Letting your mind wander is a major cause of unhappiness - <AUTHOR> http://io9.com/5687282/ <comment><USER2> There seems to be a major uncontrolled variable in this study, namely external expectations of what you _should_ be doing.

I found, as a kid up through college, that I was happiest when my mind was wandering. As a kid, I also had no expectations about what I should be doing - I basically decided that homework was bullshit as a young teen, so I could do whatever I wanted and not feel guilty about it.

That changed once I got into the working world and suddenly was responsible for my own success. Now, whenever my mind wanders, there's a little voice that goes off in my head and says "But you're not being _productive_! Nobody cares what you think about, they only care what you do."

It seems like a reasonable hypothesis to say "people are happiest when they're doing whatever their internal value system says they should be doing." And it's consistent with the data. People were least happy when resting, working, and using a home computer, which are also the times that social expectations are highest that you actually _should_ be working. They were most happy when having sex, exercising, and conversing - but nobody expects you to do a job while having sex.

I'd like to see the data broken down by age group and cultural values, and in particular, I'd like to see if it holds true for cultural groups that do not have the same focus on productivity and achievement as middle-class Americans.

</comment><comment><USER3> During my day job, my mind wanders constantly. I work in construction and I'm highly intelligent, which means I rarely have to concentrate hard like others do. So I spend a lot of my time thinking up story and plot details, which actually makes me quite happy.

Although I think having a dozen different characters living in my head probably exempts me from inclusion in a study on happiness.

<comment><USER4> _Although I think having a dozen different characters living in my head probably exempts me from inclusion in a study on happiness._

nope, only if they get _out_ of your head.

<comment><USER3> Does escaping onto 'paper' count, or is that simply transmuting the imprisonment into a virtual extension of my mind?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is pretty much related to the concept of flow [1]. Simply put, we are most satisfied (in the long term) when in flow, which could be characterized as the blurring of awareness and action, the feeling of control, a distortion of time perception, and some other stuff outlined in the link.

Simply its a more formal definition of 'the zone'. Yeah, the same zone as in sports, music, or coding sessions. Basically, the idea is that almost any activity can be experienced in the flow, and the further away from flow characteristics we move, the less satisfied we are. Thinking about something else while doing the current task is about as far from flow as you can get (unless the other thing you are thinking about is an flow experience thing).

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_%28psychology%29>

</comment><comment><USER6> By extension, spending too much time on Hacker News will make you unhappy. Get back to work! ;-)

<comment><USER7> Although, reading Hacker News is what I'm "actually doing," and I'm very focused on it!

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> If your mind is wandering, it's probably because you're not interested in what you're doing. Therefore I doubt simply focussing on whatever boring task is before you will bring happiness: the trick is to actually be doing stuff that interests you. Not exactly an Earth-shattering revelation...

</comment><comment><USER9> What?! Have all the sages had it right by telling people to live in the moment, to become more present? :)

</comment><comment><USER10> This article reminds me of a TED talk I liked by Barry Schwartz on "The Paradox of Choice."

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO6XEQIsCoM>

The speaker argues that that freedom and choice are held as unassailable virtues by Western cultures, but in fact research shows that too much choice leads to unhappiness.

If you think of mind wandering as perhaps a product of too much choice for the mind, the two ideas are complementary.

<comment><AUTHOR> I didn't think of that video, but I had the same thought. When I have trouble concentrating on what I'm doing, it usually seems to be because I'm thinking about checking what's new online or reading the recent updates on Twitter or checking my email or any of a number of other things. As other people have said, we have almost instant access to more information than ever before. Maybe it will just take a while to figure out how to deal with that without letting the urge to know about everything control us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> This study documents an association but fails to prove causation. Therefore this headline is misleading.

<comment><USER12> The causation could easily be in the opposite direction. People engaged in boring/unhappy activities are more likely to let their minds wander.

<comment> m-photonic The study does address that possibility:

>Even more intriguingly, they discovered that people's feelings of happiness had much more to do with where their mind was than what they were doing. Only 4.6% of a person's happiness could be attributed to what they were doing, but 10.8% of it was caused by what they were thinking about at the time, and people consistently reported being happiest when their minds were on what they were doing.

However, what I'd suggest is that the happiness associated with an activity isn't 100% a function of the activity in and of itself, but whether or not you're in the right mindset for that activity at the time. Thus it would be possible for the wandering mind to be an effect and not a cause and still be more strongly correlated with happiness than the nature of the activity itself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm faintly bemused that the study used an iPhone app to prompt volunteers.

I got rid of my iPhone precisely because I thought it was leading me to not enjoy the times when my mind wandered.

</comment><comment><USER14> This makes sense, if you're intently focused on doing a task or completing something you wouldn't have time to really display any emotion, let alone unhappiness.

</comment><comment><USER15> "But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

</comment><comment><USER16> The several thousand year old practice of "Mindfulness". Derived from the earlier (pre-Buddhist) practice "Vipashyana" (i.e., clear seeing).

Yes, keeping one's mind centered, aka, in the present moment, in awareness, is being happy. Being happy without external causes.

Unhappiness is basically thought-forms or thought-waves saying "I am unhappy" or "I am bored" or "I will be happy when ...". There is no more reality to unhappiness than mere thought-forms. The underlying silence revealed by a still mind is happiness itself.

</comment><comment><USER17> Previous discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1895008>

</comment><comment><USER18> This reminds me of John Gray's idea that idleness is a burden for most. "Work fends off the heavier burden of idleness, and even the round of commuting keeps the self at bay." [http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/issue_17/mostly_a_wise_leap_...](http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/issue_17/mostly_a_wise_leap_from_grace/)

</comment><comment><USER19> Happiness is overrated. I'm just fine with a life of mild melancholy peppered with occasional fits of ecstacy.</comment>


Introducing Bluetooth Mesh Networking - <AUTHOR> https://blog.bluetooth.com/introducing-bluetooth-mesh-networking <comment><USER2> I don't know if bluetooth mesh will have the same problem, but zigbee as implemented by Samsung Smartthings leaves a lot to be desired.

For one thing, there is no obvious way to inspect how "the mesh" is configuring itself. I can't observe whether or not repeaters are working as intended nor anything about the quality of the signal strength. The only way to make changes to what gets connected to what is by turning everything off and then turning it back on in a controlled sequence.

I hope that bluetooth mesh vendors will provide tools for troubleshooting and actually inspecting network. Networks can be squirrely things, I don't like taking a shot in the dark with this stuff.

<comment><USER3> Many Zigbee setups aren't actually mesh networks.

Zigbee defines only 3 device types:

1) Coordinator - Always on and the root of the network. Only 1 per network.

2) Router - Always on, can forward data from other nodes and send it's own data.

3) End Device - Can sleep, can _not_ forward data from other devices.

In practice with something like SmartThings, the hub is the coordinator and you can assume than any device which has a battery is an End Device since routers are required to always be on. _Some_ wired Zigbee devices (like light switches) will act as routers, but I've found they usually don't advertise if they do or not.

For many people, all their devices are battery powered thus they have no routers so there is no mesh at all, every end device must talk to the controller in this setup.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> How about introducing reliable bluetooth instead?

<comment><USER5> It's reliable, you just need to use an rf cable.

<comment><USER6> > It's reliable, you just need to use an rf cable.

This reminds me of a German engineering wise saying: "Wer Funk verstanden hat, nimmt Kabel" ("Those who have understood wireless use a cable.").

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I just want my wireless BT headphones to work right across multiple devices, can they fix that too?

<comment><USER8> My Bose headphones can be connected to two devices simultaneously, and paired to more devices (I don't know the limitation for pairing). Same for my 40$ bluetooth speaker.

<comment><USER9> Do your Bose headphones randomly cut off in an not so crowded office? Then when your laptop can't see them, does it start playing music over the speakers quite embarrassingly?

<comment><USER10> Not sure why this is downvoted.

This happens to me, but usually with my phone on the train; happened this morning, in fact.

But it's also happened with other brands so it's not limited to Bose.

Which would mean it's a Bluetooth issue.

<comment><USER11> I have been exclusively been using bluetooth headphones for over 6 years in a city. I have never experienced any of those issues. I ride the bus and live in have a high population density neighborhood. I work in a building with over 300 workers and haven't had a single incident like that.

<comment><USER12> Any particular vendor?

<comment><USER11> LG Neck Bands and GoNovate

GoNovate G10 is the smallest bluetooth that sits in your ear like a hearing aid. I LOVE IT.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> With mesh network being shipped, I hope there is now time to develop an improvement to how bluetooth can be implemented into applications to allow better UX in handling connections/handshakes. It's fine when you only use one device, but when you start using two, man it's not user friendly

</comment><comment><USER14> This is a standard press release. Can someone tell me what this technology actually is/does? Is it a bluetooth profile? A new protocol? At what layer? Is it a new spec/new optional/addition to the spec? Does it require new hardware?

<comment><USER15> All the details in the spec: [https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/mesh- specifications](https://www.bluetooth.com/specifications/mesh-specifications)

I'm not following this too closely, but here's the summary as I understand it: it's a software evolution based on existing BLE hardware. It's not a new profile, they're above the connectivity layer. Most important "detail" IMHO: it's just the first step of BT mesh. This version 1.0 is based on flooding, so not super efficient. Take all the pictures with a gazillion devices with a big grain of salt ;) But an extension with routing, allowing better scaling, will follow soon. Then it will have the potential to scale better. But this first version is enough to get started, and sufficient for limited scale deployments like consumer applications at home for example.

<comment><USER16> This is correct. Several private companies built their own mesh networking protocols on top of Bluetooth, and multiple silicon vendors also offered their own mesh technology built into their stacks. If I recall correctly, one company essentially donated their mesh networking protocol to the BT SIG, and this became the basis for the official BT mesh. Within the SIG, there are multiple efforts to bring mesh networking to the standard, through various workgroups.

I think most of this is a response to 802.15.4 meshes, which have been around for a long time, but are officially getting formalized into specifications or product offerings. Thread, Zigbee, Z-Wave are all gaining momentum, and the BT SIG is trying to not lose marketshare to these products.

Interestingly, Thread is the only mesh network of those I mentioned that supports IP, through 6LoWPAN.

<comment><USER17> Interesting. I'm in the middle of running some experiments on top of an ad-hoc network of raspberry pis connected over WiFi. I next wanted to evaluate the Java-based distributed system I've created on top of some kind of other mesh networking technology (e.g. ZigBee, Bluetooth, Thread, Z-wave). I was hoping to simply treat these as layer 2 technologies for which I could buy a corresponding dongle for my Pis and use OLSR on the Pis to control the routing. Do you mean to say they all define their own network and transport layers? Ideally I'd just like to be able to open a TCP socket without having to worry about the underlying mesh network implementation.

<comment><USER16> Yes, ZigBee, Bluetooth, Thread, and Z-Wave all define their own network and transport layers. ZigBee and Thread are built on top of the 802.15.4 PHY and MAC standard, Bluetooth operates in the 2.4MHz frequency band and operates on the 802.15.1 PHY and MAC (or did at one time), and Z-Wave operates in subGig frequencies and implements its own PHY and MAC layer (plus all other OSI layers). Opening a TCP socket across any of these is essentially impossible because of the miniscule frames all of these support. Thread is the only one that is even capable of supporting IP, but it does so over UDP, using 6LoWPAN (basically IPv6 header compression and packet fragmentation).

Z-Wave, Bluetooth and Zigbee are full-stack, meaning they implement their own application layers as well, so unless you implemented TCP on top of the application layer, you probably won't get what you are looking for. Thread just provides the networking layer, so you could potentially use it to carry whatever traffic you like.

<comment><USER17> Great info, thanks. Tallies with what I've read over the last few days. If I understand correctly, Bluetooth provides RFCOMM as a reliable transport protocol. Could I just use this in place of TCP for point to point connections or does it have major limitations? I guess I'd have to change my endpoint addressing given there is no IP obviously.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> And I still can't use my Bluetooth mouse and headset at same time reliably on the MacBook pro. How can I trust that?

<comment><USER19> Hmmm... I'm able to use my BT headset, Apple trackpad, third-party keyboard, and an old SonyEricsson mc600 all on the same MacBook Air with zero problems, other than the appallingly short battery life in the (now retired) trackpad. This is immediately next to an iMac with Apple BT keyboard and Apple BT mouse, again with zero problems.

Is it possible there's something else in your environment interfering with the BT signal? Perhaps an office with lots of other BT connections?

<comment><USER6> > Is it possible there's something else in your environment interfering with > the BT signal? Perhaps an office with lots of other BT connections?

Bluetooth uses the frequency range between 2,402 GHz and 2,480 GHz. This is in the ISM band that is also used by Wi-Fi. Indeed according to the German Wikipedia article on Bluetooth (I could not find such a remark in the article in the English wikipedia)

> > [https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bluetooth&oldid=1...](https://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bluetooth&oldid=167423313#Technischer_Hintergrund)

Bluetooth can be disrupted by Wi-Fi, microwave ovens and cordless phones (but not by cordless phones using the DECT standard as is common in Germany).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Why "introducing?" There are already products on the market that have this. Most of the lightbulbs in my house operate on a Bluetooth mesh network. It's slower than the wifi-connected bulbs, but the range is much greater since each bulb only needs to be able to see the next-nearest bulb. Otherwise I wouldn't be able to reach the lights out on the driveway.

<comment><USER20> I doubt they use Bluetooth Mesh, but more like using BLE - Bluetooth Low Energy.

<comment><USER21> Bluetooth Mesh is built on BLE. The proprietary meshes that existed before the standard was released also were flood mainly flood meshes on BLE.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I found the FAQ to be a good introduction document to the new mesh networking feature.

[https://www.bluetooth.com/what-is-bluetooth- technology/how-i...](https://www.bluetooth.com/what-is-bluetooth- technology/how-it-works/le-mesh/mesh-faq)

<comment><USER23> Thanks for the link. This explains why they would use low power devices with an m:m flood network:

 _" Bluetooth technology implements a managed flood approach in which only main-powered nodes serve as message relays. Low-power nodes, such as battery- powered sensors, are not responsible for message relay." [...] "Bluetooth mesh handles multicast communications using a publish/subscribe group messaging approach. [...] Bluetooth mesh also supports virtual addresses, which extend group addresses by allowing a 128-bit UUID to act as the destination address."_

They also seem to have added strong security guarantees. So in theory, they could control a large number of sensors using a small number of relays, and have fine-grained, secure control over the low-power devices, and avoid complex routing. It's honestly not a bad idea.

Now let's see if they fuck it up like all the other BT implementations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> It'd be interesting to see how this compares to scatternet that has been part of bluetooth since 1.0.

<comment><USER25> I guess the idea here is that it will be self-configuring.

So if a central node in the network goes down, the rest of the mesh will reconfigure their connections without human involvement.

And thanks for reminding me of the term, i had a feel something like this was already in Bluetooth from the early days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Permit me to be skeptic when anybody claims

>A Proven, Trusted Technology

When talking about mesh networking.

<comment><USER12> Some mesh networking technology is proven and trusted, carrying billions of transactions per day. Disclaimer: I work for mesh networking vendor SSNI, and we've been producing and operating large-scale reliable mesh networks for over ten years now.

It is not easy to do well, though, and there are more failed attempts than successes at this point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> So how will me and my friends take advantage of this?

Will we have to wait for new hardware that supports it?

Or will we be able to update drivers on our Android phones, and then it'll just work?</comment>


My Farewell to Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://passionatereason.com/2017/01/my-farewell-to-twitter/ <comment><USER2> I'm was never at the level described by the author, but I left Twitter for the same thing. I too am a creator and I'd get retweets with very little action. That was a huge moment for me because I realized the reality of Twitter. It's one giant bullshit factory.

You can even tell how much it affects the minds of people who are prolific other places. Writers for tech blogs stop writing about useful shit and start writing about the reactions of twitter posts. You can see how the self obsession causes people to try to craft those perfect 140 characters. Everyone thinks they are a comedian.

In the end I found that no matter how diverse your followership, Twitter is a hopeless echo chamber populated by twentysomethings with no real life experience who are chomping at the bit to eat you alive if you don't conform to the enforced political correctness of the moment.

I'll never go back.

<comment><USER3> > You can even tell how much it affects the minds of people who are prolific > other places. Writers for tech blogs stop writing about useful shit and > start writing about the reactions of twitter posts. You can see how the self > obsession causes people to try to craft those perfect 140 characters. > Everyone thinks they are a comedian. In the end I found that no matter how > diverse your followership, Twitter is a hopeless echo chamber populated by > twentysomethings with no real life experience who are chomping at the bit to > eat you alive if you don't conform to the enforced political correctness of > the moment.

I wouldn't quite go that far; I barely use Twitter - the concept is not appealing to me and I really don't care for the type of interaction it enables, but to call it an echo chamber is basically the same as calling the Internet an echo chamber. You are limited by your decisions on who you want to associate with and who you want to read. The suggestions may be tailored to you, but ultimately you pick. Anyone can find an echo chamber for themselves on Twitter.

Many businesses have found a lot of value in Twitter - status accounts, event updates, and so on are handled really well through Twitter as the platform lends itself to subscription via text as well; I've used it successfully in the past for such purposes and we never had a problem with it.

How you decide to invest yourself in the system will determine your experience. The social interaction part of twitter isn't for me because it's not really the kind of conversations I like and I find the format limiting. But that doesn't mean it's a bad system, it's just not my cup of tea,

<comment><USER2> I think there is more to it than that now. I think how you market on Twitter is totally unique from the way you do it anywhere else. Success on that medium, depending on the thing you are marketing, can become predicated on a number of things.

For example, I've witnessed game developers who were making truly beautiful things, who got stonewalled because they wouldn't drink the current koolaid. That flavor of koolaid at the moment happens to be the results of the election and defining where you stand. A few years back, I saw great indie companies getting blackballed because of anything less than purist views on subjects like gamergate.

I do think you can penetrate and market well on Twitter, but it comes with quite a few ifs. Maybe this comes, for the first time, with having a marketing platform with instant human feedback (note: I did not say customer).

<comment><USER4> > I saw great indie companies getting blackballed because of anything less > than purist views on subjects like gamergate.

I think that's ok. We used to have a notion that a product is just a product, and we should all just pretend the people making it are apolitical and enjoy the product on its own merits.

But that leads to a world where resources pool up in random places. This guy has a billion dollars because he makes a beverage a lot of people like? Why? Are beverage skills the barometer for deciding how resources are allocated?

I should note that this system works OK when there is an additional pool of public resources that people can rely on. If private revenue is "spending cash" but the state still controls its natural resources, and cities have a commons, and extended families take care of each other, things are kind of OK.

But that's over now, we are privatizing 100% of resources, so now revenue really has to be a perfect proxy for how we think resources should be allocated, from a social/moral perspective.

So now we are moving to a world where that guy needs to not only make a nice beverage but he needs to show that he shares our values, because we're not just buying a soda, we are deciding who will starve, which ecosystems will be destroyed, and what kinds of people will be unemployed.

If someone needs an indie game maker to disavow feminist commentators in order to feel comfortable buying a game... well, I disagree with the moral stance, but I support very much that person's right to spend their money and influence that way. We have no other choice in a capitalist system.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I am proud to say I essentially shun all socia media. I have never had a Twitter or Instagram account. I do have Facebook, but I essentially never use it - I haven't posted anything in years other than "happy birthday" to a few people.

Social media has always been incredibly self-centered and narcissistic. But over the last few years it has become a truly nasty place with all the flame wars and political crap going on. Everyone has something to say. And no one listens to anyone else. I have no use for such a medium in my life.

Twitter is by far the worst of all social media because of the limited message length. No well-reasoned arguments can be expressed in that short limit so we are instead left with a battle for the snarkiest, most sarcastic comments people can muster.

The so-called "discourse" in America (and probably the world) has reached a new pathetic low. I am confident I am not missing out on anything of actual value.

<comment><USER6> No offense intended, but what you're doing here, a performative version of your life described in a way that makes you look good, is a big social media activity. As is the broad critique of society and particular things in it.

I'd add that I don't think current social media tools are much different than my experience of Usenet and Listservs of yore. Or HN. Or the offline world where a lot of people are thrown together, like schools and workplaces. People are people.

As an introvert, I pretty easily get tired of people, so I can sympathize with your reaction. And I go through periods of seeing the worst in people. But that's more about what I'm seeing than about what people are.

<comment><USER7> You can't tell the difference between Facebook and HN? C'mon.

You actually have a good point, but by overstressing the similarities of social behavior on different sites you make the point weaker. We do some similar self promotion and efforts to improve how others perceive us in face- to-face interactions as well, but no one would refer to that as "social media".

<comment><USER6> No, then they just call it "social". Which is my point: the differences between the social media platforms, HN included, are relatively small. The commonalities are vast. People are people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> You know, the author of this blog post echoes my thoughts almost verbatim. I am feeling like I am swept away in filthy, roiling, floodwater every time I switch to my Twitter tab. It has become exhausting, and a detriment to my actual work, so I am going to take a sabbatical.

Facebook to a lesser extent - that platform is still a useful means to communicate with family who are scattered wide.

By far, I am really enjoying Instagram at the moment - it is SO much more peaceful and non-confrontational. I only have a tiny couple of hundred followers, and am following about the same number of friends, musicians, guitar makers, tea manufacturers and such. It is just _nice_ to sit back and scroll through my feed and see uplifting images with NO arguments or one upmanship or sniping going on...

<comment><USER9> > I am feeling like I am swept away in filthy, roiling, floodwater every time > I switch to my Twitter tab.

Surely the answer there is "follow better people"?

<comment><USER8> Generally, I do, including other developers and business people etc. But of late, the tensions and general angst at the US political situation etc. has meant that normally calm, rational people have been getting frayed around the edges and retweeting or getting involved in online arguments, so my feed is corrupted by that.

I am no innocent, as I have contributed a bit myself of late - it is hard to suppress that welling of indignation, anger and frustration sometimes.

<comment><USER10> My Twitter feed is very carefully curated, but the signal-to-noise ratio has plummeted over the past few weeks. Between Trump and Brexit, it seems like everyone's buttons have been firmly pushed.

<comment><USER11> The signal-to-noise on my feed has been on a downward spiral since before the election, it's honestly just gotten progressively worse, with no sign of improvement on the horizon.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I must be using Twitter wrong, because seeing that these articles come up so frequently, I feel like I'm one of the last people who still likes it. I did get turned off when it got marketer heavy (right around when App.net tried to be a thing), but came back to it a few years ago. I only follow ~700 people, and am followed by ~300, so I know I don't get most of the spam that heavily followed people get. In the nearly 10 years I've had an account, I've only posted 5400ish tweets, so I consume far more than I contribute. But, in general, I like it again. I get headlines from my local news outlets, occasional pictures from Star Wars sets, thoughts of other folks I admire and aspire to be like, and an outlet for the short, dumb things I have to say. If I wanted to write longer form, I have a blog, so I have never done those 10+ tweet storm things, and never typed "/1" at the end of a tweet. It's never open on my computer, so it's mostly checked on the couch, while waiting in lines, or when I'm otherwise idle.

I think this is where I differ with the author of the article is that the expectation of return for me from Twitter is zero. If I go a day without checking, I don't care. If I post something to it that dies on the vine, I don't care. Sometimes I get likes, sometimes retweets, but nothing I put out there is expected to have a return.

<comment><USER13> You're ahead of the game if you don't care about any of that. Question is though, why bother using it at that point?

<comment><USER14> Sometimes just the act of writing something down or putting something out there is therapeutic in a way, isn't it? Sharing can feel good even if it is only with a single other person. Doesn't have to be a 'best seller' and 'liked' the world over to be meaningful to yourself. If I post silly little thought or quip, I'll chuckle to myself, and move on with my life. Doesn't matter to me if anyone else actually sees it, shares it or whatever else. I got the laugh I needed out of it. Maybe someone else will. Maybe no one will. If you're marketing or have some deep need to be loved by internet strangers, the stats are important. But some people just like to share for the sake of sharing and aren't in it for the points.

<comment><USER13> If you're serious about that, I would just launch your own ghost / wordpress instance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> angry-hacker I have given up on social media too, but not for "Stallman" reasons but rather it makes me unhappy.

Hacker News is the only place I visit and thought HN the websites too. I have visited HN every night for the past 4 or 5 years. It gives me everything I need, I need to stay away from politics though because I don't agree with majority here and discussing things makes me depressed.

<comment><USER15> +1. HN is a sanctuary and I really hope it stays that way, despite people syaing I am 'sticking my head in the sand' by requesting politics be kept off the site.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I left Facebook a couple years ago and Twitter a couple weeks ago. I used both somewhat successfully to promote my work for a long time.

I find it remarkable how much better my life feels already. I have so much more focus, energy, and concentration to devote to my work. I don't have the constant nagging at the back of my mind to mindlessly scroll. Left without an easy escape, I find my focus tends to go towards actually creating things. And if I feel the itch to interact with people, it's more of a one-on-one interaction.

I highly recommend trying it.

</comment><comment><USER17> Warning, this will be slightly vulgar. If you go to zoo and see primates that are mad, they sometimes throw _ahem_ waste products at each other. We share 96% (or whatever) DNA with them. I am willing to bet $2.56 that if you did a MRI scan of a monkey in "throw mode" and a human on social media ranting, the same parts of the brain will light up.

I am so sick of politics (all sides)

</comment><comment><USER18> Did the same in November. The aspect regarding the "silence" mentioned in the article is actually quite amazing. I'm still not fully used to it so sometimes it seems as if I have forgotten to do something important. But no, it's just that there is no witty tweet that has to be drafted or a (possibly heated) discussion that has to be continued.

</comment><comment><USER13> This seems to be the trend over the past couple of years. Started with Twitter with me, then Facebook, then Reddit. Hacker News, YouTube, and a couple mature news sites are about all I use outside of my own projects at this point. I've even gotten to the point, where I've installed comment section blockers in my browsers, so I won't see all of the horrible things people say to one another these days.

I'm honestly surprised on how much things like SnapChat, and even Facebook are still growing. It must be just the very young crowd, that hasn't gotten completely sick of it by now.

<comment><USER19> >It must be just the very young crowd, that hasn't gotten completely sick of it by now

Also the older crowd. My mother loves telling me what she saw on facebook. I'd be willing to bet it's just the millennial demographic in the middle that shows low social media usage.

EDIT: Btw, which news sites?

<comment><USER13> Would be interesting to see that graph, though I suspect we never will.

Edit: Quick scan of google news, and arstechnica is basically enough to get today's info out of the way.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Why not just create a completely new account with no ties to who you actually are, follow the cat picture accounts, Neil deGrasse Tyson and whatever else you are interested in?

Trying to get more followers seems to be the bad thing.

<comment><USER21> Because you'll wind up in the same place. You might start off more detached, but you'll eventually be just as emotionally invested in the responses to whatever you do with that account.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Went into the article assuming it was another anti free speech whine piece. Was pleasantly surprised that it was more generally about social media, MH, and a dependency cycle.

This pervades social media culture and as is noted in the article-- a user _knows_ it is taking a toll but the rush is a driving factor. It is like drug, or any addiction-- captivating and hard to break.

Decent article, nice change of pace from other articles recently.

</comment><comment><USER23> Here's a previous HN post along the same lines – the foreboding letter to the future, if you will, from an ex-Google design ethicist: [https://medium.com/swlh/how-technology-hijacks-peoples- minds...](https://medium.com/swlh/how-technology-hijacks-peoples-minds-from-a- magician-and-google-s-design-ethicist-56d62ef5edf3).

</comment><comment><USER24> I'm right there with you. Unfollowed everyone, set my profile to say "I'm out." and told people to send me an iMessage if they want to chat. I'm still composing meaningless tweets in my mind.

Hopefully another few weeks will cure me of this, although after 10 years, I suspect it might take much longer.

</comment><comment><USER25> Twitter has been good in the past. After the election, it was still mostly ok. But since the inauguration, it's a completely different story.

One example close to the heart of HN: following tptacek/tqbf for crypto/business/security/how-to-cook-pork/funny-ESR-excerpts for years has suddenly turned into endless berating of people into enduring struggle sessions over support of the President.

And this is but one example. It's happening to everybody. For some reason, the inauguration has turned nominally good Tweeps into horrible human beings.

So yes, I've had to leave Twitter also.

</comment><comment><USER26> Not gonna lie, clicked this headline hoping it was @jack's resignation.

</comment><comment><USER27> I enjoyed using Twitter for ~8 years. It gave me access to news and opinions from groups that aren't covered by traditional media, and it functioned as an RSS feed for people I wanted to follow (authors, researchers, etc.)

However, I quit Twitter because it wouldn't let me control my own data. I was in the habit of favoriting things that I wanted to follow-up on. Then Twitter changed Favorites to "likes," which wrongly implies I'm endorsing the content. Twitterati know that likes don't necessarily mean anything, but imagine a customs officer looking at my likes, for example. Twitter doesn't provide a method to batch remove all likes, so I tried various 3rd party utilities. The utilities seemed to work initially, but likes would later reappear, even months later, as if restored from a backup.

This experience helped me see that silos can never be trusted.

</comment><comment><USER28> Twitter is a great way to get your name out there and establish a relationship with others. It's a terrible way to make direct sales, because that's not why people go to Twitter. If they're on Amazon (which _is_ a place they go to buy stuff) maybe they'll type your name into the search bar because of what they saw on Twitter.

I treat my Twitter account as a personal account. I don't tweet very much, and if I want to take a week off, I don't even check Twitter. I am happy I did that, because I'd hate to feel an obligation to be on there now that everything is politics.

</comment><comment><USER29> Ok, but who are you?

</comment><comment><USER30> Interesting - PgUp/PgDn stop working when I maximize the window. I've got a 1440x2560 screen.

Relevance to Twitter? (a) Twitter as its worst is still 10x better than this sort of thing; (b) Twitter's Following page doesn't work properly at this resolution either.</comment>


Your birthdate in the decimal expansion of Pi - <AUTHOR> http://www.angio.net/pi/piquery.html

<comment><USER2> I love this sort of thing:

> Be warned that 50 million digits of pi takes up 50 megabytes. This can take > up to 4 hours to download with a 28.8k modem!

<comment><USER3> The website doesn't look like it's been updated in a dozen or so years, but it's still up. It's a good style marker for how the web used to look. I guess they still make enough in ad sales and Pi t-shirts to stay running.

<comment><USER4> "It's a good style marker for how the web used to look."

Loads fast and easy to read. I hope our web designer friends are taking note.

<comment><USER3> This was probably very slow back in the day. The irony is that network speed is being used to cram more stuff across the web, rather than speed up existing material. The price of change.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> An idea I've had, the answer is most probably no, but I found it interesting to think about, others may find it trivial:

Is there a number that (1) contains most subsequences and where (2) finding a certain subsequence is computationally efficient? Also, (3) finding a subsequence given a starting and end position should be efficient. If so, we have a efficient mean to transfer data. Just send the index positions. And we can store any data with just those two index positions. Then again, those index numbers are likely to be very very large. Perhaps we can in turn transform the index positions to smaller index positions by finding their positions in the sequence. Then we need a third number to signify the number of recursive uses of the storage.

<comment><USER6> (1) Yes, 0.1234567891011121314151617181920212223242526....

(2) I'm too lazy to do the calculation right now, but it should not be too difficult to calculate the sum of the lengths of all numbers smaller than n, and then you've got the index of n.

(3) In any feasible encoding, the expected size of the start index of n will be much larger than the size of n. And every recursive step will just blow up the sizes even more.

<comment><USER7> If you slightly modify it to 0. 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 00 01 02 03 04 05... then the number n padded with zeros to k digits can be found starting at position 10 * floor(10^(k - 1) / 9) + k * n.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Maybe of interest for some of you: [http://baby.pirthday.com/](http://baby.pirthday.com/) 8 days until the perfect creation date for your ultimate pi-baby (born 3/14/15).

Other essential services are: your age in pi ([http://pirthday.com/](http://pirthday.com/)) or seeing who has his pirthday today ([http://happy.pirthday.com/](http://happy.pirthday.com/)). Disclaimer: Logo has been created by a friend (@turboele), other stuff by me.

</comment><comment><USER9> Interesting idea. Actually, just thinking, could be used for a pseudo-crypto app. Just send a series of origin numbers [n1,n2,n3...] and this translates to [pos1,pos2,pos3...] series of numbers. You can use also instead of Pi any other transcendental/irrational number [0].

[0] [http://www.numberworld.org/digits/](http://www.numberworld.org/digits/)

</comment><comment><USER10> So if I take the latest Lady Gaga mp3 and look at the stream of bytes, and if I can find that identical stream of digits in the digits of Pi, does Lady Gaga (or her record company) "own" that portion of Pi? If yes, then WTF!?!? If no, why not, and what does this mean for the idea of copyright, anyway?

<comment><USER11> Copyright restricts copying, it doesn't restrict similar, or even identical, expressions that are independently generated (a jury may see similarity as evidence of copying, so merely the theoretical possibility that a similar work was independently arrived at doesn't get you a free pass from liability, but similarity itself isn't restricted by copyright.)

So, no, the fact that a sequence of bytes occurs in a particular digital recording doesn't mean that the copyright owner of that recording "owns" that series of bytes. It means they own a specified set of rights _in that particular recording_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> > If, on the other hand, you act like a computer geek and use zero based > indexing, then you get these numbers: 6, 27, 13598, 43611, 24643510

Heh, it says "act like a computer geek" and the numbers are not even in binary? :)

</comment><comment><USER13> I wonder if there is not a bug in the decompress program:

      for (i = 0; i < FILE_SIZE; i++) {
        printf("%d%d", (buf[i]&0xf0)>>4, buf[i] & 0xf);
      }

Shouldn't this be >>8 ?

<comment><USER14> No, it's extracting the upper 4 bits of the byte, not the upper 8 bits of a 16-bit quantity.

<comment><USER6> This is actually a quite standard number format. Real computers like the 6502 [http://www.6502.org/tutorials/decimal_mode.html](http://www.6502.org/tutorials/decimal_mode.html) and the IBM zSeries have harware support for that encoding [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary- coded_decimal#Packed_BCD](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary- coded_decimal#Packed_BCD) and there are decoder chips like the 74LS48 that directly translate these nibbles to 7-segment display numbers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> at what index does the ascii encoding of the entire works of Shakespeare begin?

<comment><USER16> I could write the index number here, but it would probably be about as long as the entire works of Shakespeare.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Well mine isn't within the first 50 million. In any case, what's the relevance of this? Everything (with the correct encoding scheme) can be expressed somewhere in the decimal expansion of Pi.

<comment><USER7> Without "(with the correct encoding scheme)" this is not a proven fact, i.e. it is not known whether Pi is a normal number [1].

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_number](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_number)

<comment><USER17> Even if it weren't a normal number it would still be true.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Super Hacker News adds one page browsing & keyboard navigation to HN - <AUTHOR>

HN has been a destination on the Web for me recently, but I've had trouble really _getting into_ it. I realized that was because there wasn't an intuitive way for me to browse through articles, comments and authors.
I started working on a GreaseMonkey script for myself and, as I got into it, decided I would share it with others who may be interested.
SuperHN keeps everything on one page and adds keyboard navigation. 'W' and 'S' browse through articles, 'A' and 'D' cycles through an article, its comments and poster. It also makes the front page a bit more readable.
You can get Super Hacker News at http://superhackernews.com
Would love all of your feedback!
Note: It only seems to be working in Firefox right now; I haven't found a suitable way to load jQuery in Chrome. Any thoughts? <comment><AUTHOR> Clickable link: <http://superhackernews.com>

</comment><comment><USER2> I'm loving your plugin. I like how I can just use keyboard navigation now!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, glad you like it!</comment></comment>


Tesla Surges Above $500, Leaving Analyst Targets in the Dust - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-13/tesla-analysts-play-catch-up-as-shares-leave-targets-in-dust <comment><USER2> According to Robinhood: "Tesla's stock has jumped 35% over the past month, becoming the most valuable American car company ever. GM and Ford produced a combined 39x as many cars as Tesla did in 2019, but the electric carmaker is now more valuable than GM and Ford combined. Oh, and Tesla lost almost a billion dollars over the past year while GM and Ford made over $10B in profit. Investors care more about future profits, and they think Tesla's e-cars are the future."

I still don't get it. You may think it's the future, but to justify such a valuation over all other car companies which have been operating for years, and who can compete with Tesla, it seems a little extreme IMO.

EDIT: after reading some comments it seems my conclusions might be inaccurate. All I wanted to point out was that the numbers were shocking at first sight.

<comment><USER3> Here's what you're missing... Most of the major automakers: Ford, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Mazda, etc do not have viable business models in the near future. They are so far behind in sustainable transportation its only a matter of time until they lose their economies of scale and are no longer viable businesses. It's an "Iphone moment"... the other car companies have great "flip phones" right now.

<comment><USER4> iPhones did not need a charging network. They did not have any disadvantages besides the high price, which made them even more desirable. But I just do not see average people who live in condos buy an EV anytime soon.

<comment><USER5> > They did not have any disadvantages besides the high price

iPhones couldn't run Flash (which powered all of the interactive content on the internet at the time), couldn't send MMS (which was the way everyone shared photos at the time) or run apps (which was how feature phones added functionality at the time).

"Why on Earth would anyone want one of those!?" was a pretty common reaction, yet they still sold like hotcakes. In the case of Flash and MMS, the whole mobile internet changed to suit the iPhone. In the case of apps, Steve Jobs finally relented, leading to the single biggest software marketplace in the world.

<comment><USER6> > "Why on Earth would anyone want one of those!?"

That reaction really only came from makers of competing phones. (RIM execs famously refused to believe the battery life was possible, Balmer threw very unconvincing dismissals.)

Everyone else was standing in line to buy one.

<comment><USER7> I think this is hindsight talking.

I remember thinking (and hearing):

'Way too expensive'

'I want a tactile keyboard'

'Nice, but I don't need one'

and so on.

<comment><USER8> The only commonwealthidespread complaint was about the lack of 3G and copy/paste.

However, the overwhelming response to the iPhone was extremely positive. Even from non Apple sources.

RIM didn't think the iPhone was possible when it was first released. Google instantly changed the direction of their Android project when the iPhone was released.

<comment><USER9> > _The only commonwealthidespread complaint_

Maybe also complaints about bad autocompletion?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I have an inkling that Tesla has now gained _long-term credibility_ , and we're on the cusp of seeing much broader adoption by _a mass of non-early adopters_ \-- people who will evaluate buying a Tesla the same way they would evaluate any other brand, based on boring criteria like long-term quality, day-to-day reliability, service convenience, overall reputation, interior features, exterior design, and resale value. The stock market appears to be pricing this scenario.

Conversely, the worst-case scenario for Tesla as a business, at this juncture, may be that it finds itself unable to remain financially sustainable over time... and ends up getting acquired by another car marker salivating over the prospects of getting its hands on the company's technology and infrastructure.

PS. I write this as someone who has purchased and owned multiple luxury European vehicles (mainly BMW and Mercedes) for the past 20+ years; for the first time, I'm seriously considering switching over to a Tesla when I replace my current vehicle.

</comment><comment><USER11> How do Tesla owners feel about the quality of their cars? I'm genuinely curious.

This is merely an anecdote, but in my experience it seems like the overall quality of similarly priced automobiles from more traditional luxury carmakers is much higher. The only significant advantage of the Tesla is the fact that it's 100% electric.

Also, this is merely a subjective personal preference, but I just don't like the style of Teslas very much. The lack something, and the style has a cheapness to it.

With that said, TSLA has been helping my portfolio, so I appreciate that.

<comment><USER12> It was -5C in Toronto last night. This morning, I couldn't get into my Model 3 because the door glass was frozen. I got some hot water from the washroom and poured it over the glass and got it unstuck. Then I couldn't drive because the sideview mirrors were stuck folded. Got some more hot water and got them unstuck. Maybe the car is designed for California weather only, but in the winter i've had these types of issues. Other than that, its a joy to drive :)

<comment><USER13> Tesla's were designed to function from Norway to DRC; here's an interesting design question:

How do you keep the heater from decreasing your range too greatly in cold environments? No passive heat source on EVs.

<comment><USER14> I'm joking but.. This Citroen has the answer! A petrol powered heater

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Berlingo_%C3%A9...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Berlingo_%C3%A9lectrique)

" _Heating_

In order to minimise battery usage, a petrol driven heater is fully integrated to vehicle. It typically takes 5 to 10 minutes to warm and provides excellent cabin heating."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've been a big Tesla fan for a while now.

Certainly a big part of me is happy, perhaps even a bit smug, to see the share price so high.

Even though I'm pretty sure electric vehicles are the future, and that Tesla has, at a minimum, brought that future closer to the now, I still think its share price is borderline insane, and, in the end, doesn't serve the company or the vision as well as a more moderate, stable price.

I also acknowledge that its CEO has not only not taken reasonable steps to 'calm things down', but has done the opposite.

Having said all that, I could be wrong, and perhaps Tesla's sales are substantially driven by all of this crazy energy, positive and negative.

</comment><comment><USER16> The correction will be precipitous. There is no reason to believe that even at the 1M vehicle level, they can be so profitable, when engaged with direct competition with other experienced producers, to justify such a market capitalization. The same cost issues will affect all companies, and I believe some Tesla technical advantages will erode.

<comment><USER17> Agree. Their customers are those who are making bank on the bull market run we've been riding. If the market should fall, Tesla will fall hardest.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> For a while TSLA had an absurd amount of short positions against it, IIRC something like an order of magnitude more than other companies. Perhaps we are seeing a short squeeze? I'd love to see data (and interpretation) on how this has changed.

<comment><USER19> You can't fight meme magic. Old skool investors don't understand this yet. They see Elon smoking pot and they short. They see him dancing, they short again. They see his bumbling presentation skills and smashed CyberTruck windows, have a laugh and put one more billion against him. And then they open his twitter and you can imagine what they do when they see him posting absolute units of a sheep...

[https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/elon-musk-tesla-stock- short-s...](https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/elon-musk-tesla-stock-short- sellers/)

<comment><USER20> I feel this is a very small part of it. There are many legitimate reasons to short Tesla, including execution problems, car maintenance support, increasing competition, their poor self-driving software. And it could go on and on. Tesla, lets face it, is a cult stock. If you believe in the valuation, that's fine, but there have been plenty of bubbles over the years and especially recently (bitcoin and weedstocks come to mind), and Tesla would not be the first item driven to loft valuations based on unrealistic expectations.

<comment><USER21> > There are many legitimate reasons to short Tesla, including execution > problems, car maintenance support, increasing competition, their poor self- > driving software.

The problem is that those issues are exaggerated for Tesla and understated for other makes. This leads to weird volatility with Tesla, IMO, and I think this latest exaggerated surge to a high valuation is a part of that.

Execution problems? You mean like the delayed VW ID.3? These problems happen all the time. Reliability issues... hmm Ford had major transmission problems on the Focus, Honda had transmission problems on the Accord a few years back and Nissan has struggled with CVT issues for years. But these don't make the press all that much, because they are boring.

But Cybertrucks and an occasional battery fire? Those are front page news, and each creates wild exaggerated swings.

Overall the extra attention helps Tesla, of course.

<comment><USER20> > The problem is that those issues are exaggerated for Tesla and understated > for other makes

Execution problems doesn't mean bad cars, it means not delivering on margins, deliveries, ect. No one is saying Telsa is not a good company. They are saying that its not worth more than GM and Ford combined. I remember when I was investing in weedstocks when Canopy (who made no money) passed in valuation one of the largest banks in Canada who had a net income of like $11 billion. This feels the same way to me. Telsa's market cap is close to $100 billion.

Tesla delivered ~1 million cars. It sells a very specialty product (luxury cars) to people who have the money and ability purchase and maintain such a car. Its a very niche product. GM on the other hand sold over 3 million cars in just China, and it has BETTER self driving tech than Telsa. Aside from that, there are a lot of people for whom a Telsa is just offlimits (such as people like myself who live in urban apartments), or people who don't have the money (such as most of the America and the world). Its not an $1k iPhone its a 40k luxury vehicle.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> In the US, what sells the most (sadly) are pickup trucks and SUVs. The numbers aren't even close. The big automakers here know this, and have tailored their product lines accordingly. Ford is basically kept afloat singularly by F-series pickup sales, and have cancelled many sedans entirely. They have an entire range of different sized trucks and SUVs for every market segment. Same with Chevrolet. Now pan over to Tesla. Tesla has one single SUV offering, and sales of that SUV are dismal. They just teased a pickup truck release with their 'cybertruck' product, but the design was purposely off-putting, and it only served to make a mockery of the market segment. So with one SUV that doesn't sell, and a parody of what is currently the highest selling platform in the US, I'm not sure why anyone speculates Tesla is in a place of upward trajectory. I don't buy the argument that other car companies can't/won't pivot to counter either. Porsche reverse engineered one of their Model S vehicles, admitted it was quite well-constructed, and then countered with the Taycan (by all reviews a better car) a mere 3-4 years later. I'm glad a company like Tesla exists to force the market to the EV concept, but most people will buy an EV when they know it's supported by a long established and trusted automaker like Toyota, Ford, Chevy, or Honda. Tesla then exists as a proof-of-concept model for the bigger players to follow, not as a displacement.

It should also be noted, many motor companies are also investing quite a bit of money into alternative fuels like synthetic petrol and hydrogen, and don't want to rely on an energy source which is primarily derived from conflict zones. They aren't 100% sold yet that the EV platform is indeed the way forward.

<comment><USER23> People have been saying this for years. However, none of the other players have built a compelling product with widespread appeal or adoption. The E-Tron? iPace? Taycan? All have been more or less dead on arrival from an adoption and sales standpoint.

Honda announced recently that they will be focusing on hybrid technology, not full electric. Toyota is backing their Hydrogen Fuel Cell technology. GM has the Bolt, a single full-electric offering. The Model 3 doesn't really have any meaningful competition at the moment IMO. Tesla has forced the industry to change and from where I'm standing no competing product has managed to holistically match the value proposition Tesla brings.

<comment><USER22> "As it turns out, through October 2019, Audi has sold about 17,500 e-Trons globally, compared to about 21,600 for the Tesla."[1]

"With clients able to register their interest, Porsche has collected almost as many pre-orders as they plan to produce electric vehicles. The Handelsblatt quotes Porsches HR Director Andreas Haffner on the status of registrations to order the manufacturer's first electric model. Says Haffner: 'There are 30,000 orders for the Taycan.'"[2]

Right, clearly all DOA. The model 3 has no competition because the major auto manufacturers are moving away from the sedan platform entirely to SUVs and trucks. It fills a small market niche, but one that's quickly slowing as a percentage of total vehicle sales.

> However, none of the other players have built a compelling product with > widespread appeal or adoption

Neither has Tesla if we're honest.

[1] [https://www.forbes.com/sites/samabuelsamid/2019/11/29/audi-w...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/samabuelsamid/2019/11/29/audi- works-to-recover-from-shaky-ev-launch/#3289203b46b0)

[2] [https://www.electrive.com/2019/07/29/porsche-reveals- number-...](https://www.electrive.com/2019/07/29/porsche-reveals-number-of- pre-orders-for-taycan-ev/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Technology sharing is very important to the modern car industry. Cars are incredibly complicated and if you follow news in the industry, in many cases brands will make technology sharing agreements so that they aren't duplicating efforts.

That's where Tesla is well-positioned for the future compared to Ford and GM. They have a whole platform and a battery manufacturing facility where other car brands may become Tesla customers in the future. Disregarding things like build quality or fit and finish, my understanding is that Tesla's battery platform and powertrain is the industry leader.

If investors think that gas cars will essentially be irrelevant 20 years, I could see why Tesla is so valuable.

<comment><USER20> The irony is that its actually not that well positioned in autonomous driving, which could be the only thing that could really driving the incredibly valuations it has now. GM, for instance, by most reports is significantly ahead of Telsa.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> The horror stories about 3 month wait for parts and the videos of water intruding into new vehicles, are keeping me away.

<comment><USER26> so i have an x and when it rains we do sometimes get some water into the back seat when raising the trunk... but to keep this in perspective... the car is like an iphone compared to your flip phone. 2007 was a long time ago so maybe people forget just how impactful that phone was when people first tried it out. That is the exact same experience I have had when first owning and S and now an X. A minor issue like water when raising the trunk on an exceptionally rainy day is just that minor when you compare it to the amazing feeling you get when the over the air update alert hits your phone and you start to wonder whether you'll get the latest update to detect stop signs. Or as I recall in 2014 - an audio up/down control near the passenger seat. Imagine if you were annoyed at the UI in your current car. With all of it's physical buttons that is it. You have no luck unless you buy a different car. In a Tesla if the UI is an issue they'll push an update and you'll have a new car without buying one. Let alone the buying experience of a Tesla vs anything else. Go online swipe your credit card... wait sometime and show up at a Tesla store and drive away with your car or they deliver it to your house. No haggling, no sleazy car salesman just a new car that gives you that feeling of an iphone in 2007 vs the old flip phone.... I am sure i sound like a fan boy... and I know my wife wishes i'd stop talking about it but it's pretty freaking worth it and nice.

<comment><USER27> I'll weigh in on the curmudgeon side. The knobs in my car were perfect from the day I bought it because they were optimized by engineers over decades. If there was ever a UI issue, it was corrected before I was born. Because the controls are physical I can operate them by touch and habit while focusing on the road. Years of driving have resulted in mental circuits that automatically detect stop signs and manage lane-keeping with zero conscious attention, just as easy as walking.

No-haggle direct manufacturer purchases are good, though. I can only agree with that.

<comment><USER28> > Years of driving have resulted in mental circuits that automatically detect > stop signs and manage lane-keeping with zero conscious attention, just as > easy as walking

I thought the same thing when I had an S a few years back. This was just the adaptive cruise control + lane holding days, and I figured it'd be nice for sure but not game changing.

I was entirely wrong. Sure, driving without AP on wasn't hard, but turning AP on made road trips and commuting 1000x more pleasant for me. Driving without AP may be habitual and ingrained, but it still occupies a certain amount of mental capacity to hold the line.

Being freed from that wasn't just about getting more time to look at scenery, either. With fewer brain cycles spent on mechanically maneuvering the car, I could spend those cycles better monitoring other vehicles for potential hazards (crazy drivers, etc.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I wonder what NYU prof Scott Galloway thinks of this given his Oct 2019 prediction that Tesla will lose 80% of its value.

<comment><USER30> he's like a modern social-media-native version of jim cramer

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Anyone remember Volkswagen shares at 1000€ in October 2008? This was a textbook example of a shortsqueeze. One German billionaire saw that the share value was at a ridiculous high level, so he shorted it. He was correct, but too early, so he lost all his money and committed suicide.

[https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2018/10/31/1540962002000/The- day...](https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2018/10/31/1540962002000/The-day- Volkswagen-briefly-conquered-the-world/)

<comment><USER31> "markets can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent"

<comment><USER4> That's what I told a friend last summer when he talked about Tesla being the perfect short opportunity. Tesla stock is an extremely hot iron. You can tell by the huge daily swings that it is being played in some way, and as an amateur you are usually the one paying the pros in these scenarios.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Just to provide some context, most indexes and large tech companies are at an all-time-high. It's not just Tesla 'doing great'.

<comment><USER33> Uh Tesla was ___$180_ __six months ago. That 's a 185% gain. Far more than the S&P. Few large cap companies have gained that much in such a short amount of time.

Don't rain on the Tesla parade. Or discount the price movement as "in line".

<comment><USER32> Sure, but you're kind of cherry-picking, as it was $300+ in January. Tesla has always been more volatile than peer tech stocks, having crashed about 40% before this surge.

<comment><USER33> Either way it's a story about the short term spike since roughly a month ago. The price movement is not in line with the broader market or all tech stocks. It's well above it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> How close are they to figuring out how to handle holding a battery charge in colder temperatures? A few owners around here I've spoken with have said they are experiencing nearly half the mileage this winter season and it's been a struggle for longer daily commutes. They also need to preheat the battery and some have resorted to using another vehicle.

Been on the fence for a while and since we operate with one car that would troublesome.

<comment><USER35> This is a big reason I avoided a Tesla this time around. If you live in Colorado and ski, you'll not only often be parking your car in extremely cold temperatures overnight, but also know that blockages on I-70 during sub- freezing temperatures are relatively common, and those blockages can add anywhere from half an hour to 6 hours to a commute. There's already a high enough risk that the battery range will be reduced in that weather, that my destination won't have a fast-charger, and that I won't be able to fully charge the vehicle overnight; but, the risk of me being unable to start the car on the highway in that weather were too much for it to be a useful option.

To be fair, Tesla is much more of a viable to me than any other EV, but as someone who works from home and only uses their car for excursions rather than daily commuting, it's not for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> While this is great for a variety of reasons... I'm lamenting on the cybrtrck. Initially after the release I was kinda excited. Lately I have been wishing it just looked like a regular truck and did things that regular trucks can do - especially since I'm big on RVs: Cab over (fuck out of luck there). Fifth wheel? (Bed is probably not standard and probably no one will have the knowledge of putting in the rails or a puck system.

In other words we're looking at best travel trailers. I'm also sceptical they're going to the enough standard tow package equipment. I just have this feeling that no one that works at Tesla owns trucks and tows things. (And when I say no one, I just feel like if 10% of the staff owns a dually that's not enough).

If they don't put up a standard compete like Rivian, they're going to lose HUGE in this category.

One last secondary gripe here - they keep saying it has more utility than a regular truck but here I am pointing out all the things it can't do that a typical truck can. Beyond that, can you even ATTACH a snow plow?

<comment><USER30> thats not how you ship a v1

what is it about cars that make all software engineers turn into junior product managers.

<comment><USER36> It would seem that all the other EV pickup startups in this space are thinking about what regular trucks do first.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> A lot comes down to whether the market views Tesla as a car company, or a technology company. The pessimistic view is that they're a car company and the valuation makes no sense compared to GM, Toyota, or VW. The optimistic view is that they're a technology company that — if they manage to stay alive — will produce value from both their core offering and the edges of their business, much the way Amazon has with AWS, or Apple is doing in Services.

Personally, I own a nominal number of shares and root for their success. But at the end of the day, it's a Random Walk on Wall Street and predictions (good or bad) are largely speculation.

</comment><comment><USER38> Believe people are betting on its future. (Shanghai Mega-Factory seems doing pretty smoothly is probably one of the factor as well)

</comment><comment><USER39> Plainsite recently published a 100-page report summarizing all the key findings from the tesla short or $TESLAQ community... some of the allegations around corporate governance, self-dealing, and outright lies are pretty damning if true:

[https://www.plainsite.org/realitycheck/tesla.html](https://www.plainsite.org/realitycheck/tesla.html)

Not endorsing their findings, merely saying it's an interesting read to understand the other side. Its allegations are well referenced with sources.

</comment><comment><USER33> Does anyone else feel like HN is somewhat ironically a highly risk adverse community? (I say ironically because you'd think a community of those working in new tech would be more risk seeking than your average person)

Seems like every time an individual stock is brought up there's 10 people claiming you're "gambling" with a disproportional amount of risk if you do anything but buy the index for every person that dares buy a company stock.

</comment><comment><USER40> The comments here seem to be lacking one perspective: Global climate change is going to force governments to ban the sale of internal combustion engines for consumer use. The markets are pricing in the expected regulations, which is why Tesla is getting such a premium since they are the most mature in the coming regulatory environment.

</comment><comment><USER41> I don't think anyone has a sustainable business model right now for the root cause ( climate change).

Although Tesla seems to be the best option right now. I think the future will be a combination of electric bikes and greatly improved public transportation + reduced cost price.

An electric car is still too resource heavy too make.

I know a lot of people here who won't agree with me. But I'm pretty sure that they don't live in the Netherlands or Belgium ( where a lot of people cycle) or that this alternative is not viable there ( too cold or too wide).

I also didn't say it was a perfect solution for all ( ev. The edge cases I gave here) and that people will easily adjust when they don't have the habit of cycling ( eg. No adjusted roads)

</comment><comment><USER33> Really incredible. I remember when it was trading at $18.

</comment><comment><USER42> My gut feeling is that this is a short spike because of all the people who wants to take a bite at rising stock price. At some point people will realize that this is a ridiculous amount of money for a share of a company which is yet to prove that the company is massively profitable. When the price collapse, it will be a steep down curve.

<comment><USER43> My take as well. At the end of 2019 the financial spam changed from "TESLA IS SINKING! SELL!" to "TESLA IS AWESOME! BUY!".

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> I think this highlights the value of the brand, the tangible counterpart of "hype". What the sceptics call starry-eyed fundamentalism is a valuable revenue stream, for whatever reason. Tesla successfully created a story of being the only cool kid in a room full of dinosaurs.

All other points good too, but didn't see this mentioned.

</comment><comment><USER45> I sold my car and now drive one of those Zebra mopeds in SD. Next time I buy a car, it will be electric.

</comment><comment><USER46> Enron looked great, right before it didn't. House prices will only continue to rise. All it takes is one drop of blood.

Maybe that will be Tesla's fate, maybe it won't but it's naive to think that can't happen.

</comment><comment><USER47> [https://www.economist.com/media/pdf/this-time-is- different-r...](https://www.economist.com/media/pdf/this-time-is-different- reinhart-e.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER48> Here is another possibility: [https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/CCMP:IND](https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/CCMP:IND)

The whole market was up 25-30% (Nasdaq). Now, as a trader, you know that there are companies that follow the market return, or accentuate it (from both directions).

TSLA being a tech company meant that you got better returns (50%) which are not too far from the Nasdaq returns. Apple returns were even crazier for a company its size: +100%!

tl;dr: We are in a bull-market.

</comment><comment><USER49> Can't read the article but I'm thinking maybe they don't need to worry about convertible bonds anymore?

</comment><comment><USER50> opening up business in china does a funny thing to a stock, wall street loves china

<comment><USER51> Er no. It was the fact that the govt gave the Tusk ~$2bn of free money (and when the money was running out i.e. it really changed the narrative around the stock).

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> California law as of Jan 1 requires all new houses to have solar panels, EV charging port, no natural gas allowed. This 100% electric future being forced is attractive to Wall Street as it forces change, despite adding ~300k to the house price. Wall Street bares no relation to the street where cars are powered by gasoline or diesel with few exceptions. It takes 75 minutes to charge a Tesla EV, much longer in cold climates (I have a Tesla owning acquaintance in Denver who confirms this). We are n a giant stock market bubble. Tesla is a good example if this aspirational earnings exuberance IMO

<comment><USER53> There is no way this adds 300K to the price of a house, and it does not take 75 minutes to charge a Tesla, more like 15-30 minutes at a supercharger depending on your state of charge. Stop the FUD.

<comment><USER52> Supercharger technology

Tesla logo at Supercharger station Tesla supercharging stations charge with up to 150 kW of power distributed between two cars with a maximum of 150[13][14] kW per car, depending on version.[15][6][16] They take about 20 minutes to charge to 50%, 40 minutes to charge to 80%, and 75 minutes to 100% on the original 85 kWh Model S. The charging stations provide high-power direct- current (DC) charging power directly to the battery, bypassing the internal charging power supply.[1] The next version of Supercharging was expected to charge with more than 350 kW.[17][18]

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

<comment><USER53> 1\. You will never be at 0% when you hit the supercharger.

2\. You don't necessarily need to charge up to 100%

3\. Supercharger V3 can reach 250KW, and the Tesla Model 3 supports this. The next gen Model S will as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> Current valuations, Tesla and Apple among the most prominent, are so far disconnected from reality that it echoes the dot com bubble. But this time, the cause is not dot com mania -- but buybacks, driven by reckless financial policy.

[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ENmRB6aVAAEziTn?format=jpg&name=...](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ENmRB6aVAAEziTn?format=jpg&name=900x900)

</comment><comment><USER55> As is the case with Apple, Tesla is a cult and obviously Musk learned from Steve Jobs that cults beat facts, cults create empires and make bad as equal as good and sane people can do nothing about it. That's how the great empires and religions were built in the old days and that's how "great" companies are being built today.

<comment><USER56> Or: it's just the only company that makes a compelling product line for the biggest global market (energy and auto) while the rest of the industry keep selling fossil fuel and internal combustion engines, both of which are destroying our habitat an ever faster pace.

The cult is believing we can keep marketing ICE cars and pumping CO2 in the atmosphere and still expect to make money. [https://i.redd.it/xobkagxotot01.jpg](https://i.redd.it/xobkagxotot01.jpg)

The market cap of TSLA remains tiny compared to trillions $ of stranded assets of the oil and ICE industry.</comment></comment>


Blue Apron Plummets After Amazon Files for Meal-Kit Trademark - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-17/blue-apron-plummets-after-amazon-files-for-meal-kit-trademark <comment><USER2> Please Amazon, do something different about the _huge_ amount of material waste generated by companies like Blue Apron and Hello Fresh. This is the main reason why I stopped using these services, the footprint is just disgusting: plastic bags inside aluminum+plastic bags inside cardboard boxes with more plastic. Please, invent some form of reusable container that can be easily stored and delivered back so we can stop trashing the Earth.

<comment><USER3> Amazon needs to do this with their regular shipments as well. They contain a lot of plastic insulation (air bags). Instead of throwing mine away, I've been saving it until it fills up a closet then I give it to a local UPS store to reuse. My closet fills up in about a month. It would be nice if Amazon had a formal program for this since you can't recycle them with your garbage company.

<comment><USER4> The problem is, if you want to cheaply ship cheap stuff quickly, you need to reduce costs. So no time to have your packers pick from 20 sizes of boxes; just toss everything in a huge box. No time to handle returns of broken shipments; just stuff those huge boxes with tons of air bags. No time to actually check what's in the boxes (towels or a vase) because you need to pack 200 boxes an hour to break even.

If "we" want to stop trashing the world, first we need to show we are willing to pay for that.

<comment><USER5> > If "we" want to stop trashing the world, first we need to show we are > willing to pay for that.

This is the typical supply-side dodge. Consumers have little to no power here. I can't dictate to Amazon or major shipping companies (I do buy AMZN's frustration-free when I can).

What option is there? Do you propose I compete with the packaging with my own offering?

<comment><USER6> Wouldn't this paraphrase as "I have no power, so I will continue financially supporting them." ?

Consumers blame suppliers, suppliers blame consumers. No one has to do anything. Long live the status quo! :)

<comment><USER5> > suppliers blame consumers

That's the dodge right there. Easy as a supplier to simply say "we provide what the consumer wants" to justify all business decisions. Courage, that is.

This is normally where the government or watchdog organizations get involved - those have been gutted or defanged in the past few decades... by business interest group lobbying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> An article called "The Slow-Motion Trainwreck Facing the Meal-Kit Industry" relates how the meal-kit industry faces the same problem(s) as Groupon:

 _" The problem Groupon faced was that their initial success validated a model that anyone could copy, and everyone who copied it increased both Groupon's cost of customer acquisition and its churn rate."_

[https://medium.com/@byrnehobart/the-slow-motion- trainwreck-f...](https://medium.com/@byrnehobart/the-slow-motion-trainwreck- facing-the-meal-kit-industry-345f14df45ad)

<comment><USER8> Wait, isn't this how capitalism works? Can someone explain what I'm missing here?

<comment><USER9> Yes, ideally in a competitive market for something that is a "commodity" type of good, profits fall to (near) zero. Not what VC investors are looking for.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It would be a great fit given that the main challenge is logistics which Amazon is already a leader in. With Amazon Fresh they even have the ability to pick up the previous week's boxes and cold packs (along with delivering the rest of your groceries at the same time!).

Blue Apron spends a fortune acquiring new customers, possibly up to $460 per sign up as of recently [1]. I bet the percentage of Blue Apron subscribers that are also Prime members is amazingly high. Amazon doesn't have to pay a dollar to advertise to these people, let alone $460.

[1] [https://www.recode.net/2017/6/1/15727182/blue-apron- ipo-s1-a...](https://www.recode.net/2017/6/1/15727182/blue-apron- ipo-s1-analysis-customer-acquisition-marketing-churn)

<comment><USER11> And possibly the ace in the hole, the Whole Foods aquisition. Local distribution centers via the whole foods stores, with fresh foods, even with premade foods if you wish. Could ultimately be a blue apron/munchery hybrid.

Their advantage would of course be their world class distribution/fulfillment tech, but also the fact that the costs of the food parts are mostly sunk already into the Whole Foods biz.

<comment><USER12> I agree. The munchery/whole-foods combo is the ace here.

They only need to figure out meals that last 7 days (chilled) with natural ingredients only, but since freshly(acquired by nestle) did it, it's possible.

Or maybe there's some patent here, and it's really hard to achieve otherwise, and that's why nestle bought them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've tried a few meal kit companies (blue apron and hello fresh) and I was underwhelmed by the product and the service.

Whole Foods ingredients + Amazon delivery = game over for most of these meal kit companies.

They would be able to provide users added levels of customization and probably same day or next day delivery whereas with most meal kit companies, you have to lock in your menu for the week the prior week, which is inconvenient if plans change.

Ultimately, I'm excited about this move as I shop at whole foods regularly and look forward to the ease of delivery that Amazon provides.

I wonder where Amazon will target next; they've already targeted grocery and meal kit delivery and revealed plans to compete with Zillow and Redfin this week in real estate. Which industry is next?

</comment><comment><USER14> As someone who has used and enjoyed meal kits (Good Eggs, not Blue Apron), I don't think this is a slam dunk for Amazon. Meal kits are a lot more than recipes and portioning.

I have 2 small kids so meal planning is hard to do consistently. I can whip up a chicken breast and veggie, but what I get from Good Eggs is seasonal recipes and fresh produce sourced directly from local farmers PLUS prepared elements including marinated meat and sauces.

So when I cook a meal kit I'm getting a much better meal (more like a dinner party meal) for about the same effort as a barebones meal I would make otherwise.

I have used Instacart and bought prepared stuff from Whole Foods, and there just isn't a comparison. In SF, I often get or see old/bruised produce in Whole Foods which used to be consistently good.

</comment><comment><USER15> This was bound to happen. A lot of financial analysts have been saying for a while that Blue Apron is a good idea that will be successful under different circumstances. Right now, Blue Apron's cost to attract and retain customers is astronomical and ripe for a competitor like Amazon to undercut.

<comment><USER16> ...especially with Apple's acquisition of Whole Foods.

<comment><USER17> Amazon, not Apple

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> As I have said before with Amazon eating Whole Foods meal kit companies that are not currently ramen profitable are toast. Ramen profitable companies would have to learn how to grow out of their cash flow.

No sane investor would be pumping money into them until they know what and how Amazon would be looking at this market.

I think over next few years we would see a total implosion of meal-kit industry with the exception being whoever operates Whole Foods on a national scale. On a regional level grocery stores and small grocery chains would offer the local meal kit service as for them the costs of expanding into that market locally is tiny.

<comment><USER19> > I think over next few years we would see a total implosion of meal-kit > industry

I don't think so. Meal kits are a niche business fighting against mass market competitors already so nothing changes with the Amazon entry.

If anything having an established player like amazon advertising meal kits increases market awareness and gets people interested.

No one is going to have a monopoly of the food business, ever. It just doesn't work that way.

<comment><USER20> > No one is going to have a monopoly of the food business, ever. It just > doesn't work that way.

[http://imgur.com/pnMMj](http://imgur.com/pnMMj)

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

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yum!_Brands](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yum!_Brands)

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

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

We aren't there yet, but the trend line is pretty clear.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIcE4OvnqAY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIcE4OvnqAY)

<comment><USER19> None of these companies is anywhere close to a monopoly on food.

Cargill might be big at 100B+ revenue (global) per year but US food expenditures are 1.5T+ per year, so even a company as huge as Cargill is capturing < 10% of the US market. Hardly a monopoly.

[https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food- expenditures.asp...](https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food- expenditures.aspx)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> This was heavily predicted around here, and seems like a natural direction for Amazon (with very little effort.)

It'll be interesting to see who else steps into this market. Hopefully there will be a focus on local pick ups to eliminate even more of the footprint.

Ideally we'd see something similar to the CSA shares where you get a rubbermaid bin once per week with everything packed in something similar to Mason jars (with an initial deposit to ensure people are playing along.)

This is a fantastic opportunity for local supermarkets and grocery stores to dedicate a section to 'What's for dinner?' \-- where all of the ingredients are grouped together with a small recipe card and a link to a video, or something along those lines.

</comment><comment><USER22> This is why Amazon purchased Whole Foods. I've been trying to get my regional WF competitor (New Season Market) to do these meal kits and have them delivered with Amazon Prime for the past 18 months. They could have killed this game and without all of the wasted packaging. I am going to continue to chip away at them.

<comment><USER23> New Seasons is great, there has been one in the progress of opening across from my office in Emeryville (East Bay - SF Bay Area) for the past year.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Honestly, WTF Bloomberg and their auto play videos.

<comment><USER25> uMatrix has been a blessing for me. Block everything until you need it. I'd rather have the web broken than let them do whatever they want.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Aren't meal-kits just plain expensive, compared to shopping at a local grocery store?

<comment><USER27> I don't think they are interested in competing on price, the value proposition is that they save you time, and the effort of meal planning. But they are pitching themselves as cheaper than eating out, and with at least the illusion the food is healthier (plus a pinch of the IKEA effect since you cooked it yourself).

<comment><USER28> I've used Blue Apron. They don't save any time at all. What I saved in shopping I lost in meal prep. I quickly went back to the prepped food at my local grocery store, which is also much cheaper.

People who really wish to trade money for time would just eat at restaurants.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Please use your local grocery store. I am 31, live in Manhattan and shop once a week for groceries. All these food startups are not solving any real problems, its Webvan all over again.

<comment><USER30> Not wanting to spend my precious time researching on the internet for a good recipe, going to the grocery store to pick up items for said recipe, and them prepping the ingredients before the cooking process even starts is a "real problem" that is very much solved by these services.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> This was inevitable. I wonder how Blue Apron is planning to compete.

</comment><comment><USER32> This seems unsavory to me (pun intended). Would the trademark take away Blue Apron's ability to operate?

<comment><USER33> It signals Amazon's entry into the market.

<comment><USER32> But no actual impact to Blue Apron, other then a 500lb gorilla wanting your lunch?

<comment><USER34> It indicates that a competitor Blue Apron can't hope to compete with is ready to compete. Amazon has everything to hit the ground running and more, and with everyone knowing Blue Apron is bleeding to get customers, it means that investors aren't going to be throwing money their way. With Echo being as popular as it is, it's a natural addition to the Echo Ecosystem; undoubtedly Alexa is about to become the world's best sous chef.

As has been pointed out, Blue Apron fails to mark its territory in any meaningful way and only had power from first movers advantage. That power is gone now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I am not fan of Blue Apron, but just ability to have this kind of stupid patents is clearly anti-business and would support any measure to get rid of those.

<comment><USER36> Amazon filed for a trademark, not a patent.

<comment><USER35> OK I see. Thanks.

Then however bad, it kind of is legitimate practice to put pressure on them. I need to read more carefully next time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> A meal kit from Amazon sounds gross.

<comment><USER38> Why?

<comment><USER39> Probably for the same reason I don't shop for groceries at Walmart.

Both brand images are associated with cheap crap. I don't want to eat cheap crap.

<comment><USER40> Since when does Amazon have an association like that?

<comment><USER39> Since their site was full of knock-offs and half of it ships from China? Every time I shop on Amazon, I have to cross-reference with like 8 different sites to make sure I'm ordering the right thing and that the price is fair.

<comment> erik-g You don't _have_ to shop on Amazon. But I feel like being a cognizant consumer is your own responsibility. By that I mean I don't have to cross-reference with 8 other sites, I feel like the prices are fair, and as best I can tell I have avoided buying cheap knockoff items. I hear this complaint a lot (here, especially) but have yet to see much evidence of that.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>