The Last Answer, by Isaac Asimov - <AUTHOR> http://www.thrivenotes.com/the-last-answer/

<comment><USER2> People might want to read the comments from two of the previous submissions of this:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1287594](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1287594)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5585646](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5585646)

In particular, there's a link to "The Last Question"

[http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html](http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html)

That's been submitted before too:

[https://hn.algolia.com/?q=the+last+question#!/story/sort_by_...](https://hn.algolia.com/?q=the+last+question#!/story/sort_by_date/0/the%20last%20question)

<comment><USER3> Even more relevant is the other Multivac story "All the Troubles of the World", as per [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_the_Troubles_of_the_World](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_the_Troubles_of_the_World)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> _Murray said, "But the odd integers can be derived. If you divide every even integer in the entire infinite series by two, you will get another infinite series which will contain within it the infinite series of odd integers."_

For S={2,4,6,8...}

S/2={1,2,3,4,..}

I used to think the set of even integers is a subset of the natural numbers.Doesnt this suggest that the reverse (the set of natural numbers being a subset of even integers) is actually true?

<comment><USER5> I think what you mean is you used to think that the set of non-negative even integers was "smaller" than the set of natural numbers. The reason you can do this is because the set of non-negative even integers has the same cardinality as the set of naturals (both are countably infinite): [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardinality](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardinality)

The same is true of the rational numbers, by the way. There is a famous proof of the fact that there are infinite sets with larger cardinality that the naturals (the reals for example): [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor's_diagonal_argument](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor's_diagonal_argument)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> It is the awareness that you are immortal that would lead to the desire to end things (assuming the concept actually exists). Logically, the voice is simply a conduit to the interconnection (nexus) of all entities. Being singley aware my own consciousness is immortal and that consciousness is also part of a greater whole are equally appealing and frightening to me. That duality is slightly puzzling and interesting.

</comment><comment><USER7> I read this every time it appears on the front page, and I enjoy it every time. Asimov remains an inspiration.</comment>


Google Fiber laying off 9% of staff, will "pause" plans for 10 cities - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/10/google-fiber-laying-off-9-of-staff-will-pause-plans-for-10-cities/ <comment><USER3> This is really sad. If not even, google can do it, then who can? I guess consumers will continue to be abused by ISPs for quite some time. I don't blame At&t, they're just a vicious business taking advantage of a monopoly given by politicians and law makers. Politicians should be blamed - <USER2> officials are supposed to have some kind of loyalty to their voter base.

<comment><USER4> > This is really sad. If not even, google can do it, then who can?

Government. They're generally pretty good at building infrastructure.

<comment><USER5> I bet that's what Google thought, too. My understanding, though, is that Google only went to cities that agreed to clear all the red tape, in advance.

So this project should have had most of the 'power of government' efficiency, short of the power of condemnation. I think the logistics and cost of last- mile wiring surprised them.

While government can do it, too, this experiment seems to show [hard wired fiber is] not financially feasible at $100/month to willing consumers. The Government won't be cheaper at building here; just 'better' at subsidizing or socializing the cost through taxes on people who wouldn't pay it otherwise.

<comment><USER4> >While government can do it, too, this experiment seems to show it's not financially feasible at $100/month to willing consumers.

It depends on what payback time they were expecting too. A government can handle it even if it takes 20-30+ years. Or even never for some things (like roads).

<comment><USER5> Alphabet has access to better capital rates than most local governments, I bet, and they could go decades without a dividend.

But, yeah, government can decide there's no need for a return. Businesses mostly don't get rewarded for doing that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well shit. I guess I'm never getting out of comcast's thumb. In the Seattle area, some places have century link / qwest 1 gb service, but most places do not. A few apartment buildings have wireless "wave"/condointernet (best name ever for an isp) that supports 1 gig. But the rest of us poor saps are shit out of luck.

<comment><USER7> It's truly remarkable that in Portland my only option is Comcast, and even then I have to keep a very close eye on my usage because they just implemented data caps at 1 terabyte when I've far exceeded that on several occasions.

Century Link is not an option. I've tried their service and all around they make Comcast look amazing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is really unfortunate. All Google Fiber had to do in Austin was announce their intentions and cable internet prices went down and speeds went up practically overnight.

I don't hold much hope for metro broadband either, mostly due to law suits.

</comment><comment><USER5> Not surprising to see a shift to wireless, but it is interesting to see them 'pause' fiber before getting a wireless tech in place. It would have to be a heck of a difference to justify a full stop.

Getting cables run in the real world must have been far more difficult for them than they ever imagined. Which is, I suppose, why the division CEO is leaving.

</comment><comment><USER9> Another new tech company realizing their show boating methodology doesn't work as effectively once you're out of cyberspace.

On the bright side this isn't the complete end to the infrastructure that enabled Google to do this originally. They are very likely to keep a lot of their fiber team so they can use it for setting up their wireless infrastructure (or at least leverage it if local interests try to play hardball), likewise they'll need to keep some around for upkeep.

</comment><comment><USER10> I don't see this as a bad move. They are still in several cities, and are committed to opening up in several more. Meanwhile, Google also operates Google Fi and is getting more involved in the mobile handset business. Strategically, it seems like networking is still a push for them.

Sometimes companies are smart to take one step back and two steps forward. Every project needs to refresh and redirect itself from time to time.</comment>


Shipping is your company's heartbeat (2013) - <AUTHOR> https://blog.intercom.com/shipping-is-your-companys-heartbeat/ <comment><USER2> The other side of this coin is when you're trying to push out the first version of an MVP. Devs can get so enamored by the process of designing and perfecting your continuous delivery process that it distracts them from the actual product, not to mention wasted time writing tests for features that will only get thrown out after the first redesign. I call it continuously delivering nothing.

<comment><USER3> The basic version of continuous delivery is devs have access to the server, and push code there when it's done. You don't need a process while you're building an MVP, or it's not very minimum.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> It sounds nice in theory, and maybe you could make it work. But in reality, distracting a developer from whatever they were doing has a cost. Add up ten 1 minute fixes and your whole day goes by.

From the customer's perspective though having a fix out in a couple of minutes is the golden standard. I guess that's were team organization and planning comes into play. Having a couple of dedicated resources to address these ad hoc issues, without distracting the people working on larger projects.

<comment><USER5> I think the dichotomy you introduce here is false. My experience with continuous deployment is that the faster you can ship, the smaller projects get.

Instead of bundling a lot of hypotheses about possibly-valuable changes up into a big release, you focus more on the next step in the direction you're going. You release those steps one by one. (User-visibility of larger features is controlled by feature flags, but you ship and user-test in small slices.)

In that context, the whole notion of distraction is different. You have to hold a lot less state in your head. Instead that state lives in your unit tests, your acceptance tests, your backlog, and the world at large. If a given developer is releasing a couple of times a day, it's just not a big deal to find a natural stopping point, release something small, and then pick up the next slice of some longer-term effort.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> > In a company where you ship continuously, you see this and think "Simple – > I'll tweak a test and a regex pattern, get a quick code review from my buddy > beside me, merge to mainline, and 1 minute later when it's deployed to > production, reply to the customer: 'Sorry about this, it's fixed now, thanks > for letting us know.'"

This sounds like a really bad idea. If it's not a critical bug impacting all your customers, do you have to fix it in 1 minute? Once your company gets bigger, you would want to do proper code review and QA, so your 'one-line fix' doesn't accidentally bring down the whole site.

<comment><USER7> You deploy gradually, initially to 1% or so of requests. If your metrics, KPIs, etc. don't suffer, it continues to roll-out until 100% of requests are using that code-path - within a few hours or so.

Takes a bit of infra effort, but for a company like Intercom, that's very easily achievable.

<comment><USER8> this is easy and doable if your change is a front end change.

good luck trying this when its a backend change involving distributed threads, locks, resources, etc where production load is 100x more than staging/test.

<comment><USER9> If the cost of downtime is high enough you can mirror some or all traffic onto a shadow copy of the infrastructure.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The War to Sell Mattresses Is an Internet Nightmare (2017) - <AUTHOR> https://www.fastcompany.com/3065928/sleepopolis-casper-bloggers-lawsuits-underside-of-the-mattress-wars <comment><USER2> My favorite conspiracy theory (which I totally believe) is that mattress stores are mostly for money laundering. No market can possibly support as many stores as there are, and every time I go by one, they're empty. It's probably because I don't understand the economics of the industry, but wow are there a lot of mattress stores. I know we all need to sleep, but spending $2,000 once every 10 years can't be a reliable source of income. Plus people will sleep on anything rather than lay out that sort of cash.

I personally, at 47, have never bought a new bed except a Ikea, from which I've bought several, all for much less than $2k.

<comment><USER3> Bed or mattress? I've been happy with IKEA mattresses, but I've found the random importers' softwood beds advertised in the classified ads to be better than Ikea's particle board. And a lot easier to assemble.

<comment><USER4> I got my wood frame thing and mattress from ikea. The mattress is perfectly fine but the wood gets dented/chipped very easily.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I remember not too long ago a legal fight between Purple and an "honest guy with concerns about the chemicals used in Purple mattresses" and then it turned out the "honest guy" was a GhostBed mattress affiliate or something. I had no idea it was so cutthroat across the board.

Edit: a summary of the spat I mentioned: [https://www.reddit.com/r/shittykickstarters/comments/69zqcx/...](https://www.reddit.com/r/shittykickstarters/comments/69zqcx/purple_mattress_suing_reviewer_over_safety/)

<comment><USER6> To be entirely fair - iirc the purple mattresses did have a powder inside them, and they were microbeads.

If Ford tells me my GM leaks gas, and they're right, that's fine with me.

<comment><USER7> I wouldn't appreciate them pretending to be "just an honest guy with concerns" though

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Here's my favorite quote:

> Kenny Kline and Dan Scalco swore that Casper wouldn't touch the site. > Casper's Philip Krim told me the same: "We exert no influence and have no > influence over the site, other than that we lent them money."

I smiled at that part, and then read on to the next paragraph:

> The new owners of Sleepopolis did disclose on the site: "Until the loan is > satisfied, Casper has the contractual right to repossess the assets and > forgive the remaining value of the loan…yes, that was written by our lawyers > ;)." Repossess the assets: in other words, take over Sleepopolis, if it came > to that. But Krim said this was just "lawyer language protecting our loan, > so we get paid back."

Wowzers!

There's all this stuff advertised in podcasts (mattresses, clothes, underwear, meal prep, snacks) which seems to be aimed at young professionals who hate the idea of having to go into a physical store and talk to a physical person. When the podcast man reads a script saying "Casper mattresses are WAY cheaper than what you'd get in a store!", I guess you're not supposed to comparison-shop and see that the Casper is $950 for a queen... which is pretty much exactly what we paid for a perfectly nice Serta memory foam mattress at a store 1 mile from our house, which included delivery and installation.

<comment><USER9> I'm not sure anyone is fooled by the "It's cheaper" \- but there are a lot of us who will pay a reasonable premium to not have to go to the store and deal with salespeople in person, and personally... I think that's a reasonable luxury to buy?

I mean, even if salespeople weren't... salespeople, it's still often a good several hours of time during business hours to drive to the store that has the thing you want, and I personally have a really hard time telling you how much I will like a mattress without sleeping on it for a week, anyhow, so I don't feel like I'm getting any value out of shopping in person.

<comment><USER10> I like to shop online and stay out of stores partly due to the time savings, but also because of anxiety. I agree that buying online is a luxury and a reasonable premium is attached to that, but I disagree that the price should be comparable to in-store.

For a company that is essentially the manufacturer and retailer, there should be quite a bit of overhead removed for them. I'm really disliking this trend where ecommerce-based manu-tailers are seen as premium brands and can increase their margins more than the other guys and make hand over fist. To me, it's even worse than slimy car dealers or furniture stores.

<comment><USER9> Note, walmart has a wide selection of extremely cheap mail-order mattresses. No idea if they are any good, but if you are looking to save money on a mattress, it's probably worth doing some research.

<comment><USER11> I got a memory foam mattress from Costco for under 200 delivered and I was quite satisfied. It also rolls up to about 2ft diameter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Relevant Adam ruins.. (The Mattress Industry is One Big Rip-Off) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvlA9UxGvSg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvlA9UxGvSg)

<comment><USER13> Thanks for the link - that was exceptionally fun to watch!

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> My small city has 20 or so mattress stores I can think of. They're always empty, having "seasonal sales", have people working them that follow you around the store, no direct prices but "I'll go look that up" and "box spring included this week!"... I hated mattress shopping.

The best thing to happen to mattresses, was that someone figured out you can roll them up and ship them direct.

The fallout from that discovery of Purple vs Casper vs Avacado (my pick, love it) vs whatever... don't care so long as I never need to go into a mattress store again.

<comment><USER14> I agree. I happen to love Casper, but regardless of who you pick, the mattress in a box thing is great because mattress stores are all slimy to me.

<comment><USER15> I went with Leesa, same reasons for going online, also has worked well for me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> That's so bizarre. A couple of weeks ago my wife and I bought a mattress (the one we currently had was starting to draw blood from a broken spring) and didn't think about going online. We went into a store, tried a couple, did a quick google search price match, and decided we'd take it. I never even considered online.

I was trying to do research after the fact (cause why would you do it BEFORE you bought something) and found that I couldn't find any sites that screamed "objective" to me - it all seemed like a bunch of sites that were advertising far more than reviewing.

<comment><USER17> > We went into a store, tried a couple, did a quick google search price match,

Even this is tricky, because they'll sell the same matress as "super deluxe" in one store and "premium super" in another store.

<comment><USER18> Is there a website somewhere that helps you navigate the fact that the same mattress will have different names at different stores?

<comment><USER19> That seems unlikely because every mattress store is its own thing with its own made up names. I imagine there are some tags somewhere on these mattress with some kind of product model that you could look up to see where it actually came from.

It would be a lot of work to organize this mess of information.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> The mattress industry (in the US, anyway) is disgustingly scammy. I think it's at least on par with used car dealerships.

I avoid it by buying refurbished mattresses from local charitable organizations.

I've never bought a mattress online, but I see little reason to think those guys are any better.

<comment><USER21> I am happy to do this regarding furniture, but mattresses is a tough sell for me. Aren't you worried about bedbugs?

<comment><USER20> No, I buy them refurbished. They strip the mattresses and boxsprings down to the wood and wire, disinfect them, then replace the fabric/padding/etc with new materials.

It's essentially no different than newly built. I've been buying these for decades and have never had an issue with bedbugs or any other nastiness.

They are less expensive, but not dramatically so. But I get a quality bed, don't have to deal with mattress shops, and get a little bit of feel-good from helping to employ people who otherwise have difficulty finding work.

And they deliver.

<comment><USER22> I find it interesting that they are able to sell them cheaper than new mattresses, which I assume are built in a high-throughput factory.

<comment><USER20> As russh says, part of this is that new mattresses are overpriced.

When I first investigated these things, I had asked them how, since they're only keeping the wood and wire, they can sell them at a discount. What they told me was that first, the beds they're refurbushing were originally donated to them, so cost them nothing. Also, since they employ people who are otherwise unemployable, they pay minimum wage, which keeps labor costs down. And thirdly, the government considers them a nonprofit work creation program and provides a certain amount of subsidy for the wages.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is a many-times repost but still a good read. I've gotten to the point where I only trust Wirecutter/Consumer Reports reviews of anything.

<comment><USER23> Yes, but it's a little hard to know what to do when you go to look at their top-rated items and there are tons of negative reviews. That has been my experience recently looking at the highly rated Bluetooth receivers on Wirecutter and ranges on Consumer Reports. There aren't that many total reviews on Consumer Reports though, so maybe the complainers there are overly represented.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I showed this article to our director of sales a while ago and he was amazed at how crazy the industry is. Not sure what I can really do amidst all this to avoid validating the aggressive tactics by these folks besides avoiding buying a mattress that is ever advertised or reviewed in any way but that's hard to do now too.

<comment><USER25> I just go with ikea who happens to sell mattresses without it being their main revenue source. If you want really cheap, DIY foam pads are cheap, but so are water beds.

<comment><USER26> We have an ikea spring mattress in our spare room - and it's _really_ comfortable. It came rolled up just like a foam mattress does.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> > Casper's sales topped $200 million last year, though it declines to say > whether it is profitable. Fortune has estimated Casper's annual marketing > budget to be $80 million.

If true, that's absolutely insane---spending ~40% of your revenue on marketing.

<comment><USER28> Well as they quote in the article:

        You have to be a strong marketer to be in the mattress industry, because they're really selling identical, rectangular slabs.

<comment><USER27> A valid point for sure. But as a consumer, I'd strongly prefer it if they spend very little on marketing and instead pass the savings onto me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Costco mattresses ftw

<comment><USER30> I think Costco even sells Casper now [https://www.costco.com/Casper-Memory- Foam-Queen-Mattress.pro...](https://www.costco.com/Casper-Memory-Foam-Queen- Mattress.product.100428876.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I bought an online bed-in-a-box after this HN post in 2013 and still very happy with it: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6900625](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6900625)

</comment><comment><USER32> I really liked this article, I bought one in Warren Evans, it's the only product I can remember buying that has came with a 10 year guarantee.

<comment><USER33> Haven't they now gone bust? I might be wrong.

<comment><USER12> Yes, sadly. Bought our bed and mattress from there 5 years ago and think we will have it more many years more.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Turning 60, I have yet to learn appreciation for this product niche. A decent foam-rubber thingy costs me next to nothing, can be rolled up and put in the car boot, and will last me several years, call it four or five.

Also: [https://xkcd.com/2096/](https://xkcd.com/2096/)

<comment><USER35> Futons are underrated as well. Foldable and disposable. Saves a ton of space in the room.

Mattresses are oversized sanitary napkins but people keep them around far longer than they should because they pay so much for them.

<comment><USER36> I've slept on quite a few futons, especially in college, and I've never slept on one that I would consider comfortable, only merely better than the floor.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15488618](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15488618)

</comment><comment><USER38> The one thing let's not neglect is that these actually are really nice mattresses.

I just spent a week at a 5-star Hawaiian resort where they (I saw and asked them) change out the mattresses monthly ... My mattress at home that I ordered online was far nicer.

<comment><USER39> Yup, I have one (I won't say which brand - they're all pretty much the same idea) and the reduction in movement transmition was amazing. My partner gets up in the night usually, and the reduction in disturbance from that was huge.</comment></comment>


What to do when your startup gets sued by a big player - <AUTHOR>

Two years ago, I launched a social media gaming company called Cashsquare. Our small team set out to create the first real-life virtual game that lets people buy and sell real-life properties, but in a virtual gaming environment.
We wanted to bring online games to the real world and we did everything the right way. We brought together a talented team of developers and marketers, as well as individuals with years of experience in real estate development. We built a business plan. We found office space, which we shared to save costs. We secured our first round of investment. And we spent countless hours developing the game - all while legally dotting all of our i's and crossing all of our t's along the way. We were starting to see all of our efforts paying off.
Then, we got sued by Square, Inc. – the payment processing company. It turns out we were not the only victims. Square, Inc. also sued other startups with the word "square" in their names. Apparently, Square, Inc. feels that it has the monopoly on the word "square," and it doesn't matter that there's no likelihood of confusion (to use the trademark parlance) between our real-life virtual game and Square Inc.'s payment processing business. It's only a matter of time before Square, Inc. insists that Moscow's Red Square or Beijing's Tiananmen Square change their names.
What are we going to do?
We're moving forward. We just launched our new version and our developers are pushing hard to make new features the next month. We feel we've invested a lot in our name and our brand, and we're not backing down just because a larger company feels it can bully startups into submission.
This is a very realistic issue that many startups and founders may face. We are going to fight it and believe our startup will survive, because we do it for the love of the game.
We encourage all startups and founders to follow their passion and persevere in the face of adversity.
Boris
Co-Founder, Cashsquare <comment><USER2> Its ridiculous to me that a company can attempt to trademark such a common geometric shape's name. How did they get away with trademarking "Square"?

Edit: Holy crap. They've filed a TON of trademarks in a ton of different categories. How have they gotten all of these? You technically can't use Square in the name of anything dealing with a computer.

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h7o5.7.5)

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h7o5.7.6)

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h7o5.7.4)

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h7o5.7.13)

Just a few of them...

BTW, someone was granted "CodeSquare" trademark before those. Also FourSquare was before those and covers much of the same legal wording. I doubt they have a strong case against you, but IANAL. The fact that you use the word "Cash" and they have multiple trademarks in the financial and computer payment space may hurt your case though.

It gets more ridiculous... CodeSquare was granted a trademark in the Goods and Services IC 042. US 100 101. G & S and then 2 years later, Square comes along and trademarks "Square" in the exact same Goods and Services IC 042. US 100 101. G & S. I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like there is a contradiction. At the very least, as a layman, it looks like some underhanded lawyer-ing that they are now using offensively.

Lastly, Square (Aka Square Enix, the video game company) also has the trademark "Square" and also is in Goods and Services IC 042. US 100 101. G & S. So two companies own the "Square" trademark within a single category. I have no idea how any of this actually works out in law, but the fact that there is so much complexity and ambiguity is startling to me.

<comment><USER3> Just FYI your links seem to be to some kind of now expired session - not sure if there's a link that lets us reproduce the search but they're definitely not functional.

<comment><USER2> That's unfortunate. All of the links are just searching "Square, Inc" and live only. Sorry that they aren't working and I can no longer edit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Here's a good read >

The best defense when a big company attacks a smaller company is to take the fight to the press. America loves the little guy. It goes back to the colonies and the Redcoats. It's in our D.N.A. [http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/03/defending-david- aga...](http://boss.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/03/defending-david-against- goliath/)

</comment><comment><USER5> Did you get sued or did you get a letter to stop using the name? It feels unlikely that the first communication you'd get from them is notice of a lawsuit.

IANAL, but ... Trademarks are one of those things where if you don't show evidence of fighting misuse, you can lose the trademark. This force makes lawyers and in-house counsel write these letters.

I do have to say that even though you are not a competitor of Square, the name cashsquare is a little confusing. With no other context, I would have thought it was related. Given trademark law and this name, it seems reasonable that you'd receive a letter.

</comment><comment><USER6> You've listed a whole bunch of other reasons as to why your company is going great, inpite of the name. I'm presuming the name's not the most important thing? Sucks that money will be wasted on marketing and branding...but it's better surely, to change that then risk loosing more? It's not fair. It's shit. But it could be better to do now than 2 years down the line when the name is more recognisable. Give it a fight if you can but I assume but the most important thing is protecting the entire company, not a name :).

</comment><comment><USER7> Why fight it? The problem is that you have cash in your name, and Square deals with payments. So there is possible confusion. Just change your marketed name, it will cost less than any other option you have. Unless your name is so critical to the success of your game that you can't change it, but I assume it's not.

<comment><USER8> Certainly the easiest is a re-brand. In fact, I'd approach Square with "we're willing to fight this, and it's going to cost both of us a lot of money...but with a proper financial incentive from Square to cover the costs associated with re-branding, we might be willing to entertain that option" (written in lawyer-speak, of course). An acquaintances company was basically paid mid six figures to change their name in somewhat similar circumstances, and they used it as a opportunity to do some interesting things, marketing wise.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi Kj3, we have discussed this in one of our first conversation with Square, however Square first considered this option and then just disappeared for a while to then come back to sue us!

<comment><USER9> So you substantiated their lawsuit by agreeing with them that there could be brand confusion, by offering a compromise. Unfortunate.

<comment><AUTHOR> Spoom - We never agreed that our brands could be confused, because we are nowhere close to what Square does. Games and processing is very different. But to avoid costly lawsuits, losing focus and if the compensation would be right (that would cover all our re-branding costs - 6 figures) we would consider it...However i must underline that Square started using the brand "Square Cash" just a couple months ago, which makes it very clear why Square really wanted our brand name. as an example they use the email: firstname.lastname@example.com.

<comment><USER9> Don't get me wrong, I understand where you're coming from and at a glance it looks like you're in the right, but their lawyers probably saw an opportunity when you provided a compromise.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Keep fighting, Boris! Although it is not always the company management's idea to bully startups (some have lawyers that get paid by the hour so they come up with cases) - it is still sad to see this happening... It would be nice to see startups unite to resist this kind of pressure

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks rikkidi for the support! :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Seriously, your answer is right here.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvlTJrNJ5lA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvlTJrNJ5lA)

Go contact a proper lawyer for more information on what to do legally.

</comment><comment><USER12> Keep moving, you still have Foursquare!

<comment><USER13> And Hollywood Squares!

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Big company, lots of money!!! Expensive lawyers! That what big companies do!!! Not nice Square!!!

</comment><comment><USER15> I wonder what Square-Enix aka Squaresoft aka Square would think of all this...?

<comment><USER2> Who knows? They both have patents on the same exact goods/services category.

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4808:lt2...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4808:lt25o2.5.184)

[http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h...](http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4809:16h7o5.7.4)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Keep fighting, guys! All the best!!!</comment>


This Robotic Ball May Change Everything - <AUTHOR> http://www.inc.com/30under30/kimberly-weisul/orbotix-ian-bernstein-adam-wilson-2013.html

<comment><USER2> Presumably this is a PR originated piece, because it surely reads like one. In any case, having a headline this ridiculously hyperbolic is actually a negative, IMO. The Sphero is certainly cool, but if I click through to read about something that "May Change Everything" and then realize they are talking about a remote control ball, it actually hurts my perception of the product more than it helps.

You delight people with the delta between reality and expectation. If you blow the expectation up too much, even a reality that would otherwise be delightful seems kind of lame and stupid.

</comment><comment><USER3> As an owner of two spheros, I disagree entirely. This ball is fun for the first 5 minutes, once the honeymoon phase is over, it just sits on the charging station glowing blue, incessantly.

It was nice when my dog liked playing with it and I could entertain him for a few minutes, but seriously, it has caused very little excitement outside of that.

</comment><comment><USER4> I was so confused about how the ball would "change everything" that I looked up product demos.

> _"This is literally at the cutting edge, blending the physical and the > virtual world."_

Sounds pretty impressive. "What am I missing!?" I wondered, "how is this different from the RC cars I played with growing up?"

Turns out this is all just hype for an orb controlled by an iPhone. Flagged for manipulation @6 points.

</comment><comment><USER5> Video of "Sharky the Beaver" game that use the ball and augmented reality: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPn3jVGQw68>

</comment><comment><USER6> I'm not sure what exactly it's likely to change.

Although I wonder at its resolution as a controller. I kinda want to have one sitting on my desk that I can spin to control some aspect of my drawing program's interface. Or whatever.

</comment><comment><USER7> Here's a an idea that may change everything:

A site that ranks news sources based on two axes(% of PR fed articles and hyperbolicity of headlines)

Journos may not get paid a lot, but they really don't have do all that much with PR Agents writing articles for them. Maybe that's why they all write books--they have so much free time b/c others do their day job for them.</comment>


The myth of razors and razor blades - <AUTHOR> http://www.techdirt.com/blog/entrepreneurs/articles/20100915/23234611035/the-myth-of-razors-and-razor-blades.shtml

<comment><USER2> What I never got about this myth is why people thought that the razors should cost more than the blades. The razor is molded plastic and the blades are a bit of plastic holding a small bit of metal that are honed so they easily cut hair and have a hard time cutting skin. There's no reason to think that the plastic should cost more than the blades. My best guess as to why the blades are expensive would be to cover marketing costs and for patented technology.

<comment><USER3> For much of last century, when the legend of the Gillette model originated, razors were not plastic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I think one thing that often gets overlooked in these types of things is whether or not Gillete just executed on other parts of their business plan better than their competitors. Maybe their sales force was twice as good, maybe their distribution was more reliable, maybe it was just more effective marketing. Perhaps they just figured out a way to manufacture blades 20% cheaper than their competitors.

For while the razor/razorblades story gets the headlines, for a lot of other products there is one company dominating the category for no apparent reason. Coca Cola, for instance, doesn't have any real benefit over other drinks, but they have a fearsome salesforce, marketing and distribution.

All I'm saying is that perhaps Gilletes main competitive advantage is kept quiet because everyone thinks it's their razor+blades strategy, and the company likes it that way because it stops people looking at other parts of the business to copy.

<comment><USER5> > Coca Cola, for instance, doesn't have any real benefit over other drinks, > but they have a fearsome salesforce, marketing and distribution.

Not as simple as that. Firstly, it is extremely difficult to enter the drinks market (setting up a countrywide distribution network, etc...).

What Coke also does (in some countries) is giving the owner of Cafes, garages and small shops a fridge (loan on permanent basis). The condition of the fridge is simple - the owner can only stock it with Coke-a-Cola products.

So right there the retailer is locked in - to distribute a smaller competitor's drinks, he would have to buy a whole fridge (or the competitor must provide a fridge). This is not likely - hence the lock-in. The customer is not locked in, the distributor is.

Another thing that Coke does is prevent competition between small retailers. You must sell Coke's products at their recommended price (otherwise you have to pay more). They also sell the products to larger retailers at a lower price (and they in turn may not sell it at the reduced price to smaller retailers).

If Coke wants to launch a new product, they basically force small retailers to carry their product (whether they want to buy it or not).

So, yeah, Coke is a pretty nasty company. Luckily for the guys in the USA, there is actual competition (Pepsi).

<comment><USER4> Everything you have said confirms that Coke has a fearsome sales force and distribution business. And that proves my point - it's not the taste of the drink but the way in which it is put in front of everyone that might be thirsty that makes them successful.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> King Gillette is the patron saint of late bloomers. He was a very average salesperson until he thought of the idea of disposable razors in his 40's. He didn't sell his first razor blade until 1903 when he was 48 years old -- that year he sold 51 razors and 168 blades, but by 1915 he sold 450,000 razors 70 million blades.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Camp_Gillette>

</comment><comment><USER7> Unrelated protip: Steam is what causes the blades to degrade so quickly. If you leave your blades outside of the bathroom, they last for a long time. I've used the same blade for about six months so far.

<comment><USER8> I've been using this technique with a disposable blade for the past few months: [http://consumerist.com/2010/03/make-your-disposable-razor- bl...](http://consumerist.com/2010/03/make-your-disposable-razor-blade-last- for-20-months.html)

I keep my razor in the shower, too, though maybe if I didn't it could go even longer.

<comment><USER9> Yep; it's similar to how barbers rub their razors on leather-- called "stropping," IIRC. It apparently smooths out any microscopic dings in the blades' edge. It also helps to realign the blades in the case of those multi- blade cartridges.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Shaving is special product: its personal. Nicks, pulls, uneven results: you feel it intensely. Once you find something that works, there is a large resistance to change.

Flip side: once something fails, folks flee in droves. Remington(?) famous case: stopped replacing "sharpening disks" every shift to save money; lots of flawed razors shipped; sales dropped precipitously until they tracked the problem back.

I'd think these things matter lots more than the "rational customer" model of economic efficiency.

</comment><comment><USER11> Nit: the lock-in is that other razors don't fit (like apple usb).

Sure, plug-compatibility is trivial, but Gillette had sufficient market power at that point to cut off any retailer stocking them.

<comment><USER12> "Like apple usb"

In what way did you mean that?

<comment><USER13> Apple USB keyboards notoriously come with a USB extension cable that's notched in the middle, so it doesn't fit other USB devices.

Here's a picture: <http://imgur.com/Aweqo.jpg>

Technically, if you're willing to risk damaging it, you can force a regular USB device in there, but it sticks out at a weird angle because of the notch.

<comment><USER14> That's an example of lock-in that makes absolutely no sense. Why would you do that with USB extension cords of all things? The only reason I can think of-- it physically locks the cables together better so it doesn't pop open in the middle of the extension cord where it's difficult to reach and reattach.

<comment><USER15> I'm pretty sure they do it because the keyboard can't source the required 500mA of current. They "proprietarize" it in order to keep people from plugging high-current devices in.

<comment><USER13> The keyboard itself contains a 2 port USB hub (regular ports, btw, with enough juice to power a Wacom tablet and charge my phone at the same time), so I'm not sure that makes sense.

<comment><USER15> Never mind, then. I have no idea why they did it but there's probably a perfectly valid technical explanation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I've had much better luck since I invested in an expensive (~$200) electric shaver. I have very sensitive skin and it was the only method I found that allowed me to shave with any frequency without too many problems. I still have a tendency to shave about once a week however. At which point I'll usually have to use a trimmer first, and then the shaver.

<comment><USER17> I've found electric to be the only way to comfortably shave daily. Wet is a little closer, but doing it daily just tears up the skin too much.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> It makes no sense, but what aggravates me about Gillete is that when you buy the razor and head, they only give you 2 extra razors instead of filling out the package with 4. I suppose it is because when you go looking for a razor, if you had to buy the head and the 4 razors the price would be so high no one would want to purchase it. It's one of those sleight of the hands the companies play that once observed, is infuriating.

<comment><USER14> It's not that aggravating to me personally--that just means I have three blades instead of five before I have to decide whether to try another razor or buy more cartridges for the same one. I _hate_ wasting or throwing things away, so if I hate the razor completely I won't have to suffer through it for very long if it only comes with 2 more blades.

Really, I'd be happy if it just came with no extra blades at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Great article, and it is relevant to my startup. Thanks for the link.

</comment><comment><USER20> And here's the reality on the consumer end of things today, straight from the horse's mouth (my husband):

Before: 16 years of avg. $13/month for a 4/5-pack of Gillette cartridges (they are $16 a pack today), along with razorburn and inflamed follicles due to their cartridges' design of pulling the hairs up and cutting them off below the level of the skin.

Today: a single $60 investment for a Merkur safety razor, and $9/ _YEAR_ for 20 blades (40 razor edges, each lasting longer than any of Gillette's cartridges), with almost no razorburn, and not a single inflamed follicle since "the switch".

<comment><USER21> Anecdotes are not data. I use a Gillette, I just bought a 10 pack of blades for 16 dollars. That is going to last me a year, maybe longer. I shave properly. Hot shower, proper technique never had razor burn ever. As the saying goes the poor craftsmen blames his tools.

<comment><USER20> This is by no means a slandering or questioning of your masculinity, but, if you can manage to go for a whole year on just 10 blades then maybe it is so that your particular stubble is playing into the equation? Some men have velvet skin and "peach fuzz" beard, and some men have leather skin and steel wool growing out of their chin.

<comment><USER21> Perhaps, it does take me a day to get five o'clock shadow. Though if I go a day without shaving I can give my wife and daughter a rash from brushing up against it.

Though that is neither here nor there, Gillette style razors are some of the most popular razors out there if they were really that poor they wouldn't have replaced their predecessors as they cost more and would perform poorly.

<comment><USER22> > _if they were really that poor..._

Unfortunately, this ignores the power of good advertisement. For example: the entire fashion industry relies on _generating_ desire to have something, not on any intrinsic value.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> So it's a myth, because Gillette didn't ALWAYS make their margins on the blades? I don't see the logic. They're still giving away the razors with one blade and expecting you to buy razors for it.

<comment><USER24> The point is that their current business model (give away the razor, sell the blades) is not the secret of their success-- that during the time they had explosive growth and became dominant, they actually had a very different business model.

<comment><USER10> Did I read it wrong? Explosive growth occurred WHEN they switched to the classic model (from the patent-protected model).</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Development laptop MacBook 2017 vs. MacBook Pro 13"/15" 2017? - <AUTHOR> I'm in the market for a new Mac laptop. I use Xcode, Terminal, Docker (MySQL/Rails/nginx/Redis), Sublime Text, and Chrome. Occasionally I use Creative Suite and virtualize Windows 10 in VMware.
I would like to balance screen real estate, weight, power, battery life, and overall value.  As I'm also using Docker on OS X, virtualization concerns me on the MacBook over the MacBook Pro.
Would someone kindly help me narrow the field? <comment><USER2> I worked at VMWare for a while, and I've been a confirmed MacFanatic since December of 1983.

In my experience, your number one driver for performance will be memory. If you don't have 16GB of RAM, you're likely to be unhappy.

Also, the higher capacity SSDs also tend to have higher performance, so you're going to want as much as you can get.

These days, everything comes hard-wired on the logic board, so if the device isn't maxxed-out when you buy it, then it never will be.

CPU performance would be my third criteria -- get as many cores and as high performance as you can, once you've gotten maximum RAM and as much SSD as you can.

For me and my wife, we would be perfectly happy to upgrade from our 2012 and 2014 MacBook Pros today, but only if we could get 32GB of RAM. Meanwhile, we wait.

<comment><USER2> Another thing I'd like to point out is that single-threaded and multi-threaded CPU performance hasn't really improved that much over the years. Compare a MacBook Pro Retina (mid-2012) Geekbench 4 performance, versus that of the latest and fastest MacBook Pro Retina (mid-2017):

Single-Core: 4658 (2017) 3597 (2012)

Multi-Core: 15691 (2017) 11091 (2012)

So, depending on whether you look at single-core or multi-core performance, that's only an increase of 30-40% over a five year period of time. That's an average of about 1.06-1.07% improvement per year, compounded over five years.

Sure, GPUs will change over time, and recent GPUs have greatly improved their performance over those from a few years ago. But how much of your development work is likely to benefit from a faster/better GPU?

Likewise with SSD performance.

For development and regarding performance, I don't think that the CPU speed will matter all that much, and there's not likely to be a great deal of increase from one year to the next.

I remain convinced that quantity of RAM will be the most important factor that governs your development cycle time, and it is entirely likely that a machine that is a couple of years old might be much less expensive and better suited for the kind of work you're looking to do, compared to how much you could afford to spend on a more modern machine.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Aside from the typical specs, note that for a similar price the MBP brings a higher quality screen (bette color gamut, brightness), a 720p webcam and Thunderbolt 3.

So even if you don't care about these things, you're getting a much better value for your money if you go with the non touchbar MBP. If you buy the MB, you'll be paying a lot for a 2015 chassis with some CPU/GPU updates.

</comment><comment><USER4> I too, would like a good answer to this. My gut says that (other than VMWare) the Macbook would be fine. You'd probably get a bit better battery life and performance out of the non-y chips, but IMO, nothing significant. I see a KabyLake Macbook in my near future.</comment>


Trading: What happened when the pit stopped - <AUTHOR> http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4d221b22-3dfb-11e6-8716-a4a71e8140b0.html <comment><USER2> 3 interesting take aways from this article for me:

> By her twenties, Ms Rifkin, who did not finish high school, was earning six- > figure pay.

I've never heard anyone call pit trading a meritocracy but it was one job where people who didn't have the best pedigree could still get a very good paying job. As is pointed out every day there are fewer and fewer of these types of jobs around anymore in the North America. I think real estate agent and sales are the two jobs that immediately come to mind as jobs that people who don't have a university education can still make great money with.

> Electronic futures trading arrived in 1992, when the Chicago Mercantile > Exchange launched its Globex technology. Nymex followed a year later with > Access, short for American Computerized Commodity Exchange System and > Services. But access to Access was confined to hours when pits were closed, > to protect the value of seats on the floor, Mr Collins says.

Even when given an, IMHO, obviously superior technology the incumbents were able to hold it off for the better part of a decade. I always try to keep this in the back of my head when trying to predict curve jumping shifts in behaviour, just because you think something is superior to the incumbent you can't assume that it will immediately replace it. Or put another way its dangerous to short the incumbants on the thesis that new tech will immediately replace them, the old guard can be very sticky.

> GEM's 17th floor office off Columbus Circle in midtown Manhattan contains > just five traders on a recent afternoon, with a few more patched in by video > feed from offices in Chicago and Dublin. The room is quiet but for the hum > of the air conditioner, brokers quoting oil structures over speaker phones > and the bleep of trades being executed, often driven by algorithms.

> Mr Vonderheide's employees studied physics, economics, chemistry and finance > at top US universities

> "A friend used to say, 'If I weren't trading gasoline, I'd be pumping it'. > Well, some of them are."

These are the people who replaced the pit traders. If you contrast them, a successful pit trader tended to be loud, big, boisterous and outgoing. When a shift does happen as the shift from pit to computer did, the new guard tend not to resemble the old guard very much and the old guard tend not to fair very well.

<comment><USER3> > _I 've never heard anyone call pit trading a meritocracy but it was one job > where people who didn't have the best pedigree could still get a very good > paying job. As is pointed out every day there are fewer and fewer of these > types of jobs around anymore in the North America. I think real estate agent > and sales are the two jobs that immediately come to mind as jobs that people > who don't have a university education can still make great money with._

Maybe among white-collar jobs, but vocational jobs, such as welding, could bring in a lot of money to the talented craftsperson without a degree.

<comment><USER4> Absolutely! At least in the States, we have this stereotype beaten into our heads that vocational jobs are not desirable. Even when we can look around and see that -- especially in places like the midwest -- the people with an enormous mansion home and a nice boat are usually the general contractors running a business, which itself pays the welder a hundred dollars an hour.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It feels like the article was dictated by someone with a very strong agenda so that it reads "good, simple people found fortune trading oil and now evil computers took their jobs".

It fails to ask a number of key questions like:

1\. Why unskilled random people were able to earn significant money as traders? Why is their background an excuse for inequality they were part of?

2\. Who was financing their crazy earnings? Surely money didn't appear out of thin air?

3\. What was the motive to hire those random people? My best guess: whoever was sponsoring their seats wanted to have a trusted partners to gather intel / pull of a scam. Either way, not exactly pretty.

4\. Who exactly is now profiting instead of the old traders and how does it affect the other participants of the market?

I do wonder which PR company is behind this article and what is the ultimate motive of their client.

EDIT:

A) Forgot to add the note about deceitful graph of "New York City jobs ..." which looks like the number of jobs goes almost to zero, except it has a base level of 90k.

B) Interestingly Mr Ardizzone was sued in 2011 for an alleged scam [1]. This would support my guess from point 3.

[1] [http://www.reuters.com/article/us-arcadia-lawsuit- idUSTRE74P...](http://www.reuters.com/article/us-arcadia-lawsuit- idUSTRE74P7VU20110526)

<comment><USER6> Actualy, it looks that article show Mr Ardizzone suing two people for fruadulant activity, rather than being sued himself.</comment></comment>


ICANN Rejects .ORG Sale to Private Equity Firm Ethos Capital - <AUTHOR> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/04/victory-icann-rejects-org-sale-private-equity-firm-ethos-capital <comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23038637](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23038637)

</comment><comment><USER3> Horray!!! This is great news !!!</comment>


Ask HN: Why does the new Dropbox app need contact access? - <AUTHOR>

It seems like every app on Android requires access to more and more things that I'm hesitant to upgrade.<p>What does Dropbox do with this additional information? <comment><USER2> Not sure if there is a correlation here but recently a bunch of iOS apps have been requesting this information as well, most of which have no good reason for requesting this info.

<comment><AUTHOR> Is there a good way that attention can be brought to the issue?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> It doesn't. That's why I uninstalled it, the same way I do every other app that feature creeps its way towards demanding greater and greater access to my information.

</comment><comment><USER4> We already know: there's no good reason whatsoever for the app to have access to this kind of information.

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm guessing so that you can share files with contacts from within the app.

<comment><USER6> Which you can do using the share intent.

Me, I got fed up with the latest dropbox client update and refused to install it on my device.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Update of NoSQL Performance Benchmark Neo4j,PostgreSQL,Orient,Mongo - <AUTHOR> https://www.arangodb.com/2018/02/how-we-wronged-neo4j-postgresql-update-arangodb-benchmark-2018/# <comment><USER2> Considering the PostgreSQL and required performance tuning - I have a feeling that there is never a good solution to that kind of problem - you either stick to default settings for each software being tested and get remarks like this, that this or that should have been optimized/changed/set to different value or you can optimize the settings but this leads to comments that benchmark is biased because it settings for X were optimized and settings for Y were not (or something similiar).

<comment><AUTHOR> True and the effort here is to have as little bias as possible. It would be great if there was an independent vendor who could create some sort of boilerplate for these benchmarks.</comment></comment>


Amazon vs. Apple: What Should E-Book Prices Be? - <AUTHOR> http://business.theatlantic.com/2010/02/amazon_vs_publishers_and_apple_what_should_e-book_prices_look_like.php

<comment><USER2> This is the best analysis I've seen yet.

There's a lot of open questions (about the price elasticity of e-books, for example), which will undoubtedly get sorted out over time--but it's important first to lay out how the interests of the different players don't always align, and the Apple vs Amazon distinction is a good point to keep in mind.

<comment><USER3> I was interested in the assertion that most books aren't fashion items, so it doesn't make sense for the price to go down over time. I'd have thought that this effect would still be there, even if it's less pronounced than on blockbusters - publicity will be timed to coincide with the launch, and I'd imagine most people waiting for the next instalment will want it sooner rather than later.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I really don't care how much it costs THEM. I care how much it costs ME.

I've been reading books from the Gutenburg Project on my PDA for a few years. Someone recently recommended a book to me that was released about 10 years ago. I go to buy it in electronic format and it's $24.99. I pass. I end up borrowing it from someone I know instead.

For me, I must provide the storage medium, electricity, and data connection. On top of that I must pay 10.00 - 30.00 for a small file that possibly contains some kind of DRM that would leave me unable to transfer the file to another device. What did I buy?

However, what if I was able to buy 50 ebooks for $25. Well, I would probably go for something like that. Right now, it's simply not worth the time, energy and money to buy what's on the market.

<comment><USER5> I'd go even further. Why not sell a subscription pass? For $20 a month, you get unlimited access to all the books in Amazon's catalog. Each rental would expire after two weeks, and you'd be free to take that book out again and again.

I'd deal with the necessary DRM if this idea was implemented.

<comment><USER6> Most local library systems nowadays let you do something kinda like this -- except for free.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The comments section finally broke through my dense thinking by explaining why you only look to marginal cost.

[http://business.theatlantic.com/2010/02/amazon_vs_publishers...](http://business.theatlantic.com/2010/02/amazon_vs_publishers_and_apple_what_should_e- book_prices_look_like.php#comment-381507)

</comment><comment><USER8> $10 seems too high when all the out of copyright stuff is available for about $1.

</comment><comment><USER9> You know, Macmillan books still aren't available to buy from Amazon. _Through_ Amazon, via third parties, but not actually _from_ Amazon.

</comment><comment><USER10> Seems to me that given the inevitability of piracy in this new format, publishers will likely not see any substantial net gains from the higher prices, which may in fact simply offset the cost of piracy on the platform.

</comment><comment><USER6> $5-7

</comment><comment><USER11> Let's make it an even 0.</comment>


JavaScript Grew Up and Became a Real Language - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/young-coder/how-javascript-grew-up-and-became-a-real-language-17a0b948b77f <comment><USER2> Recently, I encountered Cookies API that befuddled me.

For example, to set Cookies:

        document.cookie = "username=John Smith; expires=Thu, 18 Dec 2013 12:00:00 UTC; path=/";

To erase it:

        document.cookie = "username=; expires=Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 UTC; path=/;";

Getting cookie by key involves splitting string and etc.

There must have been some constraint that shaped this API, and I'd love to learn about that constraint.

If I designed an API like this in a tech interview, nobody would hire me.

<comment><USER3> [https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add- ons/Web...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add- ons/WebExtensions/API/cookies/set)

Will probably be incorporated across browsers at some point.

document.cookies just isn't a huge pain because every framework provides abstraction around it. So not many people are motivated to clean it up.

Also, document.cookie is a runtime environement thing and not nessarily tied to JS.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> is this a meme?</comment>


Playing with an attacker: I messed with smbdy trying to hack CryptoWall tracker - <AUTHOR> http://blog.0x3a.com/post/141950176719/playing-games-with-an-attacker-how-i-messed-with <comment><AUTHOR> I edited the title to fit into the 80 char limit.

What is that? Worse than twitter?...</comment>


Nails Never Fails (Lenny Dyktra is a Massively Successful Entrepeneur) - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/03/24/080324fa_fact_mcgrath/?currentPage=all

<comment><USER2> Wow - he comes off as a jerk, but this venture will probably net him another couple Gulfstreams

</comment><comment><USER3> Interesting. Not sure I want to get his particular outlook on life though when I get older.

</comment><comment><USER4> I knew there was a magazine for wives of sports players, but it didn't occur to me that there wasn't one for the players themselves.

<http://www.prosportswives.com/>

</comment><comment><USER5> Thanks alot for the ?currentPage=all.</comment>


Opa: now looks like JS but works like JS on steroids - <AUTHOR> http://blog.opalang.org/2011/12/opa-gets-new-face-introducing-new.html

<comment><USER2> While I prefer the old syntax by a long shot... I hope this does help Opa gain adoption.</comment>


Lost Apple Project - <AUTHOR> http://lostapples.org/ <comment><USER2> this sounds cool from the title, but this website is just an unfinished template - none of the links lead anywhere, and even on the landing page the placeholder text from the template is still present. why bother submitting something this low-value to HN?

</comment><comment><USER3> I live in an area rich with history of a family that grew apples and pear trees (there is also a direct connection to Laura Secord and how the company trafficked wartime information into/out of the country via chocolate treat deliveries). It must have been a super wealthy family because the neighbourhood is huge, and you can still find apple trees literally _everywhere_.

One particular school has a veritable grove with massive apple trees that the students surely must love in the autumn. One particular pear tree near my house has a surprise feature of growing both the expected pears AND inosculated branches that sprout mini-pears that appear to be from a completely different breed.

I imagine that the Lost Apple Project would be interested in the area and what grows around here.

</comment><comment><USER4> This man Tom Brown in North Carolina went "viral" last year for his similar hobby and website:

> My Hobby: Finding "Lost" Apple Varieties

[https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/dbvyv7/t...](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/dbvyv7/this_mans_collection_of_lost_apples_varieties/)

[https://applesearch.org/Junaluska_Apple_Discovery.html](https://applesearch.org/Junaluska_Apple_Discovery.html)

</comment><comment><USER5> Their Facebook page is more current than this website. I hope they offer a Patreon or similar someday soon.

[https://www.facebook.com/lostappleproject/](https://www.facebook.com/lostappleproject/)

</comment><comment><USER6> Oh, that Apple!</comment>


Stephen Fry on binary choices - <AUTHOR> http://www.stephenfry.com/2009/09/18/a-tale-of-two-cities/

<comment><USER2> I often find myself in agreement with Fry's seemingly incompatible interests. Like his appreciation for the Free Software movement[1] as well as Apple's achievements[2].

[1]: <http://www.gnu.org/fry/>

[2]: <http://www.stephenfry.com/2010/01/28/ipad-about/>

</comment><comment><USER3> C.S.Lewis has had some clever things to say on the topic. There's this brilliant paragraph in _Mere_ _Christianity_ that goes:

"… so many people cannot be brought to realise that when B is better than C, A may be even better than B. They like thinking in terms of good and bad, not of good, better, and best, or bad, worse and worst. They want to know whether you think patriotism a good thing: if you reply that it is, of course, far better than individual selfishness, but that it is inferior to universal charity and should always give way to universal charity when the two conflict, they think you are being evasive."

Think this applies here, too.

</comment><comment><USER4> Wow, do I know his feeling. I call it 'Coke/Pepsi' binary thinking. The notion that the World is essentially binary, instead of a multi-dimensional varied landscape of gradients.

<comment><USER5> I hear you. I loved Coke and hated Pepsi. But then Throwback Pepsi comes along and it's like, my mind is blown.

<comment><USER6> My problem with Pepsi is I am not fond of the taste of Pepto-Bismol.

But then on the whole Coke/Pepsi argument I am more a Dr. Pepper drinker.

<comment><USER7> Wintergreen mint

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'm reminded of this, written in May, 2007:

<http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/TwoAndAHalfMen.html?HN>

<comment><USER9> Interesting article, especially in referencing "The Two Cultures", which I had not encountered before.

Modern "Geek" culture actually seems very adept at bridging that gap.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> "You just quoted Family Guy" - I thought you liked The Simpsons

I don't see how this relates to the rest of the examples.

<comment><USER11> The implication is that if you enjoy Family Guy, you must not like The Simpsons, while his point is that it is perfectly reasonable that one could enjoy both.

<comment><USER10> The joke I was making is many people are Simpsons purists and say Family Guy is complete crap.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Never lived in the US, but getting an impression that the political system also contributes to this binary syndrome.

</comment><comment><USER13> When attending a serious dispute, try to throw in

"You\We are both right!" Helps wonders.

</comment><comment><USER14> Other languages seem to have less binary options too.

<comment><USER15> I think you are right. I think that an issue here is the assumed "more then others" so the question "Do you like the Beatles?" carries the connotation "Do you like the Beatles more than other bands?" Its a nuance of the language I think rather then an attempt to lock someone into an either or situation.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Stitch News – A news app that lets you save/share any piece of text - <AUTHOR> https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/stitch-news/id968510314?mt=8

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey I am Sam, I built Stitch News with my friend Phil at Make School. We are trying to making it easier to keep track of all the important information we read everyday and also make it easier to share that information. Let me know if you have any feedback, questions, or ideas. Thank you for checking it out!

<comment><USER2> Hey Sam, this is Mike, the founder at Diffbot, the tech that powers Instapaper. Stitch looks great, and we'd love to help out. Send us a PM.

[http://diffbot.com](http://diffbot.com)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Ugh ;) Looks like the probable use of this will be to allow news items to propagate based on how much sloppily- or poorly-written, inaccurate, or ambiguous verbiage there is buried down in the bottom. This is always the problem with poorly-written, sexed-up headlines, but at least the reporter isn't always writing those himself. Down in the article is where the sensationalist-but-crappy writing/reporting is likely to dwell.

</comment><comment><USER4> The facebook login is a turn off for me. I do like the idea of sharing sections of text tough, that's a new one on me.

I couldn't find a good way to read news so I made my own (and tidied it up a bit to share with friends).

-I like to mark things as read. -sync reading progress on mobile & laptop -keep things minimal.

It runs at [http://www.serializer.io](http://www.serializer.io) if anyone's interested.

</comment><comment><USER5> Nice. I'd like to have that highlighting feature in the read-article part of my app:

[http://blanqd.com](http://blanqd.com)</comment>


Ask HN: System Design] How to design a grid view with millions of records? - <AUTHOR> The requirements are following: 1. Data could be aggregated differently. 2. Filtering of aggregated data. 3. Underlying data is huge. Around 10 tables with millions of records.
Currently we load everything into memory and based on the filter and aggregation level prepare data on back-end side and show it on UI. It works but it has multiple downsides:
- Initial load takes multiple minutes, because we need to query db and load all required data into memory, but consequent queries load much faster because we have this data already in memory. - Filtering logic is awkward and resembles "if column1.isSelected then filter" logic. - To be able to show actual data we need to update in-memory representation if we have smth new in DB. To do it we are polling DB and reload the data if it's stale.
To me this implementation looks too overcomplicated and not scalable (e.g. the app is limited how much data it can store).
What is the best approach of implementing such thing? <comment><USER2> Could look into an elastic search / Lucene solution</comment>


Demo of Google TV (Skip to 32:00) [video] - <AUTHOR> http://www.promeas.com/ifa-tv/webcasts2010/keynote5/index.html

<comment><USER2> I'd like to offer what I believe is the humongous missed thinking on every product like this and any service that aims to mix internet and TV. Maybe it's been done and I've somehow missed it. But I'd like to call it the Stumbleupon feature.

All of these services ask me to think about what I want to watch. But there's this thing that we all do, and I absolutely think there isn't a single person that doesn't do this, and it's called "channel surfing". You just flip and flip and flip to see if there's something more interesting than you're currently watching, or you've just finished watching a program and you want to explore your options.

Stumbleupon provides exactly this, but much more. Stumbleupon is purpose-built specifically for boredom, and over time tailors itself to you. Next, next, next, ohh that's cool, next, next, next. That's exactly what I want from a TV experience. Additionally, I'd be able to save and share with friends.

An example of how this feature would differentiate itself from current methods is, I like a lot of TED videos, but there's also a lot I find incredibly boring. With current interfaces, I have to click a TED category and then sift through all of their offerings. And how the heck would I even know if I'll like something until I play it? Blegh! The Stumbleupon feature would know what type of content I like, and would be able to pull out TED videos that it thinks I would find interesting, and all I would have had to do was click "Next", and it would eventually be presented to me.

That's all I got to say. Add a dang Stumbleupon feature, and an internet-tv box will be MONEY.

<comment><USER3> Already exists on YouTube: <http://www.youtube.com/leanback>

Edit: Just noticed they showed Leanback in the demo.

<comment><USER2> True, what they have is pretty darn close. As long as it offered me TV and Movie level content and gave me a custom-tailored feed based on what I like.

<comment><USER3> YouTube is starting to offer movies and probably TV shows to follow. The stream is personalized based on your activity and the activity of your friends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I really hope that they improve this, it failed in so many ways.

1) When in Top Gear and watching the action, I'll buy a ferrari. This is a demo of screen-in-screen, yet bringing up the search bar hid the freaking screen, you could no longer watch the action. The screen-in-screen only worked when the search results came up, but the whole point of screen-in-screen is to not miss a second.

2) Transitions... where are they? Every screen was a surprise, it just obliterated the prior screen entirely and suddenly. If you were watching the action and accidentally touched a button you could miss your team scoring a goal... transitions help with this, as does opacity. It also gives it a deeper more tactile feel and a sense of quality.

3) Web browser on a TV. That's it? The font rendering looks terrible on the TV, none of it appeared to be readable which I hope is just the video of the presentation.

4) Where are the apps? Any apps would do? But more specifically things like:

4a) twitter for TV. Imagine watching a game and having tweets of a hashtag search appear live around a chosen space on the screen (overlay) or to reduce the screen (screen-in-screen, but the main screen at 80%) and a list of tweets on the right. Immediate awareness of all your mates watching the game elsewhere... an extended social experience based on shared viewing.

4b) home dashboard. Imagine the TV having 2 stand-by states, one being a home dashboard in which the screen goes into a low-power screen saver type state (utilising a low-power palette for the device and dimly lit) and on this dashboard information from which appliances are on and using power, where your family members are (via Latitude), what you have in the fridge and cupboards and some suggested recipes, the weather for the next 6 hours, local transport information, your unread email counts, google voice, shit... throw in Skype and use a high def web cam built into the TV so that full room video conferencing has arrived for home use.

And what did they present? Chrome browser within a TV at a touch of a button and the most primitive screen-in-screen I think I've ever seen.

I'm just, argh! Google, FFS! Hire me and let me run riot in doing the right thing here, this is an idea whose time has come and right now you deserve to be beaten to the post because the offering is under-whelming and doesn't yet offer anything that having an XBox, PS3, Apple TV or even just a bog standard media centre cannot offer.

Heh, enough of the rant. I'm just passionate about the potential here and was ready to be blown away. I hope the finished product leaps on from this and blows me away.

<comment><USER5> For 4) she did say they'd have an App store, I think she actually said Android App store, so I'd imagine all your app requests are likely.

<comment><USER4> I suspect they're thinking that apps are just apps and that games for the phone are good for the telly.

But without details, we just don't know. I'd rather see segmentation and cross-over of apps by device. A twitter TV app as I've described is silly on the phone, and a real time navigation app doesn't make the greatest sense on the TV (unless someone wants to do a fly-by of a potential holiday destination using street view).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Soon, you won't want to buy a TV without a browser." Hello, WebTV of 1995…

Love the browser demo; you can't read a single word shown on-screen. Massive UI fail in trusting normal websites to be TV-friendly! This is why AppleTV has had its _own_ YouTube browser for years now. Heck, the Google TV demonstrator has to manually start fullscreen mode on YouTube. She mentions LeanBack as an alternative UI, and describes it as "intuitive." Have you tried it? I have. I couldn't figure it out. It is exactly the opposite of intuitive.

 _Edit:_ Irrelevant comment: The demo starts with _Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs,_ a terrible movie based off a great book? Interesting Google chose an antithesis of (Jobs-founded) Pixar for their demo.

<comment><USER7> huh, I thought that Cloudy with a chance of meatballs was awesome. seeing the clip made me want to watch it again.

true, it had little to do with the book, but i don't fault it for that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Seems to be getting a tough reception here. Seemed pretty good to me, basically delivering various things that I geeked up myself with an Acer Revo running Ubuntu and XBMC, but with vastly easier setup, a better interface, and better integration with US cable TV and DVRs.

The key elements they've got right as I see it is that it's based on HDMI passthrough, so you're not switching between HDMI (or other) inputs and back again which is a major stumbling block for my family, particularly as we control the cable with a remote that can change the TV volume but nothing else. With Google the picture slideshows, last.fm etc. just appear on top of the standard video signal and they appear to have IR blasters to pass through all kinds of controls to other devices, which is hacky but necessary unless you want to buy the entire ecosystem from your cable provider.

They're also building it into TVs and Blu-Ray players, which means one less control (and box) to worry about. Integration with iPhones/Android is something that geeks already do to various degrees (e.g. setting recordings while out and about, flicking through or searching your video library on your phone) but it's good to have it built in from the start, particularly with voice activation for finding that rarely used channel.

On the other hand searching the web while watching a program is something I do right now with my iPhone or netbook, so I don't really see the benefit of that, but then it kind of comes for free so why not?

</comment><comment><USER8> So, it's basically Chrome OS glued to a TV tuner with quick access to a search bar.

Count me not impressed. Similar (and more featureful) stuff has been around in other OSS projects like MythTV and XBMC for years at this point.

<comment><USER7> every time ive thought about setting up mythtv, i never did because i knew it would take me hours, it would cost money and time to find the right tuner cards, and there would be no particular guarantee that i could actually get it to all work in the end.

Are there many non-techie users of XBMC/MythTV?

And anyway, ideas are worthless if execution is poor. if google creates an integrated seemless product then it doesn't really matter if XBMC has been doing it for 10 years or not. Its like saying that the (original) iPhone would be useless because other phones had had browsers/email/whatever for years. Apple executed better, thats all that mattered

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I don't really see the use case for this. Doesn't everyone inclined to want these features have a laptop/tablet/SmartPhone within arms reach when they sit on the couch and watch TV? I can't imagine watching a video with friends and using the TV to search for something while making the video 1/8th size in the corner. Assuming I did want to browse Flickr on my TV I would want a TV friendly UI -- not the Flickr website. It makes sense to have a set top with tight integration with other devices for control, TV-centric apps make sense if you can figure out a non-clunky control method. Another demo I saw included setting up an IR blaster to a cable box with video inputs. No one wants to do that. That's exactly why Windows MCE was a failure. At this early stage Google TV doesn't seem to have moved far enough away from being an Android based HTPC. Some people undoubtably want that but I'm not sure it's a mainstream thing.

</comment><comment><USER10> The current version doesn't feel too impressive though I'm sure the pie is big enough that improvement will happen quickly with big investments being made rapidly. The vision is inspiring. The implementation needs work.

</comment><comment><USER11> A year ago my wife and I cut the cord. We gave up cable and switched to a media PC with Hulu and Streaming Netflix as our primary sources. It's been a great change for us (particularly with Hulu+), but I do think Google TV is pretty hopelessly misguided.

It seems like a lot of folks are convinced there is a lot of great TV out there on the Internet and it's just a matter of finding it. That doesn't really seem to be true to me. Most quality content is rather short. Mr Deity and the like aren't really "curl up on the couch" TV. I don't want to surf, I want to be passively entertained. That means in half-hour chunks with high production values. You know, like the Networks tend to create.

For that you seem to have three real options:

1\. Hulu 2\. Netflix 3\. Torrents

I'm not really into the hassle and dubious legal status of #3... but past that what's the point? Until there are folks truly producing great content, discoverability really isn't the issue is it? Yet isn't that what Google is trying to solve here? I just don't really get it.

<comment><USER12> It's nice to see how the "three real options" break down in Germany.

Hulu: nope

Netflix: nope

Torrents: works

<comment><USER13> Well, why are german people watching american content? Why don't the german language producers create there own version of hulu?

<comment><USER12> Because the US spends so much money on production value that we can't compete and just dub stuff. While these dubs are really high quality, I personally find awful to watch them since a lot of jokes or puns get lost in translation :(

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Can't wait for Adblock for TV...

</comment><comment><USER15> This doesn't make me feel like "I want that".

<comment><USER16> Part of the reason for this is certainly the fact that the product itself is not particularly extraordinary.

The other part is that she is no Steve Jobs. Marketing, and more specifically _believing_ in your product, makes all the difference.

<comment><USER17> Even Jobs is having a tough time selling Apple TV

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Money quote from Schmidt's postscript: "Instead of wasting time watching television, you can waste time watching the internet!"</comment>


Mike Tyson Launches Own Bitcoin Wallet Service - <AUTHOR> http://themerkle.com/news/mike-tyson-launches-own-bitcoin-wallet-service/ <comment><USER2> Wow, wasn't expecting this headline today!

On the real though, this could absolutely lend some credibility to the BTC platform. If a bunch of celebrities and high-profile individuals start using this app, or even just BTC in general maybe it would help people become less hesitant to consider accepting BTC at their own businesses.

Mike Tyson might be eccentric, but you don't stay rich by making poor choices, I hope that others realize this so that this app enjoys some popularity.</comment>


Google. Who's looking at you? - <AUTHOR> http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article2688404.ece

<comment><USER2> i dont quite understand a lot of this alarmism over google.

<comment><AUTHOR> _"... i dont quite understand a lot of this alarmism over google. ..."_

Because you can join the dots. From HackerNews ( <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=70454> ) to Facebook ( <http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5381210911> ) to google ( <http://www.google.com/search?q=joe+guilmette+Santa+Cruz,+CA> ).

It's not so much the fact it's google it could be spock or facebook. Public companies that keep everything you pump into it via the Internet can be considered harmful. Listen to this talk by the Eben Moglen talk, _"Freedom Businesses Protect Privacy"_ [0] to understand the implications.

[0] __ITConversations __, _"Eben Moglen, 'Freedom Businesses Protect Privacy', mp3, 18Mb, 40min"_ ~ <http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail1897.html>

<comment><USER3> I get the impression that it's a generational thing... overall, people of Generation Y and the younger generation seem less concerned about the personal information abundance on the internet.

<comment><AUTHOR> _"... people of Generation Y and the younger generation seem less concerned about the personal information abundance ..."_

Could be. I get the impression that _"geny"'s_ (I'm a " _genxr_ " <http://flickr.com/photos/bootload/227128232/> ) are sort of adapting to posting personal info and are work out strategies to blunt the side effects. It's personal choice to add a blow by blow description of your youth.

There are implications for individuals and groups however. To me its about _"Power"_ of who has _"Control"_ of memory. In historical past this was public. Technology that captures _"private memories"_ of useful information that can be _"shared or withheld"_ and abused. The real danger is inference and prediction from the data that leaks, often voluntary into private/public databases through bailment ~ <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bailment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: On the app store, making money... now what? - <AUTHOR>

Recently, I made an app with my girlfriend and we put it on the App Store. We did it more for fun and enjoyment than financial gain (figuring that the App Store is pretty much a lottery so we didn't really worry about it), but it's starting to pick up steam  and is well on its way to bringing in the equivalent of a few months worth of paycheck.
Relevant details:
- She's a US citizen, I'm not (I'm here on a work visa).
- The developer account is in her name. (we did this because it seemed more solid to setup a US app store account under the name of a US citizen rather than under the name of an alien)
- We both agree that we put in roughly the same amount of work (her in assets and design, me in code).
I'm not really sure what to do to make sure that we make the best out of the situation. Should we just split the profits as they come? Should we set up a joint developer/bank account? Should she start a US company in her name? (She's currently freelance, and I don't intend on leaving my current job.)
Is this a situation that HNers have experienced and found a straightforward solution to, or is the best thing to do seek legal advice? (and is it worth it to put 10-20% of the profits towards legal advice?) <comment><USER2> If it's making some money I would incorporate. You don't want a patent troll screwing everything up for you and you can mitigate the risk of that for a a small fee.

You can own shares in the company and that way your ownership stake isn't at risk of a hand-shake deal. Situations change so prepare for the worst and hope for the best. She is your girlfriend so it sounds crazy but hey so are pre- nups.

Pay the lawyer if you are getting paid.</comment>


Thinking Like a Programmer (2018) - <AUTHOR> http://third-bit.com/2018/03/16/seven-ways.html <comment><USER2> I'm not sure "thinking like a programmer" is a concrete goal, what would be accomplished. Getting a job?

Programming _is_ a thing, but it's always been very diverse, creative, individual, personalized and wide variations of requirements. No two programmers will solve the same complex problem the same. The best programmers will solve it without programming!

For programming itself, I think the fascination with computing itself is enough. You can go the academic route, hobby route, enterprise programming route or make your own way in the world. Being able to cobble up the pieces in order to build solutions is often enough skillset needed. There's never been a profession where you learn more on the job.

If there's one goal the profession should embrace it's simplification and interfacing with the users, aka userfriendliness!

</comment><comment><USER3> 0\. Learn to break large and complex problems into smaller and simpler problems

I agree with the seven, but I think it's missing one of the most important ways programmers think.

<comment><USER4> Breaking down large and complex problems is what "programming is about creating and composing abstractions" is about in the text.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Greg Wilson made the talk "What We Actually Know About Software Development, and Why We Believe It's True".

The gist of it is that we're too much willing to believe bloggers without experimental evidence (e.g "DSLs are good"), and not willing enough to follow/apply proven scientific results ("code reviews significantly reduce errors" ).

That was 10 years ago. Today, he writes:

> "The best way—in fact, the only way—to improve productivity is to improve > quality"

This is a highly controversial statement (with which I agree, but that's not the point), stated here without supporting evidence.

Are we supposed to trust him? Where's the Greg Wilson from 10 years ago? He could have been the evidence-based software guy giving the software industry the push it needs towards more proof/experimental-studies!</comment>


Why MacRuby Matters (Present & Future) - <AUTHOR> http://antoniocangiano.com/2009/03/29/why-macruby-matters/

<comment><USER2> Also see <http://blog.headius.com/2009/03/on-benchmarking.html> for the other side of this story

<comment><USER3> From <http://maglev.gemstone.com/status/>

"MagLev swings from being much faster than MRI to being much slower". We're focused on RubySpec compliance for now, and will address performance later this year.

It's in a private alpha test, so I guess we'll see.

MacRuby is interesting because Apple has a new platform for OS X and the Obj-C runtime, and they're selling them like hotcakes. You have your Webkit window with Ruby locally, talking to some servers remotely if necessary, and the desktop app / web app just gets a lot more interesting.

<comment><USER4> It's been in private alpha test for a long time now, and yet they hyped it up a year ago with insane performance claims (50x faster than MRI!). I'm glad to hear they are "focused on RubySpec compliance". However, the whole reason people got upset last year was that until it's at least usably compliant, it's not Ruby.

Their compliance graph looks encouraging, though, hopefully we'll see some proper tests soon.

Yeah, I've been playing with the new release of MacRuby all weekend and it is _great_. And it's embeddable, too! The possibilities are incredible. Don't get me wrong, I love MacRuby, I just think Antonio's benchmarking process is flawed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is predicated on the assumption that Ruby matters, present & future.

While I love Ruby, and use it for most code I don't write in Javascript, I can't help but wonder if in 10 years' time Ruby will look as big and bloated and arcane as Perl does now, and some new upstart will have all the mindshare.

<comment><USER4> You say that like it's a bad thing!

If there was a viable young upstart which was better enough to seriously start stealing Rubyists away (perhaps a "Ruby for functional programming"?) then wouldn't that be a net gain for the world?

I love Ruby but I _hope_ it's irrelevant in 10 years' time, because we've all moved onto something unambiguously better. Think of how much more productive we'll be! : )

<comment><USER3> Alan Kay, in his Turing award lecture:

A couple of years ago we started this project called Squeak, which is simply not an attempt to give the world a free Smalltalk, but an attempt to give the world a bootstrapping mechanism for something much better than Smalltalk, and when you fool around with Squeak, please, please, think of it from that standpoint. Think of how you can obsolete the damn thing by using its own mechanisms for getting the next version of itself.

<comment><USER4> Inspiring words from a great man!

I think the concept of code generation is yet to sink in to the mainstream programming world, but one might expect it to have a huge impact when it does. Especially in the emerging world of distributed programming.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I am not qualified to comment on the speed issues, but I don't want to loose sight of how very cool MacRuby is, even if it is slower than YARV/JRUBY. Imagine taking Ruby to the Iphone. Too cool......

<comment><USER6> But Objective C is pretty nice too and with blocks being added to it, is there any reason to want Ruby (other than personal preference) on the iPhone. They should have had it from day 1 of course.

<comment><USER7> If you consider Obj-C and Ruby interchangeable, you haven't programmed in at least one of them.

<comment><USER6> Both and I have done Smalltalk so I know exactly what blocks should look like (and it is not what it is in Ruby).

Maybe you should verify your assertion again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have to agree with Nutter - MacRuby is nowhere near a complete implementation and there is absolutely no point trying to judge its performance until it is. See last year's MagLev debacle for precedent. You were right on board with that train wreck, if I recall correctly, and let me assure you the few of us who poured skepticism on their numbers are feeling pretty vindicated by now.

Another problem I have is the use of these artificial benchmarks to judge speed at all. Time and time again experience has shown that benchmark performance has little relevance in the real world. For example, your most recent Ruby 1.9 benchmarks post:

[http://antoniocangiano.com/2008/12/10/reflections-on-the- rub...](http://antoniocangiano.com/2008/12/10/reflections-on-the-ruby- shootout/)

shows Ruby 1.9 coming out 250% faster than 1.8. 250%! This is an absolutely meaningless figure. I have recently posted my own benchmarks of actual production 1.8.6 and 1.9.1 installations running an actual real world program (Rails) serving an actual production web site and the performance gain is closer to 15%:

[http://fukamachi.org/wp/2009/03/27/thin-ruby-191-vs- ruby-186...](http://fukamachi.org/wp/2009/03/27/thin-ruby-191-vs-ruby-186/)

I will not pretend that my quick and dirty testing is any kind of canonical "last word" result but on the other hand, I also can say with absolute certainty that no sizable app is going to experience anywhere _near_ a 250% speed increase from Ruby 1.9. These benchmarks are worse than nothing, they're completely misleading. I am all for getting everyone onto 1.9 but geeze!

And of course you can't even run a "real world" app on MacRuby at all, because it's too immature, which kind of completes the circle of pointlessness. It is way too early for this kind of thing.

I do sympathise with your mission of promoting knowledge of and getting people excited about the future of the various Ruby implementations but can you please tone back the hype a bit?</comment>