A month of Flutter: a look back - <AUTHOR> https://bendyworks.com/blog/a-month-of-flutter-a-look-back <comment><USER2> For those betting on Fuchsia to help Flutter's adoption, work has started to create an UI compositor that is framework agnostic and there is a prototype of a Rust based UI.

[https://fuchsia.googlesource.com/garnet/+/master/docs/ui/sce...](https://fuchsia.googlesource.com/garnet/+/master/docs/ui/scenic.md)

[https://fuchsia.googlesource.com/garnet/+/0a214f5721d723a7d0...](https://fuchsia.googlesource.com/garnet/+/0a214f5721d723a7d0757531d157f76bb54b9f95/public/rust/fuchsia- ui)

And Android is being ported to Fuchsia, similarly to what happened to ChromeOS and Brillo.

[https://android-review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia](https://android- review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia)

<comment><USER3> So you're saying you don't believe Fuchsia will lead to increased flutter use because there will be other options?

<comment><USER2> Yes.

I expect just like it happened with Brillo and its C++ Frameworks, reborn as Android Things, Google will replace Flutter by something with more mainstream market acceptance, and the UI agnostic composition engine is paving the way for that decision.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The rise of Flutter makes a lot of sense when you think about how mobile has evolved over the last 5 years.

The days of Instapaper and the like where you could build a really good app and sell it, are long since past. Nowadays I'm not sure it's really possible to make money as an app startup. Your best bet is probably releasing a game and being the one-in-a-million that goes viral.

Other than that, apps are the purview of existing big companies, and those mostly are concerned with lowering costs (since margins on mobile are so thin). With that being the case, something like Flutter that gives you a fairly good cross-platform experience are going to thrive.

It's sort of like Java in the enterprise. It doesn't matter if it's pleasant to use. There's a clearpath towards success, it's safe for cheaper developers to use and not screw things up to bad. It will never be the hot thing but it doesn't need to be; that's not its target demographic.

<comment><USER5> The... "rise" of Flutter? According to which metric?

Flutter is nonexistent outside Google employees and a handful of Flutter advocates who write books or blog posts about it.

The performance and tool chain penalty of flutter makes absolutely zero sense today, when so many better alternatives exist.

<comment><USER6> Disclosure: I'm one of those Google employees.

I think it's a bit of a stretch to say it's non-existent outside of Google; curious to know what made you feel so negatively about it.

Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you exclude non-software content); given that it wasn't even in the top 100 six months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly. And even though it's only been out of beta for three weeks, it's used by large companies from Alibaba to Square to Capital One. Examples like this [1] show that it's fully capable of delivering game-quality experiences even on older devices, since it compiles directly to ARM code and uses the Skia graphics engine.

[1] [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimens...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimensions.showcaseapp&hl=en_US)

<comment><USER7> > _Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you > exclude non-software content); given that it wasn 't even in the top 100 six > months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly._

Are Github stars a valid metric for use? Personally, I have ~280 repos starred, and all of those stars are bookmarks. "Cute, I might use it one day".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I was really surprised at how dev.to drove traffic. I've never used the site before, does anyone have any experience with it / any good communities to get started with?

<comment><USER9> I made an account recently. The content is pretty basic and quality posts are few and far in between.

If you are looking for a growing community, it looks like a good place to post, since competition isn't that hard.</comment></comment>


Papas, please let your babies grow up to be princesses - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/thelist/papas-please-let-your-babies-grow-up-to-be-princesses-7dc7c2ec7cd2 <comment><USER2> "The opposite of Science isn't Girl."

So good.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I'm thrilled that my girls love to play with Legos and other engineery toys... to build houses and cars for their dolls :)

</comment><comment><USER3> Really this wraps around to the notion that "feminine" things are bad, and that feminine things detract from otherwise masculine pursuits. Kind of like the idea that girls aren't real engineers unless they look, dress, and smell like teenage-boy nerds.</comment>


The Complete Guide for the Principle and Steps of Protein Sequencing - <AUTHOR> http://www.creative-proteomics.com/services/de-novo-peptides-proteins-sequencing-service.htm <comment><AUTHOR> N-terminal sequencing service Almost all of the protein synthesis starts at the N-terminus, and the N-terminal sequence of proteins has a great influence on the biological function of the protein as a whole. For example, N-terminal sequence affects the half-life of proteins, meanwhile, it is associated with protein subcellular organelles. These are closely related to the function and stability of proteins. N-terminal sequencing of proteins is helpful to analyze the high-level structure of proteins and reveal the biological functions of proteins.

At present, the N-terminal sequencing of proteins is mainly classified into two major categories: non-mass spectrometry and mass spectrometry. Traditional non-mass spectrometry includes classical Edman degradation method that takes advantage of transcription-RT-PCR to get cDNA of corresponding protein, and then protein sequence will be obtained by reverse counting. Mass spectrometry is an important method for the accurate mass determination and characterization of proteins, and a variety of methods and instrumentations have been developed for its many uses. Its applications include the identification of proteins and their post-translational modifications, the elucidation of protein complexes, their subunits and functional interactions, as well as the global measurement of proteins in proteomics. Each of which has its own strengths and constraints.

All the above is about the details of protein sequencing which can be applied for protein identification, also will be helpful for studying the biological function of the peptide/protein.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Protein sequencing is the practical process of determining the amino acid sequence of all or part of a protein or peptide, which can be used to identify the protein or characterize its post-translational modifications. It mainly refers to the determination of the primary structure of the protein. The primary structure of the protein comprises the number of polypeptide chains that make up the protein.The main strategy for protein sequencing is to divide the polypeptide chain by chemical or enzymatic digestion and then determine the amino acid residue content and composition.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Protein Sequencing Steps 1\. Cleavage of polypeptide chains. Protein molecules which is consisted of multiple polypeptide chains must be resolved first. Several polypeptide chains are linked together by noncovalent bonds, called oligomeric proteins, such as hemoglobin tetramer, enolase dimer; can be treated with 8 mol / L urea or 6 mol / L guanidine hydrochloride Separate polypeptide chains.

2\. Determination of the number of polypeptide chains in the protein molecule. The number of polypeptide chains can be determined by measuring the relationship between the number of moles of terminal amino acid residues and the molecular weight of the protein. 3\. Disulfide bond. Several polypeptide chains are cross-linked by disulfide bonds and can be treated with excess beta-mercaptoethanol in the presence of 8 mol / L urea or 6 mol / L guanidine hydrochloride to reduce the disulfide bond to mercapto. The resulting thiol group should be protected with an alkylating agent to prevent it from being reoxidized.

4\. Dertermine each polypeptide chain of the amino acid composition and caculate the molecular ratio of the amino acid component.

5.Analyzing N-terminal and C-terminal of the polypeptide chain Peptide chain end group amino acids are divided into two classes: amino-terminal and Carboxyl-terminal. In the peptide chain amino acid sequence analysis, the most important is the N-terminal amino acid analysis. N-terminal analysis (Sanger method; Edman method; DNS-Cl; enzymatic degradation), C-terminal analysis (hydrazinolysis; enzymatic degradation; lithium borohydride).

6\. The polypeptide chain breaks into multiple peptides. The peptide sample can be broken into two or more sets of peptide fragments or peptides by two or more different fracture methods.

7.Determining the amino acid sequence of each peptide.

8\. Determining the order of peptides in the polypeptide chain. The amino acid sequence of the entire polypeptide chain is interspersed with the overlapping of the amino acid sequences of two or more sets of peptides.

9.Determine the position of the disulfide bond in the original polypeptide chain. Generally, pepsin is used to treat the peptide chain without disconnecting the disulfide bond. And the peptide is separated by two- dimensional electrophoresis which can analyze and sequence the the peptide group that may contain the disulfide bond after treatment with formic acid. Methods were analyzed for peptide comparisons to determine the position of disulfide bonds.</comment>


early signups on cloodly.com - <AUTHOR> http://www.cloodly.com techcrunch.com <comment><USER2> Cannot disclose what it is, no privacy policy, no nothing, just some vague text and a signup form.

It's not the stuff that gets me excited about signup early to something, sorry.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Can you please give us you feedback, and what you think it is?</comment>


Why Can't People Hear What Jordan Peterson Is Actually Saying? - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/01/putting-monsterpaint-onjordan-peterson/550859/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> This trend of people modifying someone's words and then projecting those modified words onto them has been more and more widespread. I see it as intellectually dishonest, and as depriving someone of their own agency in the context of discourse. Everyone has a right to speak for themselves, and this mindset erodes that right.

</comment><comment><USER3> Because some people don't want to hear what he's saying.

And it would have looked unseemly to just shout him down or throw him out of the studio.

So Ms. Newman used rhetorical landmines. But he's had practice dealing with those devices because he lectures smart alecky kids almost daily.

<comment><USER4> It's almost like she helped him get his point across, it was clearly an "Us vs Them" debate for her, she pushed it hard, and Peterson defused her with his argumentation and composture.

It's kinda sad how things have gotten to this football team filosophy where you defend your side no matter what. I'm glad Peterson is having all this reach, even though I don't agree 100% with all he says.

<comment><USER5> I'm curious what you don't agree with. Could you go into detail?

<comment><USER4> Not with what he said in the interview, I wasn't clear about that, it's more about some of the concepts that he goes about in his biblical series and in some interviews, can't find a link right now.

For example, the concept that truth can be anectodal instead of empirical (as derived from grand narratives and the reason why religious stories hold so much weight in western civilization) is still something that twists my brain. I believe there is a greater truth behind these stories, and what we tell each other are abstractions and pieces of those underlying truths. To understand and explain these narratives is to mine for what actually valuable for us, and telling them is a way of "triggering" our minds into going through the process in which those truths manifest themselves... but maybe that's the only way we can achieve a protocol of sharing primitive truths with our communication.

I think that's a part of it. Funny enough I found Jordan Peterson through HN a while back when someone linked his Maps of Meaning lectures in a thread about what books or articles changed their lives. Now we're here talking about his philosophies.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> While I like Petersen's message and analytical competence quite a bit, in this interview he makes the mistake that a lot of highly intelligent people make: he states the truth at his level of intelligence and training and expects the other person to understand perfectly. "If you've correctly listened to my exact construction of words, you should understand." He could do better at connecting with her, on a relational level and not only an intellectual one. (Which, yes, is much more of an abstract concept and is typically a lot harder for intellectual people, and is definitely a lot harder when someone seems hostile.)

He still does a good job of articulating the nuances of his position, but needs perhaps a little more connective tissue to let her know "I'm not against women! Hear me out." And I don't mean to let her off the hook, because she inappropriately framed his arguments a number of times.

It's incredibly difficult to think on your feet in front of an audience/camera, let alone actually learn and genuinely absorb an entirely new level of complexity for something you already think you know. I appreciate what Petersen's saying about how the gender gap _as described_ is a myth, and he articulates his reason for saying so: it's actually an 18-factor gap. But after he explains this and she continues to use the phrase gender gap multiple times to challenge his view, that's where he needed to identify that she has not correctly processed his real view, and stop her: "But ok it shouldn't be called a gender gap: based on the data, it's an 18-factor gap. Do you see what I'm saying?"

Connective tissue; reading your audience.

<comment><USER7> I won't say that you don't have a valid point in general.

But in this situation, IMO Petersen did a fantastic job of being personable, clear, and helpful. Especially considering he was granted one sentence at a time.

If it was any less "intellectual", it'd be a interview with a fifth-grader.

<comment><USER4> Jordan Peterson analyzed the interview to greater detail in this video: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6qBxn_hFDQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6qBxn_hFDQ)

He goes full on clinical psychologist on what he thinks happened, and also where he thinks he could have lead the interview for better. According to him, he was not dealing with Cathy Newman the person, but rather a personification of an ideology. It's very interesting to hear, also for the remainder of the interview.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There's a strong tendency to divide the world into with us and against is, allies and enemies, for us and against us. Government, social justice, social media. It's as if we are trying to recreate a two party platform in every area.

And it's disappointing.

The same happened with James Damore. His points have been frequently misinterpreted, despite the careful language used. Only in a very crude sense was it an "Anti-diversity" memo; the thesis was Google should shift attention from equality of outcome gender diversity to other forms.

Peterson is an even more distinctive example because it went back and forth many times (and was a better venue).

I hope we see more people like Peterson. Not necessarily people who think the same as him, but people who have rational unallied perspectives.

<comment><AUTHOR> > despite the careful language used

That seems to be the advantage of the interview format: Jordan Peterson had the (repeated/continuous) opportunity to correct the misrepresentation/distortion of his words. James Damore was not given that chance.

<comment><USER7> Yep, the medium/venue was a huge help for Peterson. And shows the existence of the problem that much more.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Peterson's relationships with feminism and youth activism are very touchy subjects, both because of factors addressed in the article, and because Peterson engages them with a vitrol that's absent from most of his other work. I'm a huge proponent of most of his lectures, but readily concede that he gets combative there in ways that are unproductive if not shortsighted. The Guardian had a review of his new book that, while blind to some nuance, landed some reasonable blows against him.

My advice to anyone looking to form an opinion on Peterson: Begin with his Maps of Meaning series on youtube. They're ~2hr lectures on the intersection of biology, religion, and morality, and they are the most illuminating rationale of world religion, its motivation, and its persistence, that I've ever read. He's frequently referred to as "Christian" because that's an easy set of values for readers to recognize, but dig into the lectures and you'll find that he's only "Christian" because the christian framework of morality is a subset of a larger and more universal moral framework common across time and cultures.

<comment><USER7> What....what part of the interview had "a vitrol that's absent from most of his other work"?

Or are your comments reserved exclusively for things other than the posted link?

<comment><USER8> The text of the posted link covers a subset of an interview. I'm speaking about things outside the posted link's text. I haven't watched the video it refers to in full.

Here's a good example I saw recently (eyeballing the timeline here, perhaps go back farther for context): [https://youtu.be/OD- VCRNIp-U?t=21m17s](https://youtu.be/OD-VCRNIp-U?t=21m17s)

It's tough, when discussing activism and political engagement, especially by youth and typically w/r/t left-wing politics and especially feminism, to get Peterson to detach universities' far-left activism from activism in general. This is especially unusual given his gift for engaging with topics in enormously broad scopes.</comment></comment></comment>


Lead nurturing in SaaS, PaaS, etc - <AUTHOR> http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/buying-cycle-and-triggers

<comment><AUTHOR> Any SaaS startups out there who have had success doing what David suggests, i.e., staying in touch with customers over a period of time to build a trusted relationship and then turning those folks into paying customers?

If yes, what were the specific actions you took that worked to drive engagement and moved them from consideration to purchase? Emails, newsletters, phone calls, etc? The more specific the better, i.e., frequency, language, etc :)

On an unrelated note, for SaaS startups, I highly recommend the blog from which this article is taken. He has lots of relevant and actionable advice.

</comment><comment><USER2> How do you cater for both the Awareness and Purchase phases on your landing page?

For Awareness, the single goal of your landing page is to ask for email address in exchange of some freebie.

For Purchase, you want to show testimonials and the call to action will be the Buy button.

How do you layout both in the same page? Any good live examples I can inspire mine from?

EDIT: For example this landing page doesn't have the Buy button but ask for an email address while saying "Try for $1) which mixes both phases in one: <http://www.trafficgeyser.com/>

</comment><comment><USER3> I've decided to go meta: Service as a Service.</comment>


All Creatures Welcome [documentary] - <AUTHOR> https://media.ccc.de/v/all_creatures_welcome <comment><AUTHOR> A documentary around the German hacker culture and their utopian vision for a digital era.</comment>


Wisdom of the crowd? Building better forecasts from suboptimal predictors - <AUTHOR> https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200120113430.htm <comment><AUTHOR> Original article:

Forecasting high-dimensional dynamics exploiting suboptimal embeddings

[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-57255-4](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-57255-4)</comment>


Show HN: A list of short, available .app domains - <AUTHOR> https://minus.app/ <comment><AUTHOR> Side note: as I was building this, I discovered that Google (the owner of the .app registry) seems to have banned registration of a bunch of interesting domains. This includes most swear words, street drugs, etc. Also on the list: gene.app, bacteria.app, pigeon.app, lens.app, and glove.app. Google Glove anyone? :)

</comment><comment><USER2> Some I checked were already taken and others were "premium" domains.

<comment><AUTHOR> Most of the shorter ones are "premium", unfortunately, that's just the way Google has priced them. I was able to get minus.app for about $60, though, roughly the same as a "non-premium" .io domain.

Which domain were you trying? About 30 have already been registered since I posted this, but it takes about 10 minutes for them to disappear from the list.</comment></comment>


Nvidia Still Working On Open-Source For Tegra Driver - <AUTHOR> http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTIzNTQ

<comment><USER2> Forgive me if I'm not terribly excited. Tegra2 has been around for... over 3 years now. It's certainly showing its age: so-so graphics, no NEON, only the 16-register variant of VFPv3, crappy memory bandwidth.

I'm not surprised it's taken so long to get this much, though, given what their closed-source under-NDA drivers looked like back in 2009 (I was working for a company building something based on Tegra2). At that time they didn't even give us full source for the driver, but what they did give us was a mess of binary blobs and ginormous abstraction layers. For a while there was actually a user-space daemon that you had to run that sat between the X11 driver and the kernel. (To be fair, though, nvidia isn't unique in the embedded world in doing crazy proprietary things on top of Linux.)

An open source Tegra3 driver would be much more interesting, but I'm sure we won't see that until Tegra3 isn't top-of-the-line anymore.

Granted, it's pretty rare in general for a manufacturer to open source their drivers for any of their SoC lines (even last-gen ones), so nvidia at least deserves some praise for that.

<comment><USER3> Quite a few of those abstraction layers and userspace interfaces exist solely to insulate between GPLed code and proprietary code. An Open Source driver can and should do away with those.

<comment><USER2> Not really. Most of the abstraction layers are there for portability. Unnecessary portability, since in the end, Nvidia decided to drop support for everything but Linux for their Tegra2 line.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Well atleast now we are seeing NVIDIA putting more effort into Open Source drivers.</comment>


Ask HN: Those of you running Mac OS X El Capitan Beta, how stable is it? - <AUTHOR>

Last year when I updated to Yosemite, I got hit by the wifi issues, so I'd like to avoid that. <comment><USER2> I'm using it on my iMac, my main work horse. Seems stable, no crashes.

Notifications sidebar is awfully slow, and Spotlight doesn't appear in the center. iTunes feels clunky. Those are the bad experiences so far.

But of course if you are using build tools i.e. Xcode and co. then I don't recommend you use it, that's usually where it's likely to break things because of updated APIs. I have a secondary machine I run builds when I need them.

</comment><comment><USER3> Do not install the beta unless you have a second machine. There are some hardware independent showstopper bugs in Beta 5.

</comment><comment><USER4> I use it on my primary work machine (after much cautious testing). It seems much more stable than 10.10.4 for me, but keep in mind, it's still in beta for a reason.

It could break with any update, or be unreliable with certain hardware configurations

</comment><comment><USER5> Broke some apps important apps. MenuMeters for which the reasoning is "due to the Apple-enforced code signature restrictions". More importantly it broke my editor - MacVim.

</comment><comment><USER6> I'm running it on three different MacBooks and I haven't run into any major issues. There have been the minor bugs but I haven't had any issues as of late.

</comment><comment><USER7> I am not personally running it yet, but I have heard no major issues. El Capitan's improvements seem to be almost entirely UX related.

</comment><comment><USER8> Seemed great to me but had to uninstall as Django is not compatible with El Capitan yet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Wait, how did an OS update break Django?

<comment><USER8> Sorry it was actually the Heroku CLI that didn't work - can't remember the exact error but it stopped me deploying.

edit:

Looks like a solution has been found so may reinstall the Beta

[https://github.com/heroku/heroku/pull/1615](https://github.com/heroku/heroku/pull/1615)</comment></comment></comment>


Build a Pager Using Arduino, Node.js and Twilio - <AUTHOR> https://www.twilio.com/blog/2014/11/go-old-school-build-a-pager-using-arduino-node-js-and-twilio.html

<comment><USER2> Wait, the Arduino needs to hooked up to the PC via serial port?

I was going to post something along the lines of "USELESS!!!", but then again it doesn't mean it isn't a good learning exercise.

All the same, I would quite be going around touting I've created a pager.

EDIT: Also, the use of Twillo is pretty contrived here when things like GSM shields exist. [http://arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoGSMShield](http://arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoGSMShield)</comment>


Facebook continues to ruin productivity. - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-more-time-spent-on-facebook-2009-7

<comment><USER2> <http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

The new title is a bit much.

<comment><AUTHOR> Noted and revised. Thanks for the comment.</comment></comment>


Why I Got into a Fight with My Phone - <AUTHOR> http://passionatereason.com/2015/04/01/why-i-got-into-a-fight-with-my-phone/

<comment><USER2> So, am I to understand you can't turn off notifications for specific apps on Android?

<comment><USER3> You can disable them through Settings > Apps if the app itself doesn't have an option.

For me, I only receive email notifications with the LED light (white). For anything with a persistent notification (ie. glovebox, lux auto brightness, etc) I disable the notifications.

The OP makes some good points regarding the 'always on' culture, but it's tough to complain about something you can easily avoid.</comment></comment>


How I'm able to take notes in mathematics lectures using LaTeX and Vim - <AUTHOR> https://castel.dev/post/lecture-notes-1/ <comment><USER2> In my math classes there was one guy who took notes with LaTex. He was quite fast due to his tweaked Emacs environment. He also uploaded his notes and the sources to some public SCM server. What sounds like a good idea turned out to be nonsense. His scripts where ridden of typos and serious errors. There where only a few people who tried to volunteer and edit the sources, but it did not do any good. The lecturers weren't impressed by the quality, and even warned students to not use those notes for exam preparation.

In the end nobody could use the notes, including the guy himself, as he underperformed in exams. Instead of concentrating on the content, he was concerned with LaTex aesthetics, fixing typos and tweaking his environment.

I would never ever recommend anyone to type math lectures/exercises in LaTex, if this is not required. Just use pen and paper and profit:

[https://www.quora.com/It-is-true-writing-things-down- using-p...](https://www.quora.com/It-is-true-writing-things-down-using-pen- and-paper-improve-learning)

<comment><USER3> I actually find all note-taking to be hugely distracting. If I really want to understand a lecture, I'd rather not be taking nay notes at all. Otherwise, when I'm taking notes, I'm just scrambling to get into paper what's being said or written and I can't spend any time trying to understand it. My goal is then to just write it down so I can re-read it at home and understand it.

That being said, I'm quite proficient in LaTeX and have taken notes in Emacs. I don't have that many more errors in LaTeX than I do in handwriting. Both are about equally distracting to me.

<comment><USER2> Do you talk about math lectures? Because during my university time I seldom met people, who understood a math lecture during that math lecture. Especially in advanced topics like category theory, algebraic theory, fractal geometry etc. Usually people understood topics and concepts for the first time long after the lectures, often not until after a second exposure in the next course. Also, in many courses you had to take notes, because the lecturer would use custom symbols and definitions. So I agree, taking notes can be distracting, but in most cases it should help your understanding, especially if you lack preliminaries.

<comment><USER3> Yes, of course I mean mathematics. If the prof was following a text (which as you say, is seldom the case in graduate courses), I find it a lot easier to not take notes at all so I can get a rough understanding of what's going on, and to go by memory to read a text later to get the details.

But it's true that oftentimes the only place to get the material from is the lecture and I have to be chasing after the lecturer to get the notes down and later try to decipher them myself.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Texture Synthesis with Convolutional Neural Networks - <AUTHOR> http://bethgelab.org/deeptextures/?utm_campaign=Artificial%2BIntelligence%2BWeekly&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Artificial_Intelligence_Weekly_23 <comment><USER2> Comments moved to [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10620229](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10620229).</comment>


Ask HN: How to price my startup's product? - d135-1r43

My startup will provide a ticket shop for a band, an event organizer or a congress. Current competitors charge 7% (excl. PayPal fees) or at least 1$ provision per sold ticket. This is way to expensive for small clubs as the whole entertainment industry is broke at the moment.<p>So how do you think should I place my fee? Go for a dumping price? Hide my actual fee by adding it to the final ticket price or be offensive and clear what it will cost at the end? <comment><AUTHOR> Be way up front with it. Priced correctly, that could even be a selling point, like overstock.com's shipping... "Any ticket, only $2.95 fee".

</comment><comment><USER2> Instead of acting like an affiliate, buy in bulk for cheap and sell for a markup.

Don't charge "processing" or delivery fees.

Make your site superfast.

</comment><comment><USER3> Definitely do not hide the fee. I hate it when companies do that - moreover, it may not be legal to not disclose...

</comment><comment><USER4> Why not test it some how. Ask people how likely they are to use again with two different fees.</comment>


Ask HN: A Domain Stolen by Registrar. What Would You Do? - <AUTHOR> I had a billing issue and was able to renew a domain 27 days after it expired. After I renewed it, I couldn't find it in my list of my domains anymore. I then contacted their support, and they confirmed the issue but said that they would get back to me in 24-48 hours. It looked that I renewed it when they are transferring it to an internal account, and they auction against the ICANN rules. As they don't send any notification that the domain is removed from your account, they seem to rely on people with multiple domains not noticing or people with a few domains not to know their rights. By the time you notice and 30 days after expiry pass, there's nothing you can do - well, at least this is what they tell you! Most people would give up - and that's what they expect. Something like this happened to me, but I don't want to be a sheeple. What would you recommend to me? Their response says that they refunded my renewal and that because the domain was not renewed 30 days after expiry, it went on an action! So, although I obviously did as they're refunding me, they still claim that nonsense! Why are we allowing this to happen to us? Do you lose your number after you fail to pay your phone bill? Why are we allowing this for something way more important? Okay, I know, some of us profit from this, but eventually it can hurt anyone of us, and especially and weak and uninformed person! <comment><USER2> If the registrar did something they were not supposed to do report them to ICANN and talk to your attorney. If after reporting the issue to ICANN and they are not found being compliant. The accredited registrar risks loosing their ability to register or renew any domains they hold under their account are normally forced to provide the original domain registrar (user that signed up to buy the domain) auth codes to transfer to another registrar.

[https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/help/dndr/udrp- en](https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/help/dndr/udrp-en)

[https://www.icann.org/news/announcement-2-2007-03-16-en](https://www.icann.org/news/announcement-2-2007-03-16-en)

Give the following a spin: [https://www.icann.org/compliance/complaint](https://www.icann.org/compliance/complaint) [https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/registrar-2012-02-25-e...](https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/registrar-2012-02-25-en)

</comment><comment><USER3> Take a breath [and a paragraph or two]</comment>


A retro way to create and share mixtapes online - <AUTHOR> http://suan.fm

<comment><USER2> nice!</comment>


France tells Google to remove search results globally, or face big fines - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/09/france-confirms-that-google-must-remove-search-results-globally-or-face-big-fines/ <comment><USER2> "The Right To Be Forgotten" is one of the worst pieces of law I have ever heard of and it still amazes me that it could come from a place like Europe.

In my opinion, Google is going to have to fight this or leave France. You simple can't have France dictate the search results that citizens of other countries receive. If that is allowed to happen then other countries will demand it as well.

</comment><comment><USER3> If Google staged a 2 day blackout in France, what do you suppose would happen?

<comment><USER4> Bing and Yahoo move up?</comment></comment>


"Don't argue with me. $100,000 is fair, and you know it." - <AUTHOR> http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=Switcher.txt&characters=Steve%20Jobs&sortOrder=Sort%20by%20Rating&detail=medium <comment><USER2> This story inspired me tonight: reading about how he didn't know if it would work or not, and how he fixed bugs as they arose is true hacking style. And it's definitely a way to get things done. So that's what I did tonight, and made a ton of progress; just hounding down and stomping on bugs mercilessly.

Why wasn't I doing that already? I'd been reading too much Dijkstra, that the "competent" programmer can show whether his code will work or not. It's definitely possible to do it that way, but it's (very sadly) too high a standard for me to reach in reasonable time (or maybe at all), for more than toy problems. Dijkstra used this approach to write a multitasking operating system. I'm pretty sure I couldn't do that.

<comment><USER3> So, there are two ways to do things, an easy way and a hard way. Once you've done it the easy way, it's probably a lot easier to cover up the traces and make it look like you did it the hard way.

And a guy who is famous both for being incredibly clever and for being rather arrogant and insecure told _all his competitors_ that they were incompetent if they didn't do it the hard way.

Programming is a form of mathematics. Maths papers are terse and beautiful and look as though they have sprung fully armed from the head of Zeus.

But you don't see the days of hacking through examples and crazy leaps of intuition (that are almost always wrong) in the finished paper, because the mathematician removes them from the story in order to leave an argument that is easy to verify.

I am not saying that Dijkstra couldn't do things the hard way. I would be amazed if his best stuff was done the hard way.

<comment><USER4> Well said!

Lakatos in his "Proofs and Refutations" addresses precisely this topic.

<comment><USER2> I like this experimental approach, it's like debugging, except you can also edit what inputs you accept. But is it actually accepted by mathematicians as an accurate description of what they do? <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proofs_and_Refutations>

Even Alonzo Church published work that was later shown to be logically inconsistent <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda_calculus> I came across

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> "Well, I think you are. How long do you think it will take to do this project? A month or two? I think a really good programmer like you could get it done in less than two months."

In my limited experience negotiating on fees for programming or selling software I've heard this line a few times. "You seem like a really good programmer, that program probably would have only taken you say 2 days, times that by an average hourly rate and thats the rate I'm willing to pay for the program and all source code".

Always a sign for me that things aren't going to go well.

<comment><USER6> > In my limited experience negotiating on fees for programming or selling > software I've heard this line a few times. "You seem like a really good > programmer, that program probably would have only taken you say 2 days, > times that by an average hourly rate and thats the rate I'm willing to pay > for the program and all source code".

Bzzt - "really good programmers" aren't paid an "average hourly rate" - they're paid an absurdly high hourly rate.

You've got to be willing to walk away, to call their bluff to find another programmer to do what you did for less.

And when they come back, the price is higher because you both know that they don't have as many options as they thought that they had before. (Alternatively, they've admitted that the options that they were using to beat you down don't exist.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Both Jobs and Gates tried to snare him with the same fallacy. It was easy for him to do because he was very good/had insider knowledge so he shouldn't be paid that much for it. Wrong.

What really mattered was how much it was worth to Microsoft or Apple and _especially_ that it was worth a good bit to both. Picture Scotty asking if that's worth somthin' t'ye or shd'aye just punch up clear?

<comment><USER8> It's a tough one, though. It sounds like an important thing to Andy was getting more of his work onto a bunch of Macs, where it could make the most impact. Which meant getting it bundled. Which meant making Steve happy.

Imagine Andy's horror, for example, if Steve had someone else build the Apple- blessed switcher instead and it worked but lacked the elegance and care of the Hertzfeld version.

Steve ended up having something Andy wanted, too. I gotta believe Jobs is a tough enough negotiator under the best of circumstances. Imagine when he's got you by your idealism.

<comment><USER9> The only possible leverage he could have had would have been to try to get Gates and Jobs into a bidding war. But that only works if Microsoft sees it as a competitive advantage to have the switcher for their apps but no one else's.

And, like you said, Andy already admitted he wanted it on all Macs, which blew any chance at leverage he had.

<comment><USER10> It's hard to say, because we weren't there. But I would have just said, then and there, "bullshit, I'll talk to Bill" and walked out the office - 10$ says he wouldn't have made it to the exit :)

<comment><USER11> Times were different back then. The market was nothing whatsoever like it is today. The context of this was for applications microsoft was writing for the mac, not for operating system development... and the fact that he had insider knowledge could have been used against him. And $100,000 was a decent amount of money at the time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> When he started on about the key combinations at the end, I was convinced he was about to give us the origin of Ctrl-Alt-Del.

<comment><USER13> I had the exact same comment (see farther down). I went on a quick hunt and turned up this as the actual origins: [http://www.reviewjournal.com/cgi- bin/printable.cgi?/lvrj_hom...](http://www.reviewjournal.com/cgi- bin/printable.cgi?/lvrj_home/2001/Sep-03-Mon-2001/business/16876535.html)

<comment><USER14> A more humorous take on it <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zADyh0JQh8>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I feel like he really dropped the ball on negotiating the sale. It seems like he didn't make any counters, and didn't use their competing interest to reap a higher price.

I was expecting at least a cease and desist or lawsuit would be involved.

<comment><USER2> Oh man you reckon that's poor negotiation skills, wait til you check out this guy <http://www.nucalc.com/Story/>

_EDIT_ found a video of Ron telling the story in person [http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7497796873809571567...](http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7497796873809571567#)

<comment><USER16> "Sadly, Microsoft has effective building security". That says it all, about corporate mentality.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> That's a great story. I'm not sure how many people can say they got a hard sell like that from both Bill Gates and Steve Jobs for one piece of software...

<comment><USER18> I feel like there should be an award for that. I feel accomplished when I manage to get _car dealerships_ to compete over me, much less CEOs worth scrillions of dollars.

<comment><USER19> They were only worth quintillions back then, remember

<comment><USER20> Also a Gatesion is more than a "Bill"ion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Probably my favourite 'Folklore' story (though I've by no means read them all) - I especially like the extra $50K kicker when Switcher was sold, something Jobs "swore they would never do".

</comment><comment><USER22> This is what the Switcher looked like: [http://school.anhb.uwa.edu.au/personalpages/kwessen/web/stor...](http://school.anhb.uwa.edu.au/personalpages/kwessen/web/stories/EarlyMacStories.html#multitasking)

</comment><comment><USER23> Wow, just wow. I am amazed by two things 1) How much a jerk both Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are and 2) How young the engineers were that started all this...

<comment><USER24> They're not jerks, they're putting the interest of their companies first.

<comment><USER25> They could do so without being jerks though, and yes, I think they both come off as jerks. I can think of several ways in which they could have achieved the same thing without being jerks.

<comment><USER24> Let's not rewrite history.

A skilled engineer Andy was obviously a very poor salesman, a trait both Bill and Steve saw immediately. They took advantage of the situation for the benefit of the company and although wording might be harsh, what they did was fair.

It was up to Andy to haggle.

Bill wrote a unneeded "thank you" letter to Andy. Doesn't look like what a jerk does.

And he eventually got $ 150,000 for his work. That's a fair amount of money, isn't it?

<comment><USER25> > They took advantage of the situation

Contradicts the rest of what you wrote... The strongest point against that I can see is the fact that he saw it somewhere else first.

<comment><USER24> I don't understand what you mean.

Do you mean they should have been "nice" to him? If yes, why? They were doing business, not having a cocktail party.

<comment><USER25> There seems to be this unspoken assumption that you can't do business if you're not nice.

This is definitely not true. If I were Jobs (which I'm arguably not, so it is possible that you can't 'get there' by being nice) I would have seen quite a few possibilities achieving the same without coming off as a jerk.

Maybe we disagree on that, but I don't think you _need_ to be like that in order to succeed. Some of the wealthiest people that I have known would never think of treating another person that way, business or not, and I find it surprising that Jobs would do this. It's just my personal take on this, don't make it in to an absolute.

<comment><USER24> We agree on that you don't have to be jerk to be successful.

I disagree when you say they haven't been nice with Andy. They've been "hard", but not mean (to me) and certainly not jerks. Steve used a fallacy to move his agenda but that's typical haggling (What! This used car is mint! And you want me to sell it for that price? You want me to close my business?!!).

Let's not forget the story is told from Andy's point of view. Bill and Jobs were probably very assertive and Andy might be sensitive to the point he perceived that negatively.

<comment><USER25> > Let's not forget the story is told from Andy's point of view.

That's very true, and from the other side it might come out very different.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> > ""But I don't want you taking advantage of this situation. I'm not going to > allow you to take advantage of Apple."

> "What do you mean?" I asked him, genuinely puzzled.

> "There's no way that you could have written that program without > confidential information that you learned by working at Apple. You don't > have the right to charge whatever you like for it.""

Wow... that makes me think a whole lot less of Steve Jobs.

That information should have been public knowledge anyway, to try to claim a stake in something that someone wrote just because you don't document your stuff is really low.

<comment><USER26> It's a common practice that parts of systems that cannot be guaranteed to not change in upcoming releases are undocumented, and rightly so.

<comment><USER25> That's true, but that is not a reason to see that as giving you a stake in someone else's efforts. I think that's a low thing to do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> With inflation, that's only doubled: <http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%24100%2C000+1984+%3D>

<comment><USER27> Not a bad deal for sitting in your house for a few months working on something that you enjoy.

<comment><USER28> Or a really crappy deal compared to how much value Bill Gates and Steve Jobs got out of it.

<comment><USER3> And thus, benefits from trade.

<comment><USER29> Benefits from trade are a good notion.

However, some trades are completely unfair.

Example, Native Americans trading the island of Manhattan for a few dollars of beads.

Even though it is great business. It is immoral to me to lie about the value of a product. Just as it would be immoral to lie about it's functions.

However, I can easily empathize with people who try to get the best deal for themselves/their company.

<comment><USER30> Native Americans sold Manhattan for $24 in 1626. It may seem a low amount, but invested at an annual 6% that would be over $125 billion today.

<comment><USER31> And yet still worth less than Manhattan.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> It seemed like he had an incredible product he could have sold for more in my opinion.

For contractual projects wouldn't it make sense to know the value of what is going to be produced (more or less) and then negotiate the percentage of it.

Is there anything akin to an agent for a programmer in this situation? In all seriousness, it might not be a bad idea for a business.

Assuming that you can add value to the talent by increasing contractual payoffs, and/or your organization could develop a reputation for excellence and potentially be sought out to find talent for certain jobs.

I'm picturing a mixture of a consultant, and a technical programming.

Any thoughts?

<comment><USER11> Keep in mind what the market looked like at the time - it was nothing whatsoever like today. The field was so new there were no ground rules. It was the wild west.

Either party could have also paid him nothing, hired someone else to do it, and been done with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Did anyone else think the story would end with the key combination being changed to "Ctrl+alt+delete"?

<comment><USER32> I was thinking command-option-escape (force quit on Mac).

<comment><USER13> Well, Microsoft was the comapny who he was talking about force-quit shortcut with, so I assumed the former.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Well, 100k is better than 40k

</comment><comment><USER34> The conversation with Bill Gates in his office reads like something out of an Ayn Rand novel. This is awesome.

</comment><comment><USER35> Damn, look at this: "... including a simple UI for selecting applications and 'Switcher Documents' for remembering sets of related applications."

I wish the concept of switcher documents had survived in the greater ecology - that would have been sweet.

</comment><comment><USER36> If this isn't inspiring to "predict the future by inventing it", I don't know what is.

</comment><comment><USER37> Excellent story. Anyone remember DESQview for DOS?

I really liked how his development cycles are spaced with mini-vacations.

Also, a nice look at the young Gates and Jobs.

...and he's a hardware hacker, too!

Good stuff.

</comment><comment><USER36> I wonder if he'd gone with the single-heap-for-all-apps idea, whether or not it would have encouraged program interoperability?

<comment><USER25> It probably would have led to programs crashing other programs by heap corruption though. More separation is better.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> When it got to the part where Andy was talking to Jobs and Jobs was trying to close a deal to buy Switcher, I could almost hear the _click_ of Steve's Reality Distortion Field turning on. Also pictured him doing the hand-waving motion Kenobi did in Star Wars when doing the Jedi mind trick on stormtroopers. "These are not the droids you're looking for. One hundred thousand credits. The Jedi will not be taken advantage of. This little one is not worth your trouble."

<comment><USER39> I always thought the Jobsian reality distortion field was more inspirational. It turns on and engineers start thinking along the lines of, "Yeah, I guess we can pack a mobo into a single square inch."

What he described sounded like vanilla intimidation. I could feel the guy squirming in his seat.

<comment><USER40> Man, for some reason a mobo in a single square inch sounds like a great idea.

Must… resist… RDF…

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Interesting to see the different approaches taken by Gates and Jobs. Gates: flattery, Jobs: implied threats.

</comment><comment><USER38> great story. great insight into Jobs and Gates too, giving a glimpse of both in action in the same era, and dealing with the same issue.</comment>


New Scandals Show How Pervasive Mass Surveillance Is in the West - <AUTHOR> https://theintercept.com/2016/11/04/three-new-scandals-show-how-pervasive-and-dangerous-mass-surveillance-is-in-the-west-vindicating-snowden/ <comment><USER3> Wake me up when someone goes to jail.

When you start sending the perps to jail for violating others' constitutional rights, they'll fall in line pretty quickly.

Until then, these "scandals" are no different than Kim Kardashian's nip-slip or that Paris Hilton video.

<comment><USER4> i think they both hilton and kardashian had nip-slips and leaked videos.

maybe that's the future though; privacy is premium service wherein you can dole out whichever tasty bits you like while all the other pleebs live out in the open.

<comment><USER5> No, that's not really the future. Here's the future: you don't get any privacy, period. Get over it. Live with it. Doesn't matter who you are - <USER2> don't get any.

Oh, and you know what? The future has already arrived.

<comment><USER3> > Doesn't matter who you are - you don't get any.

Really? I doubt it. The rich and powerful get plenty of privacy and protection. It's just the us remaining 98% that don't.

<comment><USER5> No, the rich and powerful pay boatloads of money for privacy, but don't get anything of substance in return.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Nearly everyone has smartphones, even the most privacy-conscious people. Until we find an alternative to the current devices, which have a mic/camera/gps that could be turned on remotely, I don't think we will be able to combat the invasion of privacy

<comment><USER7> get a phone without GPS (yes there are such phones) and physically remove the microphone and use a wired headset.

<comment><USER8> It can still be triangulated from the phone towers.

<comment><USER9> What about using voip such as Google voice?

<comment><USER7> Still need internet connection, tracking a device over wireless is arguably just as easy, even if you rotate your mac addresses.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's practically out of control. How do you educate a whole population on how it all works to help them avoid the mass surveillance trap?

<comment><USER11> More importantly, how do you stop it? These systems have the ability to destroy or compromise anybody that speaks up against them. Everyone has secrets.

<comment><USER12> Indeed, everybody has secrets, so what's the big deal? If everybody's secrets were out, then it would just become the new normal.

I think the privacy war is as winnable as the war on terrorism. It's better to figure out how best to build a post-privacy world then to cling to old unachievable ideals.

Maybe we can get a semblance of privacy by flooding the system with so much data, real and fake, that it requires real detective work to dig up reliable information about someone.

<comment><USER13> Do you draw your curtains? Close doors? Close the toilet door? Do you wear clothes on a hot day? Do you leave bank statements out when friends are coming? Do you have performance appraisals publicly? Do you mind if everyone sees every email/text you ever sent? Would you be happy if your doctor saw you and treated you in the waiting room? Humans have an inherent desire for privacy a lot of the time where I am.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Experience with PornHub's bug bounty: Scornhub - <AUTHOR> http://makthepla.net/blog/=/scornhub-bounty <comment><USER2> This is one of those cases where it's the responsibility of the bug bounty platform operator (HackerOne) to ensure that its customer (PornHub) deals appropriately with bug bounty participants. If PornHub doesn't offer a clear scope and fair reward for effort, penetration testers may be disillusioned with the HackerOne brand also and choose not to partake in other bug bounty programs it oversees. And of course the platform cannot thrive without a large number of skilled and active testers.

<comment><USER3> "PornHub penetration tester" would look... interesting on a resume.

<comment><USER4> Once you have worked as a dev for at least one porno company you are pretty much pigeonholed in the industry.

<comment><USER5> And that means you have to use PHP forever.

<comment><USER6> This is so true. I work for a large social network and we recently got an email from an employee of a particular porn streaming company. They wanted to implement this new web compression protocol/algorithm into their systems and they had heard that we were doing the same.

Our solution involved writing Apache Traffic Server plugins and achieving high throughput. Their solution involved using PHP to execute the demo cli tool that came with the library and pass it the content they wanted to encode.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Hope they have patched everything reported and not paid for, because I'm sure there are other parties who would find that information valuable.

</comment><comment><USER8> Do hackers seek to make a living off bounties? It seems as if they just want a good, rewarding, motivating experience. To be treated with respect and to get the recognition they want. $50 for a vulnerability appears very low for this. Looking in the hackerone site, some companies publish how much they give to the hackers and most have a much more generous minimum reward.

<comment><USER9> Part of the equation is that companies offering bounties need to compete with entities who also offer rewards for said knowledge.

<comment><USER10> I'd hope that some people, at least, actually want to fix problems and gain respect in their field. As opposed to engaging in criminal activity and selling out to the highest bidder.

<comment><USER11> It's easy to say "I do it for the respect, not the money" when you have enough money to get by.

There's plenty of guys out there who are searching for hacks like this because they need to feed their kids. I won't criticize them for selling bugs to nefarious entities.

Bug bounties aren't for guys like us who don't need the money.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Another grumbly hacker complaining about a bug bounty undervaluing their work.

It wasnt long ago that notifying a company that they had a vuln was an act that risked prosecution.

Bug bounties are a release valve. They are not a substitute for a job. They will never pay the same as crime. Writeups like this are not going to facilitate relationships with leaders in the security industry. This post and others like them are embarrassingly naive.

<comment><USER13> Money is money. Offer $25k and a researcher gets RCE on the vast majority of your scoped boxes, you better pay a substantial portion of that $25k. Shame on PornHub, I'll be using xvideos from now on.</comment></comment>


Twitter Launches New Design - <AUTHOR> http://tech.li/2011/12/twitter-launches-new-design/

<comment><USER2> Was it just me or is the name 'Twitter' omitted from the header in the new design?</comment>


PopcornTime.io announces Butter - <AUTHOR> http://markdownshare.com/view/1c88847d-b885-450b-9409-aaf8f758e8e6 <comment><USER2> I've never used Popcorn Time. Is it normal that I can't connect to [https://popcorntime.io/](https://popcorntime.io/) ?

<comment><USER3> Unfortunately, yes it is. [http://status.popcorntime.io/](http://status.popcorntime.io/)

<comment><USER2> That doesn't load either.</comment></comment></comment>


Toys 'R' Us Plans Bankruptcy Filing Amid Debt Struggle - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-18/toys-r-us-is-said-to-plan-bankruptcy-filing-as-soon-as-today <comment><USER2> Though this may have something to do with Amazon (and retail generally trending online), it does appear that the big culprit here were Bain Capital (and its partners) who took it private in 2005 via leverage buyout and ladened Toys r Us balance sheet with untenable debt from thereon. Apparently, they were paying $500M in interests alone per year vs. reinvesting capital in growth of their offline stores or online retail.

I personally feel that, similar to bookstores which as seen a resurgence in neighborhood mom & pop stores, while Amazon will continue to dominate, a lot of smaller toy retailers (both online and offline) will spring up to take Toys r Us' space.

<comment><USER3> Toy stores are a _great_ example of opportunity for brick and mortar. Just like book stores, they operate in a space where curation, discovery and the physical experience adds real value.

The town I grew up in has a great independent toy store, and I make it a point to shop there every time we're in town. Every time I find something unique that I would have never looked for on Amazon, and often I'm hooked by the tactile act of playing with something that couldn't be fully replicated online.

As an interesting aside, this particular store[1] fought for its right to keep their mural (which was awesome but violated city codes) all the way to the supreme court[2]. They lost, but you've got to admire the chutzpa of someone willing to do that.

[1] [http://www.inlandoctopus.com/](http://www.inlandoctopus.com/)

[2] [http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/city-paints-over- wa...](http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/city-paints-over-walla-walla- octopus-sign/)

<comment><USER4> >Every time I find something unique that I would have never looked for on Amazon, and often I'm hooked by the tactile act of playing with something that couldn't be fully replicated online.

You're absolutely right. The result usually is though that the kid finds a toy they like then puts in on their Birthday/Christmas wishlist from where the Santa buys from Amazon. I like to think I never do this, but if the price is much higher even I have a limit.

I think that manufacturers should sell to physical toy stores at a lower price, and actively make sure online price is the same or higher than instore. but I dont how easy this is to police or even if is legal in some countries.

<comment><USER5> > I like to think I never do this, but if the price is much higher even I have > a limit.

Really? You rationalize going to a brick and mortar international franchise simply because it is physical, instead of going to an online international franchise?

Thats the biggest stretch of "buy local" that I've ever been exposed to.

<comment><USER6> OP is talking about a small toy store, but regardless - an international franchise that has a location in your home town employs people from your home town, whereas Amazon (for the sake of argument in this case) does not. That's the core argument of 'buy local'.

<comment><USER7> Pretty sure the person who delivers my packages doesn't live in another country.

<comment><USER6> A tiny fraction of the alternate, yes. Though of course much of the logistics planning an operations is easily outsourced.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Take the same building, reduce the space dedicated to toy sales, open up a series of indoor playgrounds and gymnasiums. Heck maybe carve out a daycare facility.

Maybe some sort of toy lab for kids to try before they buy.

Refocus the concept on being a real place for kids to grow and I think you'd see customers coming in the door again.

<comment><USER9> A place to try before you buy on amazon.

<comment><USER10> I used to go to Borders constantly, like a hangout. As Amazon grew, I found myself doing exactly this: going to check out the latest releases, flip through the pages, pull out my phone and check Amazon prices. 99% of the time it was cheaper there. Add the book to a wishlist or my cart, put the book back on the shelf and leave empty-handed.

I felt horrible when Borders went under, but I do the same at B&N. If brick-n- mortar want to compete with Amazon, they need to compete with their prices. However, they also have a lot of additional overhead that makes it untenable.

This trend of resellers is going to occur until Amazon dominates the market, or we start buying direct from vendors which doesn't seem likely for many items.

<comment><USER11> This is why many bookshops teamed up with coffee shops. Even Blackwell's in Oxford has Caffé Nero upstairs. Several indie bookshops do it too.

Nowadays I just go to the Oxfam bookshop near me. It's cheaper than Amazon marketplace (£2.80 shipping). I'm working through the old Hugo/Nebula winners and pretty much every week there's a new classic sci-fi I haven't read. That and cookery, you can pick up lovely books that would cost upwards of £20 for £2.50.

I'm also very wary of buying on Amazon, because it's been flooded with cheap crap from Aliexpress. The exception are a few brands like Anker which are reliably OK.

<comment><USER12> > I'm also very wary of buying on Amazon, because it's been flooded with cheap > crap from Aliexpress.

Seattle here. Only transplants buy from Amazon. We've known about this problem here for years.

You'll usually see native Seattlites buy from B&H, Newegg, or the local shops and use Amazon as a last resort.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> It really is unfortunate that stores I grew up with as a kid, ones like KB Toys, Montgomery Wards, Service Merchandise, Blockbuster, Kmart/Sears, and now even Toys"R"Us have gone by the wayside for one reason or another.

It both depresses me and blows my mind that future generations may not even be able to experience Brick and Mortar.

<comment><USER14> Do we really want our kids to enjoy fluorescent-lit warehouses full of cheap crap that will be thrown away a couple months after it's bought?

<comment><USER15> There's something to be said for getting rid of excessive waste and unnecessarily large warehouses of "cheap junk", but it's also worth remembering that toys play a very important part in teaching children fundamental skills like hand-eye coordination, simple problem solving, fostering imagination, etc.

It's a game of "what-ifs", but I'm fairly confident in saying I wouldn't be pursuing the career I am now if I had never had the experiences of walking down the Lego aisle at the toy store and falling in love with piecing together toy cities.

<comment><USER16> Same - except for me it was also _Capsela_ (now called IQ Key), a bunch of cheap plastic crap that let you engineer modular machines.

I think the medium that kids play with 'toys' has changed with tablet and phone devices. Now they're solving puzzle apps and building Minecraft cities - whether or not that's a good or bad thing, I'm not sure, but it doesn't bode well for toy stores.

<comment><USER15> I think so too, but I wonder about the long term effect that doing everything in the virtual world will have on abilities in the physical world. It's extremely anecdotal, but my little brother, who almost exclusively plays Minecraft, seems to have a fantastic imagination but very poor fine motor skills. He has trouble doing anything physical that requires not using a keyboard and mouse.

<comment><USER17> I feel like there's a point far into the future where they might consider the current technology age as a turning point in our evolution as biological beings. Consider a future 1000 years from now, after we've spent a thousand years interacting with the virtual world. Imagine a world where the virtual is indistinguishable from the physical - where the virtual IS physical, and the physical IS virtual. Virtual worlds that are infinitely customizable, creating scenarios for your mind that are infinitely more compelling than what you can experience in the purely physical realm. Reset your life to any point in time. Fast forward. Rewind. Play through every conceivable event. Travel to any destination you can imagine. Meet anyone or any creature. BE any creature. Live an existence that can be shaped by your very whim; reality could be whatever you wanted it to be, changes made as quickly as thoughts come and go. For all intents and purposes, you are the architect of your own reality. God.

Computer chips implanted into the body to regulate vital functions. Nanobot technology to repair or modify biological cells. Countless methods to sustain and prolong your biological life.

Eventually the biological dies, but the virtual simulation is not interrupted. Instead, your consciousness is uploaded to the world's mainframe server, where your mind is allowed to continue on it's journey of self-discovery within the virtual world. You and your loved ones can continue to interact virtually, forever. Where you can continue to explore, to learn, and to experience life long after your death.

You are virtually immortal.

<comment><USER18> Since we don't understand the nature of consciousness there is zero evidence to indicate that mind uploading will ever actually be possible.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The CEO of Toys 'R' Us as of 2015 is Dave Brandon. He was the former CEO of Dominoes Pizza. After he left Dominoes in 2009 is when they started the "We used to suck, we don't anymore, please come try us again!" advertising campaign.

After Dominoes, Dave Brandon was the athletic director at the University of Michigan. During his time as AD, he managed to alienate the majority of the fan base, hire a coach who got worse over the course of four years and who ended with a losing record and who gave up the title of "winningest program" to Notre Dame, violate FOIA law, repeatedly mishandle PR situations (including the time where it appeared that a QB with a concussion got put back in the game), and run up the athletic department debt. He got fired on Halloween 2014, after slightly over four years as AD.

Color me not surprised Toy 'R' Us went under.

<comment><USER20> Are there non-cynical explanations of how someone with such a terrible track record gets hired? Maybe a dearth of alternative CEOs? Or is the reality as bad as it appears?

<comment><USER21> Who's on the board that hired him? Did they have a pre-existing personal relationship from a frat or something? Getting to the bottom of this would probably inform a good stock shorting strategy.

<comment><USER22> I'm now pondering a "these fratboys are deleterious to boards" index fund thanks to your post.

<comment><USER23> Bonus points for using social graph data for boardmembers and the fratboys they hire to front-run terrible CEO hiring decisions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I remember being young and looking forward to every year near Christmas my mom and Grandma would take me to Toys 'R' Us and pick out my present.

Feels weird to hear they're going bankrupt. Understandable, though. Huge stores with random assortments of product (non-essential product, unlike toilet paper et al.) aren't cost effective or convenient in comparison to something like Amazon.

</comment><comment><USER25> Bain Capital strikes again?

</comment><comment><USER26> Of all the things in the world, _children 's toys_ are THE most amenable to replacement by makers, tinkerers, and other people who want to _do something_ in the real world.

(Alas, that's not what's happened. People just buy the cheap plastic crap from Amazon.)

<comment><USER27> Doesn't Toys 'R' Us sell the same "cheap plastic crap" as Amazon?

<comment><USER28> Amazon sells a slightly different but much wider range of "cheap plastic crap" thanks to FBA. There's no shortage of budding sellers with an Alibaba account who think they have the next best thing (read: re-labeled, generic Chinese crap) and flood the market with crazy cheap products making it difficult for bricks and mortar retailers to compete.

A store like Toys 'R' Us may have a slight advantage when it comes to licensed merchandise, but I think even most of the big sellers long ago accepted that it's impossible to ignore the Amazon juggernaut and now also sell on the platform.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Does this mean that the "R Us" trademark suits will cease[1]?

[1] [https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/intellectual- proper...](https://www.lexisnexis.com/legalnewsroom/intellectual- property/b/copyright-trademark-law-blog/archive/2011/05/12/like-a-scene-from- the-godfather-toys-r-us-tells-smokes-r-us-don-t-mess-with-the-family-of-marks- free-download.aspx)

<comment><USER30> Or intensify?

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Can someone explain why it would be loaded up with debt on going private?

<comment><USER32> Bain (and their horrible ilk) put up a tiny amount of capital to secure huge loans. They used those loans to buy the company, taking it private. Once it is private they can do whatever they like with it; they pay themselves back for the loans by loading the company up with debt (and then some to ensure an immediate profit). They cut everything to the bone, fire as many people as possible, then spin the husk back out as a public company (or offload it to some other sucker).

Bain effectively risked nothing to make a killing and ensure Toys-R-Us would eventually file for bankruptcy due to an unsustainable debt load. Banks are happy to loan Bain money for these schemes because Bain makes a killing on them and private equity almost always finds a sucker dumb enough to buy the zombie company off them. (Every once in a while the zombie goes south so fast private equity is left holding the bag).

For loans to the zombie company the terms are punishing enough the bank only needs the zombie to survive for a limited amount of time.

The part I don't understand yet is who is the dumb money buying shares in these hollowed-out debt-laden husks from the private capital vultures? It almost always ends up badly. Even when it doesn't the upside isn't great.

FWIW Guitar Center is almost certainly headed for the same end and for the same reason.

<comment><USER33> >The part I don't understand yet is who is the dumb money buying shares in these hollowed-out debt-laden husks from the private capital vultures? It almost always ends up badly.

Is this based on reliable statistics or on highly visible anecdotes? Perhaps the "dumb money" isn't as dumb as you think.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> From SEC (shortened):

+</comment><comment></comment><comment>-----+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+

| In millions | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 |

+</comment><comment></comment><comment>-----+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+

| Net Sales | 11,540 | 11,802 | 12,361 |

| COGS | -7,432 | -7,576 | -7,931 |

| Operating Earn. | -460 | -378 | -191 |

| Interests | -455 | -426 | -447 |

| Total loss | -6 | -156 | -452 |

+</comment><comment></comment><comment>-----+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+</comment><comment>--+

1\. Their revenue is quite stable but decreasing 2\. Their EBIT is positive and increasing 3\. Their operating cashflow is negative but increasing 4\. So they seem to be running out of cash... 5\. They cannot lend more with such bad terms eg. 12% interests.

</comment><comment><USER35> Leveraged buyouts take down another victim. As always, it's shocking that these are legal.

</comment><comment><USER36> "Ratings agencies have rushed to cut their credit ratings on Toys "R" Us to reflect the sinking market sentiment...[S&P] had the retailer rated B- just two weeks ago, and Moody's Investors Service still has a B3 rating and stable outlook for the name."

Ratings agencies once again showing how efficient they are at actually rating debt. B3 and stable outlook for a company that has actually field for bankruptcy, you gotta be kidding me.

</comment><comment><USER37> I'm not surprised. They sell pure garbage. Every single time I go there to get a toy for my kid, I can't pick anything. I end up spending an hour walking around choosing the best of the worst and keep repeating to to myself something like: "Where does this shitty store get the money to pay the rent?"

<comment><USER38> While I agree... as a kid I have very fond memories... makes me kind of sad. I see the same excitement now in my kids...

<comment><USER37> I moved to U.S. just a few years ago, but I know what you mean. The bar to kids' happiness is very low, which is, unfortunately, not the same with adults, including myself.

<comment><USER39> The kids are thinking "did that look cool" and are swayed by the box and presentation (eg big box to hide the small size of the toy, etc.).

Adults are wise to the tricks and look for a toy that's not just good to play with "right now" but also will last to be played with again, and will still entertain when the box is open and the novelty has faded.

In short kids are an easy mark (easy to con).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> What are toys these days? VTech LED craziness or Lego-on-steroids? No kid (even Babies it seem) are interested in old fashion wooden/metal toys whereas toddlers+ are only interested in digital/musical/mechanical stuff that feels all 'plasticy' and 'gimmicky'.

Let's face it - kids these days are taught to follow the latest 'fads' when it comes to toys and to feel everything they own is super disposable -- similar to their parents.

No wonder Toys R Us can't meet the budgetary requirements of a modern parent whose kids are so fussy when it comes to toys that as soon as the kid is 7/8 years old, the focus is shifted to electronic gadgets and the modern sport 'app'rchery.

</comment><comment><USER41> I have come to the conclusion that it is very hard for a specialty businesses to survive in the era of Walmart and Amazon - which does not bode well long term for places like Barnes & Noble and Gamestop. I hope I am wrong.

<comment><USER42> At least for Gamestop, you're probably not wrong. Amazon Prime gets you new video games at 20% off MSRP. That's cheaper than what the distributor sells them for.

<comment><USER43> I think GameStop makes most of its money buying trade-ins. Perhaps they are more in the pawn shop business than the video game business?

<comment><USER44> Go into your local Gamestop for a copy of Destiny 2 and see how hard they try to push you into buying a pre-owned (used) copy for $55 over the new copy for $60.

Their trade-in value for Destiny 2 is $24 (in store credit) and their pre- owned purchase price is $55. No wonder the sales staff force the pre-owned games over new.

Gamestop gave the middle finger to game producers when they realized how selling used games was way more profitable than new. When they file for chapter 11 in the near future they will claim downloadable games and competition from Amazon killed their business rather than their greed causing their suppliers to find alternative sales channels.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> > With speculation of a bankruptcy mounting, shares of Toys "R" Us's vendors > tumbled on Monday. Mattel Inc., the maker of Barbie and Fisher-Price, fell > 6.2 percent -- its worst decline in seven weeks. Shares of Hasbro, the > company behind Monopoly, Nerf and Transformers, dropped 1.7 percent.

Does Toys R Us owe money to Mattel? Or are people thinking that if they go away or significantly reorganize people will just buy fewer toys of these types? On the surface a 6% drop for Mattel seems huge based on this news. If a grocery chain goes into bankruptcy, you're not going to see Coca Cola stock drop..

<comment><USER46> According to this article, Toys "R" Us accounts for about 10% of Mattel's revenue. That seems pretty significant:

[https://www.reuters.com/article/us-orbital-atk-northrop- grum...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-orbital-atk-northrop- grumman/northrop-grumman-nears-deal-to-purchase-orbital-atk-source- idUSKCN1BS0YB)

<comment><USER45> If Toys R Us is responsible for about 10% of all toy sales by revenue that wouldn't be terribly meaningful, but yeah, if they sell proportionally more Mattel toys, whereas other retailers might sell comparable toys from other brands more, that could certainly account for it. Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Too bad. Toys r Us has a great selection and good pricing. I found that they almost always beat Amazon on toys and eliminated the risk of counterfeit stuff, especially for things like Lego.

</comment><comment><USER48> Aw man, I've just rediscovered this place with our 9 month old son. Was looking forward to going there as he grew up. Hopefully they can work out some sort of restructuring..

<comment><USER49> Most kids are just as happy playing with the wrapping paper as with the toy inside.

That is to say: your son will be just as happy with something you two might find or make together.

<comment><USER50> Star Wars action figure? No way. Lets get some paper towel tubes, markers, and glitter and make our own!

<comment><USER51> The original post was about a 9-month-old. No baby that age cares in the slightest about Star Wars, but they love boxes.

<comment><USER50> Well, he also was talking about the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> This episode of Planet Money (best podcast evah btw) kinda explains why retails like Toys`R'Us was defeated by Amazon.

[http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/07/26/539552579/episo...](http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/07/26/539552579/episode-629-buy- low-sell-prime)

</comment><comment><USER53> Toys 'R' Us might have been a great store when we (I) were kids, but I went there a few months back--what a wasteland. Barbie, GI Joe, and movie tie-in action figures as far as the I can see. Good riddance. People can buy crappy Angry Birds dolls on Amazon just as well as Toys 'R' Us.

I hope this opens up opportunities for superior brick & mortar toy stores.

<comment><USER54> When was it anything but Barbie, GI Joe and movie tie-in action figures? That is mostly what it was in the 70s and 80s when I was a kid. 1/2 the movie action figures are probably Star Wars just like when I was a kid.

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> Damn. I was just in one like two weeks ago looking for a laser tag system. The prominent NERF gun display right by the entrance was glorious. NERF has progressed significantly and has also developed a new kind of spherical ammo in case you were wondering. I'll have to buy a few while they're on clearance.

</comment><comment><USER56> They've just filed for bankruptcy [https://www.toysrusinc.com/press/toysrus- inc-commences-court...](https://www.toysrusinc.com/press/toysrus-inc- commences-court-supervised-processes-to-implement-financial-restructuring)

</comment><comment><USER57> A toy store that isn't even a little magical to walk into is not long for this world.

</comment><comment><USER58> I don't want to grow up, I want to be a Toys `R` Us kid......

</comment><comment><USER59> When they closed down its flagship at Time Square, I was expecting TRU not doing very well.

</comment><comment><USER60> I guess I'm never getting my eToys gift certificate redeemed then :(

</comment><comment><USER61> Ah yes, another Bane Capital success story.</comment>


Reuzel – A tiny C++ thread pool - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/leohotfn/Reuzel <comment><USER2> PSA: Please don't do stuff like this in header files:

using std::string;

It's not cool to impose that decision on clients of the library.

<comment><USER3> Note that this is not the same as "using namespace std;" since you are only exporting the namespace std::string.

This should almost always be ok since no sane programmer should ever name their class string in the namespace of std.

As a developer, I wouldn't feel too bad about causing namespace conflicts in this manner because hopefully it will suggest to the maintainer that their class name is a poor choice.

<comment><USER4> Actually, it tells the compiler that every time it comes across a class called string that isn't fully qualified, it should use std::string. And since he's put it in the global namespace, it will apply everywhere this header is visible.

He really shouldn't do that in a header, but if he at least moved it down a couple of lines so it's inside his private namespace, it at least wouldn't affect anyone else. There is no good reason to do it globally.

<comment><USER3> But that begs the question why do you have two classes named string to begin with? The ambiguous name choice of string for an alternative to the standard is a terrible idea and all the problems associated with it should be the responsibility of the person making that decision. Putting using std::string in the header would at the very least make whoever is using your class strongly consider the necessity of 2 classes named string. They would be forced to use the fully qualified name for their type instead of ambiguously referring to their alternative string class as string. This prevents future maintainers from getting confused as to why there are 2 versions of the class string.

<comment><USER5> But "string" in std _isn 't_ ambiguous, precisely because it's in the std namespace.

As to why a program would have two classes called string... well, there's a funny thing there, because it _didn 't_, at least not until it started using this library that does "using std::string" in its header...

(Anyway, why is it the library author's concern? They're writing a library! Not only is this the tail wagging the dog, but they're actually making it harder to use, and easier to say no to. Exactly the wrong thing.)

<comment><USER3> I think we're viewing the issue from 2 different stand points. You are correct that from a library authors perspective they shouldn't impose undue restrictions. I was thinking more along the lines of code maintenance within the same library module where it could be helpful to signal to others that come along that the stl string is the expected default. I think most people would agree that (using...) in the header is a bad idea if the header is intended to be apart of the Public API for the library but I think its use can be justified in a few select instances of internal headers in order to impose cohesive coding convention.

If its my library and I don't want other maintainers adding additional string classes internally, I can at the very least force them to use fully qualified names for their alternative string classes to avoid ambiguity. I hate working on code that has 5 different versions of the same freaking thing because each developer decided to implement their own version when the standard way would have sufficed. That was the point I was trying to make. Just like putting const and override on functions, it's a way to help maintainers avoid doing dumb things.

<comment><USER2> It kind of sounds like you're looking for technical means by which to "signal to others". In that case, perhaps some documentation (for other contributors/maintainers) could be of use?

Beyond that I'm not sure what to suggest. The problem is that even if you have a Really Good Reason for what might otherwise appear to be a bit of gratuitous incompatibility, it's rather unlikely that others will figure out what that reason is without some explanation. IME anyway.

<comment><USER3> Documentation is only good if people read it... which most developers don't. If someone tried to make a class called string in my module, they would receive immediate feed back from the compiler that there are now multiple definitions of string which should tell them that they are creating another copy of something that already exists.

Nevertheless, I'll concede that its not the best way to go about things. But it is something you can do and I wanted to highlight a case of why a "Never do This" feature is even allowed in the first place.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The C++11 thread library ([http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/thread](http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/thread)) is at least not insane, and at best you might even like it. In my view it's certainly a better bet than pthreads, because it runs on Windows too.

<comment><USER6> Indeed, it's portable and part of the standard. Personally I'm a big fan of this implementation: [https://github.com/progschj/ThreadPool/](https://github.com/progschj/ThreadPool/)

<comment><USER7> Thanks, this looks a lot better than the one in the subject.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Another simpleapproach to exception handling (beyond calling abort) is to allow an exception callback to be registered. This can allow appropriate diagnostic logging, and/or compensation

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> What does this library offer over std::async?

<comment><AUTHOR> What do you mean?

<comment><USER3> the c++11 library std::async provides a built in mechanism for spawning asynchronous tasks. Under the hood, std::async uses a thread pool. So I'm asking why use this library when the stl already provides a thread-pool mechanism?

<comment><AUTHOR> I think The C++ thread library is overdesigned so it lost some function. What's more, on Linux it's chicken ribs. So I encapsulate POSIX Threads using C++, to take advantage of RAII.

<comment><USER3> Good explanation, and frankly I agree. From looking through it, I like the control your lib allows. If its performance is superior on Linux as you say, nice work!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! BTW, the encapsulation is not finished yet, such as mutex and condition variable. I'll go on with the work, and welcome to contribute if you're interested!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Feedback for New Video Streaming App - <AUTHOR> Hi HN,
My co founder and I have been working on a Live Music Video Streaming App called Streamly.
It allows artist to stream their live shows direct from their iPhone to their fans that can't make the show.
Were looking for any feedback and so anyone who has a minute to check it out and post feedback would be much appreciated.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/streamly/id1033329382?ls=1&mt=8
Thanks All.
Rich <comment><USER2> Hi Rich,

I think this would be better suited to Show HN than to Ask HN :) .

I googled for Streamly and one of my first hits was a YouTube background player app

[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/streamly-youtube- background/...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/streamly-youtube- background/id1006159494?mt=8)

The idea sounds very good, but I would be extremely worried about the legal implications of using it, unless you get licenses/approval from the parties (band, venue operators or whatever you might require), you're probably party to copyright infringment.

There are some typos that make it less credible, "weather" instead of whether, "Up comming" instead of Upcoming, etc.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thanks GFisher, I must have missed that typo. I will try it in Show HN instead.

The app is aimed at artists broadcasting their own gigs and so hopefully shouldn't run into legal issues.

Thanks for taking the time to look into it and for the feedback.

</comment><comment><USER3> Submit this to Evalueight.com</comment>


Unfit For Office Because She Plays World of Warcraft - <AUTHOR> http://kotaku.com/5948987/maine-democrat-is-supposedly-unfit-for-office-because-she-loves-poisoning-and-stabbing-in-world-of-warcraft

<comment><USER2> After some experience with MMO's I came to the following conclusion:

You can either be a "winner" online or offline. You can only choose one.

If she can do a stellar job while devoting a large portion of her time to a video-game, more power to her, but the odds are stacked against that actually being the case!

</comment><comment><USER3> She's level 68 (I think that's now 22 levels shy of the level cap), which any gamer can tell you, means she plays anything from a lot.</comment>