, I trust them more. When they lend their brand to more bizarre groups, I trust them less, not because the sponsored link itself changes the truth of the rest of the articles, but because it signals a lack of judgment that might have a common source with many other important and difficult decisions a magazine or newspaper must make.

For instance, when I read the Economist, I feel rather confident in their facts. They have a particular fiscally conservative slant, but in general they have proven to be realistic and relevant. They might not espouse particularly novel solutions, but they lay a solid framework for further thought. As it is, The Atlantic is reasonably trusted. That's almost surely the reason Scientology would like to place a sponsored story there, in addition to, or in lieu of, more popular outlets.

In the coming transformation of journalism, institutions like The Atlantic, or newer upstarts like Svbtle, will have to consider sponsored posts and similar "brand-lending." When they do, they'll have to decide whether they want to be a trusted brand, or an interesting one.

<comment><USER3> Judging by this sponsored story, it seems that the people running The Atlantic have already decided to turn this august publication into an "interesting" brand. It's a shame.

What doesn't make sense to me is that The Atlantic supposedly became profitable a couple of years ago -- see [http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/business/media/13atlantic....](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/business/media/13atlantic.html) \-- which, if true, means they didn't actually need to do this!

<comment><USER4> > The Atlantic supposedly became profitable couple of years ago

Things change fast.

<comment><USER5> Things change quickly.

[This message from the Adverb Defence League]

<comment><USER6> "Fast" has been used as an adverb since at least Old English…

<http://i.imgur.com/GuFFX.png>

<comment><USER5> Things have changed, gradually.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Please consider writing a letter to the Editor (at this url: <http://www.theatlantic.com/contact/>). Here's what I wrote:

Hello,

I've been very disappointed by Atlantic's decision to run the Scientology promo article under sponsored content ([http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/scientology/archive/201...](http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/scientology/archive/2013/01/david- miscavige-leads-scientology-to-milestone-year-/266958/)).

Despite the small label on top saying "Sponsored content" and a banner at the very bottom, which needs to be scrolled down to to be seen, I didn't feel that it had been immediately obvious that the content had been paid for and had not met the exacting standards of the Atlantic's editorial team. In fact, I had only realized that it was sponsored content once I scrolled down to the banner "sponsored by the Church of Scientology" at the very bottom.

I am afraid that continued publication of such sponsored content, especially in a subtly deceptive way like this, will invariably end up cheapening Atlantic's brand and marring your journalistic reputation. While I understand that running a magazine in the internet era is hard and subscriber revenue constitutes a smaller part of the total, I feel that the fact that this content is paid-for had absolutely not been made explicit enough and, as a subscriber, I feel that such blatant hijacking of Atlantic's identity betrays the trust of your readers and violates your journalistic duty to inform and enlighten.

Best regards,

Paul Milovanov

<comment><USER8> A friend of mine just became an associate editor at the Atlantic. He's a good guy, rational and open minded, I sent him this URL and the story URL. I'll be interested to see what he comes back with on the issue privately.

<comment><USER9> You know, it's entirely possible for something like that to have happened as a result of a poorly thought out advertising initiative without any ill intent on the part of the overwhelming majority of employees of Atlantic. While the editorial office and the executives of Atlantic should really know better than this, I'm not necessarily willing to jump to conclusions based on this single incident, which, moreover, appears to have caused them to reconsider their sponsored content policies.

I do like the idea of assuming incompetence (or negligence) before malice, and, well, clearly someone hasn't done their job to allow this to happen, but that's probably the extent of what happened.

<comment><USER10> Why does everyone jump out of the woodwork to say this? Even if this was an accident, which I doubt, it's still gross incompetency. This wasn't caught inside the institution. Who knows what other complete lies they'll publish next?

This is an accident like photoshopping images. And worse, they let the criminals / cultists moderate the comments. This further hurts subscribers who would use the forums to discuss the validity of the content.

The scientology organization has killed those they disagreed with in recent history and church doctrine still specifically allows a number of horrible actions, many ultimately fatal. They're a terrorist organization.

Subscribers should be looking into legal options. They literally paid for spam, from a hate group.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I have been one of the biggest submitters of Atlantic links to HN in the past year (and, no, The Atlantic doesn't pay me to post links) and I will now cease submitting Atlantic links. I used to submit a lot of Atlantic links to my Facebook wall too, also never, ever being paid to do so, and I will cease posting Atlantic links there too. And I think I had better write to the editors of The Atlantic, like James Fallows, and tell them why I no longer recommend their publication. I will read The Atlantic from time to time based on recommendations from other readers I trust, but I will not put my own trust on the line to support their business anymore.

AFTER EDIT: For those of you who need to detox after seeing a Scientology puff piece on the Atlantic website, I recommend the Village Voice website, which has an extensive set of articles

<http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/scientology/>

in a humorous but fact-checked manner on the inside story of Scientology.

<comment><USER12> HN should consider banning links to the Atlantic for a year.

<comment> brown9-2 Because they took questionable advertising from an organization we don't like? That's a bit much.

<comment><USER13> I'd go further. They're a dangerous, internet-hating cult.

<comment><USER14> And a literal terrorist organization.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> So they're essentially letting Scientology use The Atlantic's "brand" to trick people into reading this? (Yes, I know it says Sponsored Post)

This, on top of <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4108929> and [http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2012/06/13/reddit-...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2012/06/13/reddit- bans-the-atlantic-businessweek-in-anti-spam-crusade/) makes me pretty weary of trusting anything I read on TheAtlantic ever again

<comment><USER16> I fear what will happen when the market for pure misinformation is fully realized. When it can be delivered as seamlessly as the real thing, the opportunity for profit is massive. The Atlantic is an example of media engineering for profit that fails to trick us -- but it is much closer than sponsored content has been in the past and certainly more effective at getting me to consume it than a regular ad.

Call me a conspiracy theorist but one thing the future holds for us is more of this. Except it will take place in scientific literature, respected publications, maybe in our own homes and (purposefully or not) by the people we know and trust. We'll need a factcheck.org for regular news.

"Sponsor post" is probably as good as we will ever get from The Atlantic.

<comment><USER17> For a (hopefully) fictional example of how this could already be happening without our knowledge, check out the film "The Joneses". Pretty entertaining film too.

<comment><USER18> I don't know. Although we are talking tail end of the 90s, there's passing reference in No Logo/The Shock Doctrine (forget which, but think the former) by Naomi Klein to lifestyle marketers that would follow a couple of people in their target demo around without their knowledge.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> >Sponsor Content is created by The Atlantic's Promotions Department in partnership with our advertisers. The Atlantic editorial team is not involved in the creation of this content. Email email@example.com to learn more.

So if the Taliban wanted to pay for content they would be fine with that too.

<comment><USER20> Stories like this destroy the one major advantage established media, such as the Atlantic, has over new media. A trusted brand.

These types of ads (branded content, in feed ads or social ads, whatever we're going to call them) are just another step in the battle to outwit a readers BS detection system.

If I can easily tune out flashing banner ads, I can easily scan pass sponsored posts.

Not worth blowing valuable trust on a short term gain is it?

<comment><USER21> If you want a mindfuck, go to sears.com. Product results include, by default, items from Amazon affiliates. These dinosaurs truly have no clue what parts of their businesses could still have value.

<comment><USER22> So they are sending customers to their competitor just because they want to make a few dollars?

Losing a customer must cost them more than the affiliate payment they get.

<comment><USER23> But, much like Kris Kringle recommending Woolworths to Macy's customers in "Miracle on 34th Street", getting you the item you want elsewhere doesn't lose Sears a customer - It makes certain they'll check Sears first in the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> UPDATE: Mat Mullen, Disqus employee got a comment past the moderator (maybe he knows someone):

This is the weirdest thing I've ever read on the Atlantic. You're actually letting the Church of Scientology sponsor content on your website?

<comment><USER24> if you go watch the 'upvote' count on his comment, it is flickering rapidly, up two, down one, up one, down two - fascinating.

<comment><USER25> Now his comment seems to have gone...

<comment><USER14> Hrm, I'll be fascinated to know whether there's a COS employee of the Atlantic or whether they give moderator accounts to their advertisers, HuffPo-style.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26>
        The Atlantic editorial team is not involved in the creation of this content.

I imagine the editorial team are currently drinking a shit ton of whiskey praying that nobody associates them with this.

<comment><USER27> Haha ... I think you're probably correct, but I'll bet the writers who show up in the sidebar on the right need something a little stronger.

<comment><USER28> They're just people who've written articles for the site, not that specific article.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> The scariest part - from the article, elected government officials lend credibility:

The Church of Scientology opened its new National Affairs Office in Washington, D.C., in a ceremony led by David Miscavige. Joining him in this dedication were Members of U.S. Congress Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) and Danny Davis (D-IL); as well as Liz Gibson, Senior Program Manager, Federal Emergency Management Agency.

<comment><USER30> I can't speak to the others but I live just outside Jackson-Lee's district. That woman is certifiably insane with or without appearing at a Scientology event. She thinks Neil Armstrong went to Mars and that Venezuela is a friendly nation.

She'll do anything to get on camera—I doubt she can even _spell_ "Scientology."

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Oh the irony.

In July 2012, " _CNN's Effusive Coverage of Kazakhstan Is Quietly Sponsored by Its Subject_ " - [http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/07/cnn...](http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/07/cnns- effusive-coverage-of-kazakhstan-is-quietly-sponsored-by-its-subject/260149/)

 _Edit_ : looks like their Twitter feed (<http://twitter.com/TheAtlantic/>) is attempting some damage control by tweeting about a "the truth about Scientology" book. Heh.

<comment><USER32> I'm guessing that it's how the editors are fighting back. Remember, the sponsored content is managed by the sales team. Editorial has no input or control over that. Just think how those reporters feel.

<comment><USER33> So white supremacists or the Taliban (or even... Wikileaks!) could buy placement in _The Atlantic_ and the paper's owners would have no problem with that?

</comment></comment></comment><comment> brown9-2 There is going to be a lesson here over the next few days about how some advertising decisions can ruin a brand.

<comment><USER34> This is TERRIBLE. I really like The Atlantic, but this is one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen.

An ExxonMobile/BP ad or something would draw ire, but this feels like a wholesale sellout of their credibility, not to mention sanity.

<comment> brown9-2 Maybe this is just a brilliant move by someone at The Atlantic who wanted to demonstrate how bad of an idea sponsored content can be?

<comment><USER35> I wouldn't burn down my house to demonstrate how dangerous it is to store kerosene in the garage.

<comment><USER36> But would you burn down your office?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> This doesn't seem worth the brand damage it causes.

I actually love the Economist "special advertising sections" about countries ("Mongolia: Open for Business", etc.). Those are clearly identified and also not damaging. Maybe Mongolia isn't worthy of 16-32 pages in the Economist on its own, but the content they do publish about it tends to be at least somewhat legitimate. Not sure if that's even possible to do about Scientology.

<comment><USER8> I read a whole issue like that on Libya on a trans-Atlantic (no pun intended) flight for a Christmas party in London. Couldn't decide where to go for the break, so figured I'd hit Libya, but it was too opaque trying to sort out how to acquire a visa, so I went to Tunisia instead. Then the revolution and the whole Arab Spring kicked off, hah!

<comment><USER37> I almost went to North Africa and the Middle East in September, 2001, just because it would have been a fun and obscure trip (probably would have skipped Libya, but Tunisia/etc. for classical reasons).

<comment><USER38> A friend of mine went six weeks after it all kicked off, said he really enjoyed it and never felt in danger.

<comment><USER37> Yeah, I knew people who were in Saudi during it. I would have felt safer as an American in most of those countries than as an Arab in the US, immediately post-9/11. I think there was a news article about some westerners in Yemen post-9/11; the people they were with were quite kind.

It still would have sucked for travel, and would have been pretty scary.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Clicking on the usernames of the pro-scientology comments surprisingly yields other generic positive comments on pro-scientology articles:

adamcroft croft posted a comment in David Miscavige Leads Scientology to Milestone Year · 5 hours ago Nice pictures. So festive and grand. Scientology does so much good in the realm of drug and human rights education and it is only right that more places be reached and more people be helped. People need to know that illegal drugs are not worth it and that we should fight for each and every individual's human rights.

adamcroft croft posted a comment in Is Scientology Trying to Take Over Self- Publishing? · a year ago I've read about this facility, and it's quite impressive. Technology in the 21st century progresses so rapidly that it's mind boggling. Not only do we have the power to virtually publish infinitely, even print publishing has gone to a whole new different level. Having worked in the publishing industry, I certainly realize what a big deal this is.

adamcroft croft posted a comment in Facing Difficulties in Life? Scientology Has an iPad App For That · a year ago Thanks Portia for providing the information.

adamcroft croft posted a comment in Facing Difficulties in Life? Scientology Has an iPad App For That · a year ago The app actually looks pretty promising. It's free, and seems to be more useful than the books I find on the self-help section in the bookstore. I've always been curious about Scientology, and this is an easy way to find out more about it.

<comment><USER40> That's surprising to you? Obvious shills are obvious.

<comment><USER14> "I suppose I was more surprised to find it so easily, rather than surprised it exists."

Scientology is like a religious 419 scam, they target the sort of idiots who wouldn't check this and take the endorsement from random internet persons at their word, not guessing that the comments were coming from COS HQ.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Here is a similar piece of content, from GE, makers of nuclear weapons and microwave ovens and former owners of NBC (now Kabletown)

[http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/ideas-roundtable- workin...](http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/ideas-roundtable- working/archive/2012/08/improving-the-nations-health-with-more-efficient- healthcare/260194/)

<comment><USER42> Yeah, but here's literally what you see as soon as you open that story (with adblock off):

<http://cl.ly/image/0W1d2f3P0L25>

That's pretty darn clear that it's a sponsored piece of content.

<comment><USER43> Large parts of it even use GE's font, making it even more clear.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> The story has been replaced with: "We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads."

There you go, one demonstrable example where complaining on the internet actually had an impact.

</comment><comment><USER45> I understand that this is "sponsoderd content" AKA an ad.

I have seen "sponsored pages" in newspapers for many years about a lot of crap, is there a reason to consider this one worse than the average?

(Yes, scientology is evil but they are not forbidden from making ads I reckon?)

edit: the "sponsored" bit is right on top of the page, as it is in dead-tree- form newspapers too.

<comment><USER32> In newspapers and magazines, sponsored content is very clearly labeled (which arguably this is) and made to look _different_. For example, most magazines require advertorial to be in a different typeface and font size, so that readers have a sense that it's somehow "different." The difficulty here is that, unlike a magazine in which you're flipping pages, you probably only saw _this_ page and thus have no sense about whether it "looks different."

<comment><USER46> Then again, the only reason I saw this page is because we decided it needs to be on the top of HN. It's like the bizarro Streisand effect.

<comment><USER47> There is a Streisand effect-like phenomenon when notorious publicity-seekers become famous due to widespread criticism. The attention, negative or not, is exactly what they want. The biggest example is probably the Westboro Baptist Church.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> The current top comment by Matt Mullen is being upvoted at a rate of about 3 votes/second!

He appears to work at discus - did he use admin powers to comment on the article?

edit: "Tom Cruise • a few seconds ago I paid you for this?! Thats not nearly enough confetti"

<comment><USER28> The other interesting thing is that it seems to have -1 downvotes. Hax? Or a javascript bug?

<comment><USER32> Someone is trying to delete downvotes as fast as they can, except more votes are arriving even faster. Stare at the counter for a few minutes, and you'll see the vote count go up and down.

<comment><USER49> Looks like the comment moderator went on break.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Harriet Beecher Stowe, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., John Greenleaf Whittier and James Russell Lowell all just retroactively disavowed any connection to The Atlantic.

</comment><comment><USER51> This is disgusting and unethical. I didn't notice the "sponsor content" bar at the top and had to go all the way to the bottom to see the disclaimer.

</comment><comment><USER52> Someone ought to write an adblock-like extension that incorporates jwz's HERP DERP filter to arbitrary URLs, starting with <http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/*>

</comment><comment><USER53> How convenient that this Tampa Bay Times article highlighting the FBI's investigation into the cult just came out yesterday:

<http://www.tampabay.com/news/scientology/article1270036.ece>

I don't think this sponsored content is a smear on The Atlantic so much so as it is a smear on the sad state of journalism as a whole and the ever increasing lengths to which news orgs will go to finance their operations these days.

</comment><comment><USER54> There is a lesson to be learned here about using third-party vendors in sensitive parts of your business.

IF you're a news outlet and you're going to let people publish "sponsored stories" and promise them the ability to moderate comments, AND you use a third-party add-on from a comments vendor, THEN you should not be surprised when an employee of that third-party company is allowed to leave whatever comments they like — no matter what your agreement with your client says.

Of course, I'm not sure that if you're a news outlet it's a good idea to let people publish sponsored quasi-news content. Newspapers have been pushing the envelope on this in the last couple of decades — remember in 1999 the LA Times upset their own staff's sense of balance when they printed a 168-page supplement on the Staples Center and split ad revenue 50/50 with the Center ([http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july- dec99/la_times_12-...](http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july- dec99/la_times_12-16.html)).

But if you're gonna do this, you've really got to do it right!

</comment><comment><USER55> Looks like The Atlantic realized it had lost its marbles, and pulled this? I now get a 404, not only from the HN link, but also from the link on their site which still has the thumbnail of this propaganda piece:

<http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/scientology>

(If anybody has a cache, I'm mildly curious to see it...)

<comment><USER56> > We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of > our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads.

looks like you're right

<comment><USER55> You can still see the meat of the article via skeletonjelly's google cache link, but I gather the fun was in the comments. The 'article' reads like a typical cult/church promotional flyer...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> I love how they captured the confetti in mid-air in each and every photograph. There's nothing scientology does that isn't choreographed and there's nothing scientology does that isn't bullshit.

</comment><comment><USER41> I keep looking to see the April Fools disclaimer or any indication this is a joke, but I am not seeing it.

Perhaps I am a victim of Poe's law.

</comment><comment><USER58> Yeah, but read the content of what is actually up on the site. It's patently transparent bullshit. "All we do is open buildings! Everything is wonderful in out world! Banner year!" It makes the church look even MORE cultish. The motives are obvious: they're getting hit thanks to the new Lawrence Wright book, so they respond with this utterly idiotic pap. It's amazing that to me that they think ANYONE would actually buy this as a real article. I imagine the Atlantic thought the same. They're providing the noose for Scientology to hang itself. It's not journalism, per say, but there is a truth revealed by this article that is WAY beyond what the church wanted and The Atlantic provided the forum.

<comment><USER14> Then why are they deleting any negative comments? If they're trying to distance themselves from the North Korea-level bullshit they're publishing for cash, the best way to strike back would be to allow users to respond without being silenced in the name of their advertisers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER59> This is why I'm sad that Google's Sidewiki failed.

You can have free and robust comments moderated by the author or publisher, it works _most of the time._

But why not just carry our commenting services with us, independent of content?

(Or is that basically what we're doing now?)

</comment><comment><USER49> In next year's recap they can talk about the big recruiting breakthroughs they made by writing enormous checks to struggling media outfits which allowed them to trick readers into thinking puff pieces were real content.

</comment><comment><USER27> Wow ... 12 new buildings!

It must really pay to start a religion and I guess in addition to emptying my congregant's pockets, there are some nice tax breaks for both the 503c and the reverends.

Can I interest anyone in an investment? I'll start the church of fleeciology and will take the first 12 people to wire one meeeeellion dollars into my Cayman Islands account as my board of trustees. Your share of the earnings will be 6%.

Our chuches won't have steeples, but there are plenty of sheeples that we can turn into paupers. There's no end to what a charismatic speaker can earn in today's market, so be the first to sign up now!

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> A sample of moderator approved comments:

Seems like David Miscavige and Scientology are on a roll. Also it appears the media have been missing the real story.

I hadn't realized there were so many new churches opened this past year. Great report!

<comment><USER60> Finally the true story of scientology is being told!

<comment><USER61> The true story of scientology has already been told. A mediocre sci-fi author realized he could make a lot of money by inventing a bullshit story [1] and then proceeded to recruit a bunch of brownshirts [2].

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu> [2] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5055604>

And frankly, I think it's high time to kick them the fuck out of Berlin, at the very least. We tried radiating the cancer; it's time to reach for the scalpel.

<comment><USER62> I don't disagree, but it is socially unacceptable to say such things about thugs in other religions, just Scientology - and they may be freely promoted in the press with equal quantities of distortion - this bothers me a great deal.

<comment><USER63> Haven't you noticed the relentless pounding the Catholic church has been taking for years and years now? Or listen to Penn Jillette's or Louis CK's remarks on Mormonism, or a great deal of George Carlin's material... many religions prey on the powerless, but we are offended by the efficiency with which Scientology drains its' adherents bank accounts and their will.

<comment><USER64> There's also no shortage of criticism for Islamic fundamentalism / Sharia law.

People generally don't have much patience for rhetoric that calls all religious belief evil, but specific accurate criticism usually has a place in public discourse.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> SG- I'm not quite sure if it's 'sellout' or if it's just the church having key people at The Atlantic to make this happen, sort of like how the church had infiltrated key government organizations around the world.

</comment><comment><USER8> Retraction: <http://imgur.com/5yVvT>

"Statement from The Atlantic

Regarding an advertisement from the Church of Scientology that appeared on TheAtlantic.com on January 14:

We screwed up. It shouldn't have taken a wave of constructive criticism — but it has — to alert us that we've made a mistake, possibly several mistakes. We now realize that as we explored new forms of digital advertising, we failed to update the policies that must govern the decisions we make along the way. It's safe to say that we are thinking a lot more about these policies after running this ad than we did beforehand. In the meantime, we have decided to withdraw the ad until we figure all of this out. We remain committed to and enthusiastic about innovation in digital advertising, but acknowledge—sheepishly—that we got ahead of ourselves. We are sorry, and we're working very hard to put things right."

</comment><comment><USER65> The comments are quite amusing. The "church" is apparently sending its minions en masse to post mindless applaud.

</comment><comment><USER66> This practice is probably not limited to The Atlantic. Reportedly CNN has published content that was "sponsored" by autocratic governments:

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/04/cnn- busi...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/04/cnn-business- state-sponsored-news)

</comment><comment><USER67> Good to see Jeffrey Goldberg biting the hand that feeds him: [http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/a-wonder...](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/a-wonderful- new-book-about-scientology-by-a-wonderful-writer/267178/)

</comment><comment><USER68> Interesting.... in the last minute I (coincidentally) watched as they pulled down the page and replaced it with:

 _We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads_

</comment><comment><USER69> And if a pro-Scientology adverticle wasn't enough, every page has at the top "A Wonderful New Book About Scientology, By a Wonderful WriterJeffrey Goldberg". I'm sure this other article is totally not related to the sponsored content.

<comment><USER70> This appears to be a sarcastic response by Goldberg to the presence of the advertorial. The book he's talking about is quite critical of Scientology.

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> The post has been removed: _We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads._

"Subsequent comment threads"? You don't say.

<comment><USER72> They're most likely talking about the article's own comment thread, as opposed to discussion across the web.

</comment></comment><comment><USER73> The side bar shows a link to an article by Jeffrey Goldberg, "A Wonderful New Book About Scientology, By a Wonderful Writer", about a book by L. Wright. Not sure if this goes with or against the post, as the Amazon description of the book seems rather positively inclined toward Scientology. I haven't read the book though.

[http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/a-wonder...](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/a-wonderful- new-book-about-scientology-by-a-wonderful-writer/267178/)

</comment><comment><USER74> Bizarrely, it isn't even written very well. It's basically:

 _Scientology Opened 12 new offices/churches._

Followed by 12 pictures, all pretty much staged the same way, with blanket text following each picture written the following way:

 _City, State: Date

David Miscavige dedicated the new Church of Scientology (City) in ceremonies attend by (nnn) Scientolgists, their guests and city and state dignitaries. The Church building, which used to be (XXX) is located near (YYY) _

The entire "Sponsored Content" feels like it was programmatically generated.

I'd expect better out of a high-school english student.

<comment><USER33> Don't underestimate their marketing skills. They know exactly what they want out of their piece on _The Atlantic_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> Disclaimer: I run startup that helps publishers to create these types of sponsored stories.

Sponsored stories are much better way to monetize content, especially for journalism industry. However, the issue is publishers should control what type of 'ads' should go live since they know their audience best. Editors should be in control of these type of ads rather than sales people. "Content Marketing" is relatively new in digital realm and I hope these type of mishaps will be avoided as industry matures.

<comment><USER76> _startup that helps publishers to create these types of sponsored stories._

What does that mean, in practice? Are publishers not capable of running an article by themselves and adding a "Sponsored Content" banner/notice at the top?

<comment><USER75> It's not that simple. There are lot of pieces. Feel free to send me an email (in my profile page). I don't want to sidetrack current topic.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER77> I haven't read all these comments, but this could not be a big deal at all.

We had a "sponsored" story written about FamilyLeaf for The Atlantic: [http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/bank-of- america/archive...](http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/bank-of- america/archive/2012/11/your-familys-private-social-network/264901)

I'm pretty sure the author was just a freelance writer that BofA was sponsoring to write about startups, and we didn't pay a cent or do anything weird to get the piece.

</comment><comment><USER78> CNN does this too.

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/04/cnn- busi...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/sep/04/cnn-business- state-sponsored-news)

</comment><comment><USER79> Write to them and tell them what you think! Here's what I said:

\</comment><comment></comment><comment>-

Sir,

The Church of Scientology has a well documented history of deceit, manipulation, and ruined lives. The best way to limit the harm they cause is by discrediting them. I was, therefore, extremely disappointed to see that you have lent them some of your credibility.

The "Sponsored" tag at the beginning of the article wasn't nearly prominent enough.

In future, I hope you will take more care in your dealings with cults and quasi-religious organizations.

</comment><comment><USER80> The Atlantic has had a consistent subjectivist and egalitarian-nihilist bias, to the point that I don't read them unless I want to debate and argue and grind my teeth.

So, this isn't as far out of character as everyone else seems to think.

I don't understand the connection between Scientology and the other stuff I mentioned, but even before this, it could not be said that this publication had integrity or practiced honesty.

</comment><comment><USER81> The most interesting part of the story, to me, is that none of the links have rel="nofollow." I wonder how much of this is motivated by SEO.

<comment><USER82> I would think it's pretty common that news sites don't nofollow links (indeed, a quick scan of some other Atlantic pages says they don't).

If they don't do it normally, why would they do it especially if the point is to advertise Scientology?

<comment><USER81> Without nofollow, the Atlantic is effectively telling Google that the links in this paid advertisement are as authoritative as their organic links by objective journalists.

Deliberate or not, I think it conflicts with Google's feelings about paid link placement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER83> This was enough to get me to cancel my print subscription, which is really the best way to show my disgust over this.

</comment><comment><USER84> Atlantic going from sponsored to censored. I sure hope it was some kind of night mod that did that. [http://www.scribd.com/doc/120420141/The- Atlantic-14-January-...](http://www.scribd.com/doc/120420141/The- Atlantic-14-January-2013-David-Miscavige-Leads-Scientology-to-Milestone-Year)

</comment><comment><USER85> Does this mean that The Atlantic is not a CIA front, or does it mean that it is? Semi-in-jest.

</comment><comment><USER86> Wow - did not know it had come to this.

OT but I felt like Frontline 'softballed' the piece on Michelle Rhee the other day. Not that I disagreed with the piece just left feeling that I did not get a critique - which is what I am used to from them.

</comment><comment><USER87> Strange they didn't celebrate their Toronto location.

<https://plus.google.com/117604621668852819090/photos?hl=en>

I hope this correlates with Canadians not giving them money :)

</comment><comment><USER88> Meanwhile, some sponsored content from Boing Boing:

[http://boingboing.net/2013/01/14/dread-cthulhu-leads-his- cul...](http://boingboing.net/2013/01/14/dread-cthulhu-leads-his-cult-t.html)

</comment><comment><USER89> VERY poor choice. You would have to blind, deaf, and in coma to know this would not cause some type of backlash. I too enjoyed their content - unfortunately now have to reconsider before reading.

</comment><comment><USER90> Article has been pulled and replaced with the following:

"We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads."

</comment><comment><USER43> It looks like a Disney religion, really. Look at the balloons at the Tel Aviv opening. Look at the cute bow they have on each of the churches! I wonder if they have rides...

<comment><USER14> The "super power" orgs have beautiful shells but rotten, partially constructed or otherwise unoccupied interiors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> I've asked PG to ban/delete links to theatlantic.com: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5058360>

<comment><USER91> I think this is just way overreaction. I'm not happy about it and think the Atlantic should revise their policies but I don't think we should ban all links because of this. It's basically just an advertisement that has been allowed to parade itself as an article; nevertheless it does not take very long to realize it is a sponsored article.

<comment><USER61> _It's basically just an advertisement that has been allowed to parade itself as an article_

Yeah, and since the advertisement is for Scientology, punishment needs to be swift, precise und merciless. You can call a lot of things "just an ad", including NSDAP propaganda.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER92> TL;DR: We are building a fighting force of extraordinary magnitude. We have forged our spirits in the tradition of our ancestors. David Miscavige has our gratitude.

</comment><comment><USER93> They have removed the article:

"We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads."

</comment><comment><USER51> By the way, can anyone even document the validity of this COS bullcrap? From what I understand they are either barely growing or shrinking from their peak.

<comment><USER91> Check out the Village Voice, they have a lot of coverage of this. Scientology is a blip, their propaganda would have you believe that is growing at an enormous rate but that could not be further from the truth, at least in the reality based community.

</comment></comment><comment><USER94> Talk about sell out.

</comment><comment><USER95> Funny how the pictures all look and feel so similar.

</comment><comment><USER96> Newspapers have done this for a long time, but at least they usually put a prominent headline "Advertizing" at the top of the ad.

</comment><comment><USER85> Contra the best article they ever ran... what's next? Why diamonds actually are scarce and valuable, sponsored by deBeers. ??!!

<comment><USER14> Amusing considering that one of their greatest articles (to my recollection) was [http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have- you...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you-ever- tried-to-sell-a-diamond/304575/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER97> Where's the line with "sponsored content"? Does anyone have some examples of where it has been done well? Can it be done well?

<comment><USER98> Often Mashable has How To articles that are sponsored, but the content is generally neutral.

</comment></comment><comment><USER99> This demonstrates that journalism's money problem is not linked to the rise of the Internet, but to credibility.

</comment><comment><USER100> While unfortunate they ran the ad in the first place, it's worth noting that it was pulled down within 3 hours.

</comment><comment><USER101> Aaaand they've closed the comments.

</comment><comment><USER102> Has anyone seen the Goldman Sachs content? Pretty sad stuff there, as well.

</comment><comment><USER103> This is disgusting.

</comment><comment><USER33> I liked the part where it said:

 _Under ecclesiastical leader David Miscavige, the Scientology religion expanded more in 2012 than in any 12 months of its 60-year history._

EDIT: before downvoting...read it again. :-)

</comment><comment><USER104> Very unethical and unprofessional of The Atlantic

</comment><comment><USER105> wasn't The Atlantic a reputable magazine?

<comment><USER106> Apparently not. Sad.

<comment><USER107> Disappointing...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER108> This again?

Every so often, the Church of Scientology goes up against the Internet.

Every so often, the Church of Scientology gets its ass handed to it.

This has been going on since 'the Internet' meant 'Usenet' for most people on the Internet.

Heh. Maybe this time will be especially amusing.

<comment><USER109> > Every so often, the Church of Scientology gets its ass handed to it.

They get a few wins too.

(<http://www.december.com/cmc/mag/1997/sep/helmers.html>)

<comment><USER110> That one frustrated me. I was teaching a class and told everyone about that service as a way to send me anonymous feedback.

Then someone tried, and found that the service had been shut down. :-(</comment></comment></comment>


In defense of 'flicks' (or how I learned to stop worrying and love 705600000) - <AUTHOR> https://mux.com/blog/in-defense-of-flicks-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-705600000/ <comment><USER2> Hi! I'm Chris Horvath, the author of Flicks, formerly of Facebook/Oculus, currently at Cruise Automation. I'm happy to answer any questions about my most-talked-about-single-line-of-code.

<comment><USER3> can you point us to that single line of code? is it stored in a git somewhere?

<comment><USER4> It's the

        using flicks = std::chrono::duration<std::chrono::nanoseconds::rep, std::ratio<1, 705600000>>;

<comment><USER2> That's the one!!!

<comment><USER5> " _A flick (frame-tick) is a very small unit of time. It is 1 /705600000 of a second, exactly._

 _1 flick = 1 /705600000 second_

 _This unit of time is the smallest time unit which is LARGER than a nanosecond, and can in integer quantities exactly represent a single frame duration for 24 Hz, 25 Hz, 30 Hz, 48 Hz, 50 Hz, 60 Hz, 90 Hz, 100 Hz, 120 Hz, and also 1 /1000 divisions of each, as well as a single sample duration for 8 kHz, 16 kHz, 22.05 kHz, 24 kHz, 32 kHz, 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz, 88.2 kHz, 96 kHz, and 192kHz, as well as the NTSC frame durations for 24 _ (1000/1001) Hz, 30 * (1000/1001) Hz, 60 * (1000/1001) Hz, and 120 * (1000/1001) Hz.*

 _That above was one hell of a run-on sentence, but it 's strictly and completely correct in its description of the unit._

 _This makes flicks suitable for use via std::chrono::duration and std::ratio for doing timing work against the system high resolution clock, which is in nanoseconds, but doesn 't get slightly out of sync when doing common frame rates._"

[https://github.com/OculusVR/Flicks](https://github.com/OculusVR/Flicks)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> The reason you don't see flicks used all that much is because media encoding is incredibly proprietary in the space where it matters most, live broadcast. Selling into the broadcast space, every broadcaster has petabytes of video in their own chosen format. You have to support EVERY format to sell broadly, and they're not going to let you transcode everything into your format. Using flicks gives you the ability to support as many combinations as possible with the least effort.

It matters very little when users are trained to tolerate slow transitions between videos, formats, etc...

It also doesn't matter a whole lot when doing offline transcoding either, as you can afford to do the more expensive calculation.

<comment><USER7> Even for live broadcast, how can a few integer instructions matter? If you have to compare timestamps every audio sample, that's a few multiplications every 22 microseconds (common denominator can be computed once). Or am I completely off here?

<comment><USER6> Trying to realtime encode 4k into AVC using pure software encoders takes about 80 cores/hyperthreads. Then you need to meet the tight 70ns? timings of the SMPTE 2022-6/7 protocols (i.e. 12gbps without using jumbo frames because reasons).

It's also necessary for clip switching. If you want frame accurate clip switching (i.e. show->ad->ad->show) you need consistent and precise pointers into your files.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Good article, with a couple of minor errors:

"Audio recorded at 44100khz" should be 44.100 kHz or 44100 Hz.

"there was no leap day in the year 2000" \- false. 2000 is divisible by both 400 and 100, so it was a leap year.

<comment><AUTHOR> fixed, thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Computer scientists with a physics background might recognize the syncing problem to the challenge of describing simultaneous events.

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

</comment><comment><USER10> For those looking for the original news article here is a link to it on HN [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16210670](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16210670).

</comment><comment><USER11> In real modern video files every frame has its own timecode, and mobile phones typically record with variable framerate when these timecodes are placed highly irregularly (the reason can be a lack of performance or an attempt to sync with light source of the different frequency than camera's settings). Any new video editing software is expected to deal with such files, and flicks are useless here.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not sure I'd agree here. RTPM is probably the most popular live streaming protocol, and it typically has huge variations in instantaneous frames rates. However it's time base is hard coded to 1/1000\. Which means it can't even accurately represent 30fps. Flicks would be at least a massive improvement here. And even given variable frame rate, a time base must be chosen in advance, so flicks is at least as good as any other value.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> > there was no leap day in the year 1900

Tell that to the management over at Microsoft. [1]

[1] [https://docs.microsoft.com/en- us/office/troubleshoot/excel/w...](https://docs.microsoft.com/en- us/office/troubleshoot/excel/wrongly-assumes-1900-is-leap-year)

</comment><comment><USER13> Heh, I've started to use it in [https://ossia.io](https://ossia.io) just two weeks ago. Works fine for what it is.

</comment><comment><USER14> > _That is 367.5 times more audio samples than video frames._

Okay, but an audio sample is not comparable to a frame of video, which by itself means something to the viewer. (But, on the other hand which probably doesn't differ much from the previous or next one, especially at 120 Hz).

An audio sample is sort of more comparable to a pixel.

<comment><AUTHOR> Its comparing 1 dimensional space to 2 demential space. So, any comparison is gong to be a little hand wavy. But temporally, I believe the comparison is apt.

<comment><USER15> > Its comparing 1 dimensional space to 2 demential space

Although I love the coinage "2 demential space", I think you mean "comparing one-dimensional space [audio] to three-dimensional space [video]". A two- dimensional signal might be a still image or a temporal sequence of samples from a one-dimensional array of sensors, such as those in a single slice of a CT machine or a linear MIMO antenna array. A video signal is three- dimensional, not two-dimensional, and probably not "2 demential" either.

<comment><AUTHOR> Including pixel intensity, you are correct. Infact it has thee planes, so you could even call it 9 demential If you break it down that way.

<comment><USER15> No, wavelength is just one more dimension along which intensity may vary (in addition to X, and Y, and time), not five or six more dimensions, so a multi- band image is only three-dimensional, regardless of whether there are three wavelength bands (like RGB or YCbCr), four (like RGBA), 8 (like Landsat), or 210 (like HYDICE, AVIRIS, and other imaging spectrometers).

<comment><AUTHOR> My point is, I am comparing temporal dimension to temporal dimension regardless of how many special dimensions there are. And I don't understand the argument that an audio sample is more analogous to a pixel that it is a frame on a time line.

<comment><USER15> It's analogous to both, from different valid points of view.

<comment><USER16> In particular, in data processing, all dimensionality is equivalent, since and infinite set S the same cardinality as S^n for any whole number n, and any finite set is smaller than the 1-dimensional set of naturals.

<comment><USER15> Yeah, at least if Hilbert spaces can fuck off, which is why we can approximate signal processing on digital computers at all. And, because of space-filling curves, in some sense ℝ _ⁿ_ is equivalent to ℝ. But, to understand signal processing, a much more useful point of view is that ℝ _ⁿ_ is significantly different for different values of _n_ , but not completely unrelated; and ℤ _ⁿ_ is a useful approximation of ℝ _ⁿ_ , as is (ℤ/ _m_ ℤ) _ⁿ_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> why is a least common multiple news and a concept that we love/hate??

</comment><comment><USER18> Did you leave that unbalanced paren in the [Hacker News] title just to drive Lisp users mad? Edit: Thanks for the fix!

<comment><USER19> Fixed, thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> The article's leap year rules seem wrong. Pretty sure year 2000 did have a leap day, but 1900 didn't.

<comment><USER21> Yep. The algorithm is: there is a leap day for every year divisible by 4, unless the year is also divisible by 100. But if the year is divisible by 400, then there is a still leap day.

<comment><USER22> Oh shit, it's FizzBuzz!

<comment><USER23> Yeah, you really dont want to be implementing a date/time library yourself. It is a far more complex problem than Fizzbuzz. There is so much nuance and easy to overlook details. Just determining whether or not a year is a leap year is about discuss complexity.

I wrote a friendlier abstraction over top Boost DateTime in C++ at a previous employer. Adding things like cross platform support of using the Olson database for historical timezone info, a friendlier interface (more akin to Python's datetime lib, which is probably the friendliest datetime lib Ive used across any language) and cross platform strptime. So, didn't do the heavy lifting myself, but rather supplied the timezone info.

There were so many subtle details. Like, what does it mean to add 1 day to a timestamp? Do you increment year/month/day as needed to be the next day? Or do you add 24 hours? This matters because if you increment the date only, you can end up with an invalid or ambiguous time. I also appreciate the author mentioning how many hours are there in a day. 23, 24 and 25 are most common for jurisdictions observing daylight saving time, but arbitrary shifts are possible. It depends on the jurisdiction. Take the US for example. It depends not just on the state, but sometimes even the county within a state. Some states dont observe DST (Arizona and Hawaii, maybe others). Parts of Indiana do, some don't (maybe this has changed).

Compound this with changes to when DST starts/ends. Its entirely political and can change on a whim. I know there are clocks that are still wrong 12 years later for 6 weeks of the year because of the 2007 US DST change, because of embedded rules for when to change.

Sorry for the rant. Spent over 18 months on that project, and I know there are bugs in there nobody bothered to fix after I left that company (fractional seconds handling in strptime I ported from NetBSD, I'm looking at you).

<comment><USER24> > Yeah, you really dont want to be implementing a date/time library yourself.

Someone should make a date/time "meta library" which iterates through all possible system time values while calling each extant language's date/time method at each iteration.

Then report the system time values for which there are discrepancies in the output.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > The number result is 0.008333333333 with the 3 repeating forever. For a > computer to store a number that repeats forever would require an infinite > amount of memory

This is very much not true, as I'm sure other HN readers will notice. The number is rational (it's equivalent to 1/120). Now, it is true that a floating point number may not be able to represent it exactly, but by no means does this number require "infinite memory." In fact I have represented the number exactly in this comment, which does _not_ take up infinite space.

For irrational numbers, sure, they cannot be exactly represented. But there are no irrationals involved in this article.

I got hung up at this point in the article, so I haven't finished it yet, but it looks like the author goes on to argue that because numbers like the above cannot be represented in computer memory at all, errors will always accumulate in representations of audio/video. This makes me question whether the author understands the problem they are writing about.

Edit: the author does in fact state that rational numbers can be represented by a numerator and a denominator. The article is actually about errors the accumulate during floating point operations. It ends up making a decent argument despite false claims about representing numbers in memory.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the comment. For the record, I am very aware of iee 754, And I am aware that some numbers that have infinite repetition in decimal can have an exact representation. I actually thought about pointing that out. However I decided that it didn't add much to the post. It was written for more of a general audience and diving into those details, while would make the post more technically correct, would not actually add any value for the average reader.

<comment><USER26> I don't want to come off as combative, but I would argue that a correction would add quite a bit to the post. What you have is straight-up incorrect and wouldn't even take that much effort to fix. "For a computer to store the decimal representation a number that repeats forever would require an infinite amount of memory, so the number is approximated" would be correct and it's just a couple words more.

<comment><USER15> Agreed.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


How employees get screwed in private equity deals - <AUTHOR> http://framethink.wordpress.com/2011/06/24/how-employees-get-screwed-in-private-equity-deals/

<comment><USER2> Are people NDA-ed, preventing them from talking about any of this? Assuming of course people have a similar experience they want to share.

<comment><USER3> I worked for a Silver Lake owned company, surviving multiple quarterly layoffs, and 3 CEOs. The only metric for these companies is EBITA, and dropping people helps maintain that number. The PE firm is making money all the while the actual company is hemorrhaging.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> You know what would be useful? A sort of Turnitin for legal documents, where you could upload your employment contract or whatever and then it would search an annotated corpus for any pattern matches. It might hone in on one of these dodgy 'one-liner' loopholes buried in an otherwise generic looking wall of smallprint, and tell you what sort of trick they're trying to pull.</comment>


Richard P. Gabriel's Review of "The Art of Metaobject Protocol" - <AUTHOR> http://www.dreamsongs.com/Files/amop-review.pdf

<comment><USER2> I like Richard P. Gabriel's writing, his words influenced and inspired me.

His review is well written and the theme of "computer language evolution stalled after 1980" resonated with me. I have an idea of MOP now, but I'm still too limited in my thinking to fully grasp the possibilities.

I think I'll buy the book should I find a cheap copy. Anyone here who wants to sell me the book for ~20 USD? (Germany) Amazon(.de) doesn't list it cheaper than 32€. :-(</comment>


Immune cells may play a role in causing cavities - sahin-boydas https://newatlas.com/immune-system-tooth-decay/59293/ <comment><AUTHOR> Curious if antibiotic use can be linked to detrimental effect on teeth by proxy, in parallel with autoimmune conditions.

</comment><comment><USER2> I wonder if the results of this study indirectly also supports this previous study linking oral cancers and oral cavities, proving that higher number of cavities results in reduced cancer risk: [https://www.webmd.com/oral- health/news/20130912/tooth-caviti...](https://www.webmd.com/oral- health/news/20130912/tooth-cavities-linked-to-lower-risk-of-head-neck-cancer- in-study)

</comment><comment><USER3> i've got a kid that's allergic to certain foods and has lots of cavities even though he eats the same things and cares for his teeth the same way his brother, who isn't allergic, does. with my sample size of 1 i can confirm this study

<comment><USER4> As an alternative sample size of one, I spent my entire childhood sniffle and stuffed up and I've had a total of 1 cavity in my mid-30 years. My sibling, who had no allergies, also suffered no cavities.

<comment><USER5> To add another n=1, I have severe allergies, not quite life threatening but almost (partial but significant throat constriction upon exposure), and I've never had a cavity and seem almost incapable of getting one. I only brush one time, at night, and don't use toothpaste (couldn't find one I wasn't mildly sensitive to).

It is established that immune cells are modulated by microbiota - and yes, there are oral microbiota, and there are even oral probiotic supplements one can take which seem to be effective for certain conditions. If you are interested in this topic, I'd recommend paying close attention to how the 2 main strains were discovered (S. Salivarius K12 and M18) - iirc. at least one of the two was first extracted from a child who had no cavities.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'd think sugar would be a big role in cavity formation but what do I know

<comment><USER7> Well sugar is food source for the bacteria that then produces acids that then in turn produce acid that can break down your tooth enamel.

So eating something with lots sugar and not cleaning your mouth of all the remaining sugar could cause cavities. However, it's not the sugar, but the bacteria feeding off the sugar.

<comment><USER6> Interesting thanks</comment></comment></comment>


The Priest of Abu Ghraib - <AUTHOR> https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/priest-abu-grahib-180971013/ <comment><USER2> This was hauntingly beautiful. A story of conscience and reconciliation with the paradoxes of war and personal spirituality/religion.

His decision to join the war as an interrogator, believing his presence and oversight would ensure the humane treatment of prisoners is admirable. I often wonder what is the right thing to do: non-participation, or conscientious participation to ensure abuses are minimized.

<comment><USER3> > A story of conscience

I'm surprised you see this. I see it differently. Excuse my language, but I see a horse-shit sandwich. Have you read any Noam Chomsky? This is a great example of 'Manufacturing Consent' \- through these feel good propaganda manufactured stories. Yes, I do think he believed his struggle was holy and justified. Yes, I am aware that this sounds harsh.

For an honest confrontation with our very real Global North shadow watch this: [https://vimeo.com/242569435](https://vimeo.com/242569435)

<comment><USER3> Wow I did not read the whole article. But's it's actually pretty moving... Ok fuck it. I'm going to do a pluralist 'both/and'. It's both a horse-shit sandwich and a story of conscience.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5xfBtD6rLY&vl=en](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5xfBtD6rLY&vl=en)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The notion that its better to have "good" people doing bad things than "bad" people is such a trash take, but it shows up in nearly every conversation of moral consequence these days.

<comment><USER3> "If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?" ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Our collective unconscious, our collective shadow: [https://vimeo.com/242569435](https://vimeo.com/242569435)

<comment><USER5> Funny that you would quote Solzhenitsyn, who in the last years of his life went hard-core Russian nationalist extremist and indeed called for separating certain people from the rest of us and destroying them (only this time it would be a "Christian state" doing the destroying, and not the godless USSR, so it would all be OK).

<comment><USER3> This is exactly what I think he is trying to say - and of course he is no exception to this rule. Are you equating his behavior with him being a failure, discrediting his work? This angle is a bit too black and white / dualistic for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Such a great godlike compassionate gentle guy ... working in Abu Ghraib without noting abuses and reporting them or even figuring out why that damm prisoner cries.

I don't think I would have courage to report in such situation. Socialization that makes it all normal and very real consequences whistleblowers get would stop me.

The issue is not dude. That issue is article writer trying to frame that work as something gentle glossing over the actual reality of the situation.

<comment><USER3> > writer trying to frame that work as something gentle glossing over the > actual reality of the situation.

100%. [https://vimeo.com/242569435](https://vimeo.com/242569435) shows this.

"If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?" ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> That he was able to get such good results from his interrogation using kindness and dialog instead of violence is interesting. This is apparently a known effect. Was a very interesting article posted here some time ago describing similar techniques that I found fascinating: [https://psmag.com/social-justice/nazi-interrogator- revealed-...](https://psmag.com/social-justice/nazi-interrogator-revealed- value-kindness-84747)

</comment><comment><USER8> What a fascinating story. Thank you for sharing. I cried towards the end as I was learning about Casteel's death. I was hoping for a plot twist, because all along Casteel was described in the past tense, so I knew from the beginning that he might not be still alive but deep inside I was hoping that he is still alive. I was hoping for paragraph that says "and now Casteel is..."

It sucks to lose someone with such integrity, values and good character. I feel like I have known him personally. May he rest in peace.

<comment><USER9> > It sucks to lose someone with such integrity, values and good character.

Sorry? Who with 'integrity, values and good character' joins an interrogation squad?

<comment><USER10> While I can understand your sentiment, it might also well be possible that such a person might be convinced of the righteousness of their cause. The article even gives some quotes along those lines. To paraphrase: "it's better if someone like me does the interrogation than someone who does not care about the Geneva convention".

I think it is very hard to judge the motivations of people from the outside. The whole point of the article was to illustrate how torn you can be between your convictions, what you want to do, and what you actually do.

Most of us are very lucky insofar as we do not have to face such tough choices.

<comment><USER9> I really don't care if they are convinced of the righteousness of their cause. History is rife with examples of people who were convinced of the righteousness, that does not excuse them even a little bit.

> Most of us are very lucky insofar as we do not have to face such tough > choices.

That's why we talk about the ones who did. Since conscription in the US ended quite a while ago _all_ of this is free choice.

<comment><USER10> Fair enough; you have given me a lot to think about---thank you!

One more thing, though: I am not sure it is always that much of a free choice (even given the fact that no conscription exists). There might be economic reasons for joining the military, for example. However, since I am not a U.S. citizen, I am not sure how much of an issue this actually is.

<comment><USER9> We had conscription here back in the 80's when my number came up I refused to join the army. There was a considerable price to pay including a possible jail term but there is nothing that would cause me to go and kill/harm others without a good enough reason.

<comment><USER10> Interesting! I admire the strength of your moral conviction! Having grown up in a generation without conscription (I did not even have a normal military service, thankfully).

<comment><USER9> Mine was one of the last years that it was still active.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This was a very moving piece, beautifully written. The story itself reminds me of a parable. Thank you for posting.

</comment><comment><USER12> War is hell. Such a beautiful story of being true to your self and finding your war through the anger and confusion of everything that influences us. Such a loss we lost this man, and many others like him, to environmental and chemical exposure issues in Iraq and Afghanistan.

</comment><comment><USER9> What a fucking whitewash. Anybody joining an interrogation squad knows what's ahead and those joining the group in Abu Ghraib, especially after the torture revelations really had no excuse. I feel about as much sympathy as I would towards a Nazi camp guard (sorry for the Godwin, but it seems applicable).

<comment><USER3> Yup. For anyone who can't see this, or is offended by the above comment, please check this out: [https://vimeo.com/242569435](https://vimeo.com/242569435)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> incredible piece. If you are thinking of reading this, and have a spare 20 minutes, commit.

<comment><USER3> I wouldn't waste your time. Watch this instead, it's only 13 minutes long: [https://vimeo.com/242569435](https://vimeo.com/242569435)</comment></comment>