YouTube marketing horror story - <AUTHOR> https://www.candyjapan.com/behind-the-scenes/youtube-marketing-horror-story <comment><USER2> This is because there is no process. Marketing (and advertising) is not an art. You need to know what your product is, who the buyer is, and the most efficient way to connect them together.

Less than 3,000 views across tiny channels with seemingly random creators, topics and locations? This is a waste of time and money.

Figure out who the buyer is first. Clearly there must be a certain disposable income level. What region buys the most? The USA? Europe? Asia? What are your customers interested in? Is it about Japan, or is it candy? Is it novelty gifts? Is it seasonal? Are there tie-ins to anime or music or some other Japanese export or culture? How big can the market even get and how do you know if you've hit saturation? These things need to be answered so you have a grid of interests and can focus on the most relevant audience.

Once you have that, _only then_ can you actually come up with a plan to best reach them. Don't just send things out without a target audience. The advertising channel you pick (whether Youtube or not) is a function of your message, and almost every "viral" hit is either a game of chance (which you will lose) or much more orchestrated than you know. 99% of influencer marketing is useless and you do not have anywhere near the scale to break through it by force.

At the very least, try and talk to some (consumer product) marketers, there's plenty of advice you can get by just asking nicely, or even pay for a small strategy session. That will have far better ROI than this.

<comment><USER3> What are your thoughts on them getting featured on a relevant Instagram page with high subscriber count.

What about trying to get to the top YouTube SEO for search terms, "candy [...] Japan", since his company is literally called that. If this feasible for a small budget?

I'm curious what it would take to pull off. Great insight, thanks for sharing.

<comment><USER4> Just because an IG has a high number of followers doesn't mean anything. I'm not an IG marketer, but there are metrics that you can check like engagement rates and even those can be faked.

I only specialize in Amazon marketing but if my process is applicable to Adwords/Facebook, the startup method would be small tests with tiny budgets. If the article writer had made a video ad or just used one of these unboxing videos and tested it on Facebook, he would have gotten immediate actionable data.

He should have a Facebook pixel installed on his website and should have collected data on traffic as well as information on those who converted. Turn the data that you have to work for you. In Facebook ads, you can create custom audiences based on value. In marketing, there are ideas of superconsumers or customer segmentation. Who are your best customers? Why? You don't have to reinvent the wheel if you already have data. Just look at the data that you have.

You can put the data you have to work on Facebook. If you don't understand your customer market but have existing customers, lucky for you, Facebook can tell you and help you find more of them via lookalike audiences.

If you don't have any existing data and you are starting from scratch, then you can create audiences on Facebook ads and test them. Or better, ID your competitors and analyze or target their customers. I'm not a pro at Fb ads so this might be outdated but the idea I'm familiar with is testing $5/day ads. $5 day ad will give you a lot of data on impressions, CTRs, CPC or impression, conversion, engagement, etc. So you can easily test multiple audiences or ads and get data and numbers. Once you crack the magical formula where your ad is successful and all the numbers add up (customer acquisition cost), you light the ad on fire by boosting the budget and scaling it. The explosive growth part. That's what I do for my Amazon clients. I ID the best strategy to success, find the magic formula by making sure all the numbers add up to their goal, and then when I find it, I pour gasoline on it and dance around the flames as the money rolls in.

That's the basic idea for Amazon ads and maybe Facebook ads. But I know Facebook ads are amazing because there are so many tips, tricks, tools, strategies you can implement. For example starting with a video, getting engagement first, then creating a new audience based on those who watched the video the longest, etc. I have also heard that Google Adwords has way more bells and whistles than Amazon ads too.

Other people mentioned some of his mistakes, another mistake he made was not having a brief and agreement. Influencer marketing is a lot more complicated than here's my product, please make a post or video about it. Most people include a brief for what exactly needs to be in their post or video. A special format with guidelines on style. Key points that need to be made, time line, etc.

<comment><USER3> As someone who knows little about marketing, thanks for sharing your process and insights. This is a really fascinating field and I can see why it is so valuable to invest in upfront for the success and growth of your business.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think the approach he took was too naive. I went to a meetup about "YouTube influencers" a few months ago who explained just this; there are companies whose sole purpose is to "vet" YouTubers and find you the right influencer for your product. They do all the heavy lifting for you, there's one pretty big one here locally called RoosterTeeth (yep they do influencer marketing nowadays amongst other stuff, if you watch h3h3 on YT they worked with him number of times).

The article was interesting nonethelss: the writer was transparent and laying down his assumptions and how they carried out the work AND the process. Executing a thing like this might be trivial but it requires a lot of annoying work, I know this by experience: even for simply sending a t-shirt to a customer (which is a simpler item is a pain).

Nowadays luckily you can send t-shirts or other apparel with a single click directly from the company that produces the item (there are a couple of names out there who will do that). BUT if you've got custom items or boxes of items (like in this scenario) you have to think about packaging, costs and the "unboxing experience", that last one is critical.

Unboxing experience can make or break the whole video.

I feel bad for the author who did so much work (180 attempts!?!) to get 17 videos and 0 sales and I suggest next time he goes to these specialists if he's really committed in using YT as a marketing chanenl.

<comment><USER6> Am I the only one that reads this and thinks how the future has become stupid?

The term "influencer" is such an eye roll to me.

<comment><USER7> Then what's a better word for it?

They aren't celebrities. They aren't just people with a following or a popular channel. They are specifically people with a following that are successful at converting sales.

Unless you have something interesting to say on the matter, I don't think this forum needs more "le wrong generation"[0] posts.

[0]: [https://old.reddit.com/r/lewronggeneration/](https://old.reddit.com/r/lewronggeneration/)

<comment><USER2> Artists, creators, chefs, bloggers, travel junkies, etc. Whatever it is that they actually _do_.

You do not just become an "influencer", instead you gain influence by way of gaining a following for doing (and being good at) something. The term is definitely overloaded and mostly pointless now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is nuts, he's still making the same obvious mistake.

Previous: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16461187](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16461187)

Relevant comment from that discussion:

 _" You targeted hardcore gamers, but you're not selling games. That's almost a complete non-sequitur. Your goal was to target people likely to purchase candy, or perhaps Japanese novelty items, via a mail subscription service. It doesn't appear that you made much effort if any to figure out what that audience looks like and how to reach it."_

It doesn't seem like much has changed, he's just hellbent on putting effort into advertising campaigns without first figuring out who the actual target audience is that might reasonably complete a purchase, and what the product's best sales message is.

I mean, have you considered the possibility that people who make cosplay videos and the people who watch them mostly care about _wearing costumes_ as their hobby, and that you might try targeting people who make videos about either _various types of candy_ or _various types of Japanese products_ because that's actually what your business sells?

<comment><USER9> Almost as if getting on the front page of HN with a story of a failed advertising method is it's own sort of advertising

<comment><USER8> I think you're probably right about that. But I bet he'd get just as much HN status and exposure with a post about how he figured it all out and nailed his ad strategy, so not sure that explains he whole story.

<comment><USER10> Well, they just got free marketing advice, so they can take that advice, succeed, and write another post on lessons learned for HN :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've experimented with influencer marketing before, mainly with Instagram Influencers for app downloads who would post a video I made for the app on their Instagram Stories, although the experience doesn't reflect paid candy subscriptions so it might not be as useful, this was also a small app I made on the side. I do remember getting 300 downloads from one influencer and the rest was negligible.

I figured out it was much easier to use young affluent females influencers from ages 18-25 who had 10000-15000 followers (not too much, as that dilutes the network and those who had too many followers were too expensive anyway) as they're usually super-connected in their network, "popular" and their followers (usually their friends, etc.) trust their opinions.

Interestingly, I didn't need to pay anything even though I didn't know these people, most were happy to just do it.

With Youtube, it would seem that only the big-name You-tubers are worth any kind of sponsorship. I find that influencer marketing is really about trust and credibility as your customer sales really come from trusting the influencer promoting the product and in turn also meeting that need the customer wanted too.

<comment><USER12> Would you like to link to the video?

> _I didn 't need to pay anything even though I didn't know these people, most > were happy to just do it._

Maybe they liked the video and/or the app itself, and that's why they wanted to show it to their followers? So I'm a bit curious about the video, maybe one can learn something from watching it (?).

<comment><USER11> This was a year ago, I can't find the video I used, it was also max 5-10 seconds. I remember I did the video by recording powerpoint slides, so I used phone or screen recording to record and then each slide of the powerpoint would move to the next one when I clicked or wanted animations. The powerpoint slides had pictures and texts. It was very amateur.

This was the app, I'm in Canada: [https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/lucid-see- who-likes-you/id12...](https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/lucid-see-who-likes- you/id1219887468?mt=8)

I contacted them through Instagram and explained my app and asked if they wanted to post the video for me. Some said yes. Some didn't. I think I also framed it as marketing experience for them too but I'm not too sure what I said exactly, I didn't really have any money at the time. Also some were friends of friends of friends and it wasn't as strange in asking them to post but I still didn't know these people.

I'm not as focussed on the app anymore and sometimes maintain it, I keep it more as a side project link for my resume.

Overall, you just need to be brave enough to message them, I was a bit shy and unsure at first and then afterwards I got used to it because it's easier to communicate online and it was the cheapest alternative I could think of.

<comment><USER12> Ok, thanks for the info :- ) I imagine they might have thought the app was a bit cool — to me, "anonymous chat with friends" sounds like something I'd be curious about trying out. Maybe one would get to hear some of one's friends private thoughts, which they now could share, when being anonymous? And maybe they wouldn't say weird and rude things (like often happens in anonymous forums, right) because they were one's friends? — So I slightly suspect the ones you reached out to, wanted to be the first ones, to tell their friends about this new and maybe cool thing.

<comment><USER11> Yea I based it on the popular and on the rise apps on the appstore which were like anon chat or live video chatting with strangers. Not sure why but they all have millions of downloads and they aren't reported as much in the media.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The only people willing to do an entire video for a free sample are people without a monetisable audience. The only people willing to do a video for free are people who are most interested in receiving free stuff. The key to influencer marketing is in the name. You must identify people who can influence your market, your goal is to use _their_ brand to add value to yours. Nike don't sponsor people who play for their local pub football team, they sponsor word class players.

I'm sure you'll find that almost every one of the YouTubers chosen for this experiment are churning out video after video of candy box samples they've received to an audience of nobody.

<comment><USER14> Nike sponsors plenty of unknown clubs. [https://www.nike.com/help/a/nikeinc- donation](https://www.nike.com/help/a/nikeinc-donation)

<comment><USER2> This is public good/PR policy ventures, not actually marketing driven.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> > _I also found that international package tracking often (24% of the time) > does not actually work, so it was impossible to be sure exactly how many > packages got delivered. I know for sure that 4 got returned back to me, and > that at least 33 arrived._

I think this part is weird, since the main part of his business is shipping packages internationally. Does the list of youtubers include too many from unusual countries?

<comment><AUTHOR> Here is one example of a case where tracking even to Florida just mysteriously stopped working: [https://trackings.post.japanpost.jp/services/srv/search/dire...](https://trackings.post.japanpost.jp/services/srv/search/direct?locale=en&reqCodeNo1=RR843939619JP)

"Item out for physical delivery" and then... nothing. Usually it should show "delivered" at the end.

Some countries were unusual such as Bahrain, but then the same thing would sometimes happen even for Canada or Norway.

<comment><USER16> Sometimes the local postal service tracking will give additional information that the source tracking doesn't give.

In the case above I would expect they they just didn't scan it when delivering. We get cases with USPS, usually with appartment buildings that they will leave packages in common spaces and they will be stolen. Although that would usually have a delivery scan.

<comment><USER17> USPS doesn't tell you much more in this case. It just ends at:

> August 20, 2018, 10:44 pm > Awaiting Delivery Scan > The delivery status of > your item has not been updated as of August 20, 2018, 10:44 pm. We apologize > that it may arrive later than expected.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> As a marketing analytics & research person, I think the biggest issue here is that the WHY of choosing to reach out to cosplay YouTubers isn't clear. Why would people watching cosplay videos like to order candy from Japan? As opposed to say people who show food recipes from other cultures etc. In this kind of marketing (basically word of mouth on steroids), the context and content I have observed from watching brands really take off are much much more important than the mechanics.

<comment> gray_-_wolf I think the reasoning could be that most people who like cosplay have at least some interest in Japan.. which sounds like something I would expect to be true.

<comment><USER18> Yes. However the business objective isn't finding people with interest in Japan. The objective is to reach people who would likely be interested in buying exotic candy. The further removed from your objective the marketing vehicle is, the exponentially higher the likelihood that the marketing campaign will fail. While I suppose Bemmu hasn't really been a marketer before, I see even "professionals" making errors like this all the times in search of chimera like "engagement" rather than linking marketing strategy and execution directly to the business objective.

<comment><USER19> buying exotic candy...from Japan. Having known a few people who are into manga, not even cosplay, they often find oddball Japanese candy interesting. Maybe not enough to buy because of an unboxing video, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Honestly I don't think marketing is a problem. In fact I have already heard of this. I think it's a super cool idea. But there's no way I can justify to myself, much less my wife to carve out $30 of my budget for candy every month. That's half our food budget. That's coming from someone who loves candy probably a bit more than average.

<comment><USER21> Where do you live that you spend sixty dollars a month on food?

<comment><USER22> That may be possible in Spain or Portugal, but you have to be very frugal.

<comment><USER23> You can do it anywhere if you're frugal and willing to cook. One side effect of globalization is that food staples prices are pretty much the same over the world. I'm not saying it will necessarily be a healthy diet and $1/day per person is definitely pushing it but I'm pretty sure you can do it in a country like USA too.

<comment><USER20> I live in the USA

Have you tried roasted a chicken? A whole chicken costs $6. Feeds 2 with leftovers, the bones can be used for broth, which can make lots of things, especially soup. The leftover meat is great for many things, like fried with potatoes. Sometimes I find that the chicken was used for 10 meals. Of course other things are added along the way, but veggies are dirt cheap.

<comment><USER23> > A whole chicken costs $6

That means you blew your 3-day food budget on half a chicken. That's just not nearly enough calories for 3 days. I'm not doubting you're able to afford chicken on that tight budget, it just seems that you're using it more like a condiment, rather than food.

<comment><USER24> You don't get all your calories from the chicken. And yes, it's more like flavoring. You round out the meal on veggies and maybe some simple carbs. The US fascination with a protein-heavy diet is, uh, fascinating.

<comment><USER23> I'm not from US, I didn't imply that he must get all his calories from chicken and I'm not the one who brought up the chicken in the first place. He seemed to imply that chicken is a significant part of this diet and it simply isn't possible on such a budget. That was my point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I see a lot of criticism of his particular angle of attack, but not much consideration of another possibility: YouTube ads may just not work very well. Maybe most ads don't really work very well. Maybe the vast majority of the money spent on advertising has been, in fact, wasted, and as we get better and better at tracking the results, we get better and better visibility on the fact that advertising just doesn't work very well.

The problem being that the people who made it their profession, really don't like that idea, and thus it is not in their interest to see this fact.

<comment><USER8> Dealing with ads is one of my professions. And I would be the first to admit that it's full of waste and fraud and misleading information and people trying to spin things positive. In many situations, it doesn't work.

The thing is that often it does work, and this business seems the type that probably has a least a few moves they could make with positive ROI.

What's driving everyone nuts is he's doing all this work and analysis but seems unwilling to stop making the most obvious basic rookie mistakes. Repeatedly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Might it be because the competition offers more bang for the buck? I'm not gonna name the competitors, but back when I looked at it, the competition offered at least larger quantity for the same price, or the same amount for much cheaper. They also send the packages once per month instead of twice per month, leading to less S&H. Whether it is free S&H or not someone's paying for the S&H; in the end, that someone is the customer.

</comment><comment><USER26> This is not a horror story at all. It's simply a marketing lesson. You have to be willing to test out different things, some work, some don't, but you learn something from each one

<comment><AUTHOR> Right. I tried to playfully use the word "horror" in there to make this fit in with Halloween. I originally planned to call it "Candy Japan marketing test: worth asking tiny YouTube channels for unboxings?". I'll add a clarification.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I am starting to think this guy's successful marketing strategy is getting articles about his marketing failures to the front page of HN.

<comment><USER28> Sounds like a fair-trade. Give inside knowledge or interesting material that you don't usually get in exchange for exposure.

The same argument can be made for any non-journalist source.

<comment><USER29> Yeah honestly the comments on this article is useful to me. At the very least I learned what not to do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I tried watching some of the 20 videos, and none of them really grabbed me. But even worse, as I was starting to get bored in the middle of watching one of them, I noticed in YouTube's Recommended For You column a video for "[Competitor's] Monthly Subscription Box" that had 100x as many views... and now I've started going down the rabbit-hole of watching _competitor_ videos instead.

In particular, this competitor video was just a lot more fun to watch: it's less about the product, or specifics of the subscription, and more just enjoying the two friends joking around with each other. And that helps sells the experience of the product: Buy this box, invite a friend over for the afternoon, and laugh at each other's awkward faces trying sour candies until the dog starts coughing and freaks you both out:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rwmezY0YZ4&t=7m44s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rwmezY0YZ4&t=7m44s)

Or just have a fun afternoon trying to get the damn bottle open:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rwmezY0YZ4&t=9m32s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rwmezY0YZ4&t=9m32s)

Of course, as much as that video had me laughing out loud & watching to the end, even that particular competitor video only has 250 views. And maybe you _don 't_ want videos like that, 'cos those girls really hated half of the candy the competitor sent to them.

The Candy Japan videos mostly had lower production values than the competitors ones. The Starbit one looked interesting, but their audio was so quiet & echoey that I couldn't bring myself to watch it. I did watch all of the "Sailor Moon & Kids" one ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHF1p3ggq_w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHF1p3ggq_w)) and it was okay, but it kinda looked like the kids weren't enjoying the candy by the end.

So maybe the channels selected need to be filtered down further based on quality of production & whether their videos in general are fun enough to be shareable. Or maybe look at this as having bought $1000 of video recorded customer experiences & feedback.

</comment><comment><USER31> Out of curiosity I just went to your website. I was thinking, "Hey, I don't know much about marketing, but this sounds like a fun product!"

Then I saw $29/month. I make a decent income, but that's just too expensive. I suspect your problem is less about advertising and more about value.

</comment><comment><USER32> There are a lot of things working against his favor, besides the novelty factor. Many of his copycat competitors also went out of business.

1\. he only offers one pricing option.

2\. go to amazon and search for "japanese candy". You can a lot more for your money without subscribing.

[https://www.amazon.com/Japanese-assortment-Dagashi-Umaibo- ch...](https://www.amazon.com/Japanese-assortment-Dagashi-Umaibo- chocolate/dp/B07B5ZPR22/ref=sr_1_20_a_it?ie=UTF8&qid=1540691462&sr=8-20&keywords=japanese%2Bcandy%2Bchocolate&th=1)

3\. after receiving a few boxes, you will find things you like. How would I re-order just those items? Amazon.

</comment><comment><USER33> I don't know if you came here for advice, but mine is contained right there in your own words: _" On a CPM basis this was actually ten times more expensive than advertising on prime-time TV."_ In all seriousness, why not advertise on prime-time TV? Seems like Japanese candy might be a minor hit. Downsides I can see, are that you might be faced with an awkward scaling problem (a nice problem to have), or that the expense of the ads and the scaling-up might require taking on investors. And of course it could still flop or underwhelm. It would be something of a "go big or go home" type move, I suppose.

</comment><comment><USER34> I went thru all the 20 videos, the videos have around 20 to 200 views, not surprised you haven't seen any sales. The creators selected are of "low" quality.

</comment><comment><USER24> Not sure these folks are trying hard enough to do things correctly. We subscribed, enjoyed the product, and after several months suddenly we weren't receiving boxes. No email, nothing on their site about any problems, so I email and wait a few days for a reply.

The problem: when a charge to my card was denied, they just canceled my subscription without notification. A simple (automated) email letting me know there was a problem would have had me fixing things within a day and they'd have kept a loyal customer. I did't sign back up because, IIRC, we'd gotten two shipments in a row that weren't very exciting and I just wasn't motivated to set it up again.

I feel like there's automation to be had, but they're having none of it.

</comment><comment><USER35> Suggestion: people know an ad when they see one. Even if someone is subscribed to a YT channel, they're not gonna sit through a video, "Here watch me unbox this thing that a not-sponsor sent me!", because it feels like the "content" is an ad.

You'd probably be better off asking them to give it screen-time in the same way that podcast advertising currently works, where the host devotes 20 or 30 seconds at the beginning or the end of the show to talk about Sponsor X.

<comment><USER18> I actually did some qualitative research on this recently. What i found was that while viewers very much know most stuff is sponsored, they try to assess signals of authenticity when looking at these

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> >This would have been OK if these small channels had such a devoted subscriber base that each would have resulted in a sale or two, but that did not happen.

What does a devoted subscriber base have to do with purchasing advertised products?

I also genuinely don't understand why you are spending so much on shipping. I have to assume that if you offered an option of monthly or every other month and spent half of the money saved on shipping on more candy that your customers would prefer it.

</comment><comment><USER37> You might try a "free shipping" coupon code (instead of 10% off), as it helps a customer overcome some of the anxiety of ordering a box of something all the way "from Japan".

</comment><comment><USER38> I get candy from these people on subscription because I found them on HN. But, it seems like most posts these days that I see on HN are about their own stupid business mistakes.

</comment><comment><USER39> Ironically this part will probably generate more sales than the original ad. BUT this part wouldn't have existed without the original experiment.

</comment><comment><USER40> The shipping costs did him in. I'm sure it works better for digital products.

</comment><comment><USER41> I hate to be that guy, but I've seen this business pop up on HN dozens of time, and it's still struggling. Time to try a new idea? I guess execution isn't everything, eh?

It's just a run of the mill monthly box that gives people cavities. Next.

</comment><comment><USER42> In previous threads, I proposed a similar idea to the founder of CandyJapan. I dont know if he took them as a cue to try out youtube. Either way, this is not what I originally proposed. This was my last comment in the matter: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16015617](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16015617)

Before I continue, its easy to stand here and say "You are doing it wrong". Please dont confuse this with me being such an asshole.

My goal here is to refine the idea, purpose, and outcome.

Idea

Having people dressed in cosplay review the candy. Possibly an attractive female.

Purpose

Get people to pay attention and buy some candy.

Outcome

Pay a actor/cosplayer to record videos for your own channel and promote that on social. Contact other youtubers and have them run your content on their channel. A cross channel feature, if you will.

Reason is that you control everything. There is little to be lost here, because your product wont need to be shipped, and the only thing exchanging hands is money. You also control the narrative and the direction of the leads to whatever collection method you decide to use.

Lets compare to the approach taken by OP.

Idea

Find a bunch of cosplayer channels. Send them free candy. Get a review.

Purpose

Get subscribers to click through and make some sales.

Outcome

Not all candy got to the channels, reviews were controlled by the channel owner (big no no unless it is a paid and scripted promotion), and no sales because you weren't in control of the narrative.

This is more common than youd think because people often think that youtube is a QVC like experience. People watch and buy. Happens often, but its not the main driver. Youtube's experience is in the "AS SEEN ON TV" product types. It is a way to get your offering out there on a platform, get some recognition and then market with the fact that you have been featured on the platform. This is why scripted and paid promotions work. You can say "AS SEEN ON $SOMEONE'S CHANNEL".

Where to go from here? Where would I go from here?

You already invested $1000+ of marketing and got a front page post on HN. Not a bad deal, but this has no long term value.

Id remove the line that says "Contact me to review my product". The outcome will be similar.

Then, I'd start looking for writers to produce me some good video scripts (less than a $100). Make sure the script is about the candy. Not the cosplayer. The cosplayer is a way to differentiate your content. It is not the focal point. Have your writers produce content about the actual candy. Think of Lucky Strike "Its toasted". Tell me how Pocky are made and how delicious they are. Come up with some ways to rate candy and rate them. So many ideas...

Id look for local cosplayers and record one of them following the scripts. Better yet, hire an actor and have them dress up. Same outcome.

Next, Id share the initial videos to my current client base. Make sure to let them know you will be reviewing their favorite candy on the videos. Share the story of the candy.

Publish it on your own channels. And pay someone to promote it on aggregators.

From there, reach out to influencers and ask how much do they charge by 30 seconds of promotion (important). Most will undercut their own rates by diving it in 30 second intervals. It also opens up Instagram videos. Then have them run your content as a feature. They love this kind of stiff because all they have to do is click publish. Easy money.

Main point is that marketing is not something you let others do for you. You can let them take control. You meed to live and breathe your own product. Not the boxes. Or the subscription. But the candy. Your goal is to have people feel excited about the candy offered in candyjapan. It will eventually force you to open an online retail store.

As always, this is not an attack. It is an outsiders perspective. From someone who has been, is, and will continue to be in similar trenches. Feel free to reach out privately. Best of luck.

PS. You are not in the subscription business. You are in the pleasure business. Candy is a luxury and a pleasure.

</comment><comment><USER43> It's not a horror story. It's a guy who has spend many years betting that he can build a business in candy arbitrage by assuming that basic economies of scale aren't relevant, but finding that almost no no wants to spend money ship a single box of candy from Japan.

<comment><USER44> He has spent many years _running a successful business_ in candy arbitrage. It may not be as successful going into the future, but as of the last revenue report he released, it was a reasonably profitable enterprise.

I have no idea why you're using this spiteful tone for someone openly sharing his experience as a YouTube marketing newbie. You also seem to be imputing some views on the author ("assuming that basic economies of scale aren't relevant") that he has not publicly espoused.

<comment><AUTHOR> I took it as harsh but probably true. He may be right that I'd be better off writing software instead.

<comment><USER45> Can you put other things in the box besides candy? It's an awesome concept but I can't eat that much candy every month.

<comment><USER46> Tea for example?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Knockout.js v1.1 - dynamic, declarative UI made easier - <AUTHOR> http://blog.stevensanderson.com/2010/10/20/knockout-110-new-project-site-launched/

<comment><AUTHOR> Check out the main project site here: <http://knockoutjs.com/>

</comment><comment><USER2> It's shiny. Helps deal with overly coupling your js UI to the DOM and makes engaging UX far easier to create.

</comment><comment><USER3> Interesting</comment>


Operation India - Anonymous [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=pFuu5lDEIK4

<comment><USER2> Indian gov (run by Congress Party) has become a prostitute of Muslim minority populations on one hand, and on the other, of America. The Prime Minister is an awarded economist yet he cannot control the prices. He is already called a puppet and slave of the actual string puller of their party Sonia Gandhi. Heaven knows what will happen to India, when Muslim terrorist-ethnical groups in Pakistan and bangladesh are already involved in a conspiracy to create "Mughlistan" corridor through heart of India and a massive genocide of the age-old tormented Hindu populations in India. When some Hindus are fed up and retaliate in violence they are considered "terrorists" by the pro-Muslim gov, who knows they also are in "Mughlistan" conspiracy!</comment>


Home burned down, can't rebuild because blueprints infringe on IP - <AUTHOR> https://np.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/68hwlr/california_my_house_burnt_down_im_being/ <comment><AUTHOR> The original title, "California - My house burnt down, I'm being threatened by the home builder for infringing on their IP because it is being rebuilt" was rejected as being too long.</comment>


Introduction to Autonomous Robots - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/correll/Introduction-to-Autonomous-Robots <comment><USER2> Shameless plug, but I'm working with a startup that teaches middle-school (and up) autonomous robot programming within the context of Sumo Robot competitions. We're active in 6 schools right now in Georgia and hope to expand to the entire east coast this year.

What sets our program apart is that we've developed a super low-cost robotics kit that lets us sell each student their own programmable robot for $100 each. I just spent the last four months writing the 8-week curriculum and associated text book.

Our website is at [http://www.sumorobotleague.com/](http://www.sumorobotleague.com/) and we'd love for you to sign up for our mailing list. We're trying to figure out manufacturing right now so that we can crank out thousands of robots to keep up with demand. If you're interested in robotics, I think our kit and program is probably the easiest introduction that you'll find.

<comment><USER3> Would this be applicable for someone with lots of programming experience, but zero automation / robotics experience?

I'm a hands on, self learner. I don't do well in a structured course, but prefer to learn by tinkering and building (while referencing good resources). I'd love to start with something like this, but wonder since it's marketed to middle school kids, if it would be too trivial?

On the other hand, I have zero experience in this field, so maybe it would be perfect...?

<comment><USER2> Yeah, that was kind of the intention. Our kit was designed to be as easy as possible. It just has two motors, a sonar sensor, three IR sensors (for line detection) and a buzzer. The book that I wrote has to take an approach that makes it accessible to kids with no programming experience, but if you're familiar with C++, you'll be kicking ass in no time.

This is the exact sort of setup that I started with (professional engineer of 15 years). Two years ago when we started the program, we built it off of an Arduino and some Pololu kits. It was a great kit, but ended up costing about $150. After the success of our program in the schools, we spent the last year developing a custom PCB that has everything all built in. It has an ATmega328 chip, motor controllers, and sensors all pre-soldered on one board. It's still Arduino programming, but on our custom device. That got our manufacturing costs down to less than $50/kit and lets us sell the whole package to schools for about $100 per kid.

Now the hardest part, as I mentioned, is figuring out manufacturing at scale so that we can crank out thousands of these little suckers.

Send me an email (in my profile) and I'll get you a free copy of the ebook. I'd love some feedback from a programmer, if you're willing.

<comment><USER3> Right on. I'm definitely going to get one of these then. I'll shoot you an email.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The summary is dense, yet the chapters remain readable. The figures disseminated across the pages make it really easier to grasp the concepts.

I don't know anything about robots, but shuffling thru the pages I found similarities with the video game programming field.

Thank you for this !

<comment><USER5> I'm surprised that a chapter titled "Intelligence and embodiment" (ch.1) would not include even a reference to Rod Brooks (MIT Mobile Robot Lab).

Brooks' invention of "subsumption architecture" (augmented finite state machines) and layered control systems in which higher level behaviors suppress low-level behaviors has been demonstrated to lead to robust intelligent behavior without centralized control, internal mapping, and emergent behavior. In short, a biologically-inspired solution which had tremendous influence in the field. To my mind, such an omission is a bit like writing a book on computer graphics and not including a reference to Watt, Foley or vanDam. Not saying it's wrong, just very surprising.

<comment><USER6> Brooks at MIT, and Latoumbe at Stanford, headed the two opposed camps during the AI Winter. Brooks wanted purely reactive robots, and did some nice insect robots. Latoumbe was into very rigid planning systems, where you approach manipulation as path planning using maze solving algorithms in a N-dimensional space with obstacles. Both turned out to be dead ends. Purely reactive systems don't get beyond insect level, and high-dimensional planning requires total information about the environment.

Then the statistical machine learning people took over and started to get real results, especially in sensor data reduction.

<comment><USER7> Neither was a dead end. Each made real contributions to the field and have real applications but, not surprisingly, turned out not to be the silver bullet that could do all things. The statistical crowd was always there and have been good at the same set of things, it just finally matured as a field and was able to produce usable results.

They all go through the same motions as anything in this industry. They show promise, everyone gets all worked up about the new thing, it produces some results and gets integrated where it makes sense, gets boring and people start looking for the next thing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Can anyone locate the PDF?

<comment><USER9> [https://github.com/correll/Introduction-to-Autonomous- Robots...](https://github.com/correll/Introduction-to-Autonomous- Robots/releases/download/v1.7/book.pdf)

<comment><USER10> thanks ... could not find it either.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is rally cool. Have been looking to get to know about robots a little more. Thank you for sharing this.

</comment><comment><USER12> For the interested, this is "autonomous" as in locomotion. (Not financially autonomous).

</comment><comment><USER13> Thanks for sharing</comment>


IBM makes significant breakthrough towards scalable quantum computers - <AUTHOR> http://www.zmescience.com/research/ibm-quantum-computer-28022012/ <comment><USER2> [http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/120229-ibm-shows-off- quan...](http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/120229-ibm-shows-off-quantum- computing-breakthroughs-says-qubit-computers-are-close)

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3642893></comment>


Ask HN: SOAP vs REST - help me understand - <AUTHOR>

My company has been offering a SOAP-based API since around 2002.  We recently ran a survey on our site in which a full 25% of visiting developers said that SOAP is a show-stopper for them and that they would prefer REST, even though we provide full code samples in various languages for our SOAP interface.
Ever mindful of our clients' wishes, we've begun designing a REST interface.  We've been trying to adopt the best practices of API providers out there, and we're planning to provide client libraries for the most popular languages as well.
This will take us a good few months, designing objects and operations, implementing the service, creating code samples, etc.  At the end of this process, a PHP developer, for example, will be able to send a fax through the REST API by using this code:

       <?php

       require('Interfax.php');
       $client = new InterfaxClient($username, $password, $faxnumber, $texttofax, $filetype);
       $result = $client->SendFax;
       echo $result;

       ?>
 instead of this code:

       <?php

       $client = new SoapClient("http://ws.interfax.net/dfs.asmx?wsdl");

       $params->Username  = $username;
       $params->Password  = $password;
       $params->FaxNumber = $faxnumber;
       $params->Data      = $texttofax ;
       $params->FileType  = $filetype;

       $result = $client->SendCharFax($params);

       echo $result->SendCharFaxResult;
       ?>
 which is, effectively, the same.  The complexity of interfacing to the API is hidden in a custom library instead of a SOAP library.  Which brings me to ask myself "what's the point"?  Where does the advantage of having a REST interface come into play? <comment><USER2> I hope you are not trolling.

The difference between REST and SOAP is how you expose your api via HTTP; with a RESTful approach, you should expose clean URLs that will be accessed via http methods expressing their original meaning (i.e. GET will only fetch a resource, not trigger side-effects; creation operations will use POST; etc etc). This usually results in simple interfaces that can be accessed directly with basic http libraries and don't necessarily rely on XML. The point of REST is that any http client will be able to access your API; wrapping libraries like the one you provide are completely optional.

Developers prefer REST for this reason: it's much easier than SOAP (where you invariably have to rely on wrapping libraries you don't understand) and doesn't introduce any dependency on libraries. If you intend on forcing customers to use a wrapping library anyway, then it doesn't really matter what you choose, because you're completely hiding the http layer anyway. Doing it "the REST way" would mean you just document your http interfaces and make the wrapper completely optional, while maintaining simplicity.

<comment><AUTHOR> No, not trolling.

The vast majority of API providers do provide libraries (of course, none of them "force" you to use them, and nor will we), and this is considered good practice in many places (see for example the recent "Designing Great API Docs" at <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3453315>).

I understand the purism of doing it the REST way, but if in practice most developers end up using a library which abstracts away REST - that's what prompted my original question.

<comment><USER2> Yeah, a library for a library, there's little difference, I agree; but the main point of REST is exactly the fact that the library is optional, and if necessary it can be entirely bypassed with little effort. With SOAP this is almost invariably impractical or impossible; you'll need a basic SOAP library even for sending "Hello world" back and forth. REST is more human-friendly in many ways.

Somebody could also say REST implementations usually end up passing less data around, because they usually don't require the overhead of compulsory metadata typical of SOAP standards (schemas, "envelopes" etc). This is obviously a trade-off with "exactness", but again most developers are happy to trade speed for metadata they'll rarely use (if ever). It also helps making server-side caching easier.

<comment><AUTHOR> OK, thanks. Going back to the drawing board with renewed vigor!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> If your clients only use your provided libraries then there _is_ no difference between SOAP and REST in this instance as the primary attraction of REST (accessing the methods through HTTP requests) will be abstracted by the library.

So either that 25% wants a RESTful interface because they're going to opt not to use your libraries or because they're conditioned to vote for REST over SOAP.

<comment><AUTHOR> > ... conditioned to vote for REST over SOAP.

Yes, I dread to think I'm going through a lengthy project just to address a current fashion trend...

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Two things:

* You're going to have to support your SOAP endpoint anyway, so only maintain libraries for your SOAP endpoint (at least for now). Having a PHP library for SOAP and a PHP library for REST will just confuse people to no end.

* Put up a form on your web site that says "Put your email in to get early access to our REST API" and then see if anyone actually bites.

Just because someone on a survey said they wanted REST instead of SOAP doesn't mean that you have to run off and do it, or that they wouldn't necessarily use the SOAP API if they actually had to solve a problem with your API.

We built some really interesting stuff on SOAP and WS-* in the 2002-2003 era, and it's always fun to see development trends go in circles.

<comment><AUTHOR> > only maintain libraries for your SOAP endpoint (at least for now

Check. This was the decision that came out of today's product meeting after reading responses here.

> Put up a form...

Check. Already did this a couple weeks ago at www.interfax.net/en/dev/rest. Already got a few bites.

> Just because someone on a survey said they wanted REST instead of SOAP ...

I agree. However, we ran several variations of the survey including one where developers had an opportunity to say that not having REST is a show-stopper for them, which got us worried.

Strangely, most of those who insisted on REST develop in environments which have the strongest SOAP support, like C#, PHP, and Java. This got me thinking that we might be dealing with fashion issues more than practical issues...

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's tough to tell how RESTful your API is when it's wrapped up in a client- side library. One of the ways I evaluate this is to ask: if I'm using a compiled client-side language, and the service api is modified in a backward- compatible way, will I need to recompile my client? With SOAP the answer is often yes because the client-side library generates code that is binary- dependent on the datatypes in the wsdl. That's bad, and one of the huge advantages of a RESTful api is that recompiles aren't needed. Your resource representation can change, so long as the informationn that was there before is still there and can be found using the same expression (eg: an id lookup in an xml document, or by a key in json data.)

</comment><comment><USER6> The primary appeal of a REST interface is simplicity. You don't _need_ a proprietary library to make sense of it. All you need are a list of resources and in the case of PUT/POST operations, parameters, and the rest is handled by the nature of HTTP. No fancy libraries, no confounded WSDL files, easily- inspected responses. You can consume it using very common libraries and even roll your own with ease.

If you're always providing API access through a proprietary library, it doesn't matter if it's REST, SOAP, custom binary protocols, or whatnot.

<comment><AUTHOR> > If you're always providing API access through a proprietary library, > it > doesn't matter if it's REST, SOAP, custom binary protocols, or whatnot.

That was exactly my thought. I was looking for reinforcement of the possibility that people will still want the entire REST interface visible and documented even in the presence of wrapper libraries.

<comment><USER6> Personally, I prefer REST interfaces, because it always seems like vendor libraries have just enough suck in them to make me want to use my own.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Personally I'd just wrap SoapClient to provide the more succinct interface and provide that to your users. You could probably programmatically generate a draft of this interface, and then manually improve and simplify it if you want. Maybe this is how you are going to implement your REST interface?

<comment><AUTHOR> Actually, moving to REST requires you to change your head around from a procedural point of view to one dealing in objects and operations, so it won't be a direct mapping of SOAP to REST.</comment></comment>


Annual Letter to Berkshire Shareholders (2019) [pdf] - <AUTHOR> https://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/2019ltr.pdf <comment><USER2> After having seen so much nonsense accounting in the books of so many startups (especially recently, it _feels_ like a growing trend) it's refreshing to see GAAP. The difference in standards between the startup universe and the 'real world' is actually scary. There have been far too many instances of people getting taken for a ride based on EBITDA when the company's financials were far from healthy.

Am I alone in thinking this?

<comment><USER3> Buffett thinks GAAP is almost useless now, and doesn't think accountants have a clue. He follows own "owners earnings" model, which is not a standard of any kind.

<comment><USER2> GAAP is definitely an imperfect standard, so I don't begrudge them going their own way (and their way seems to be reasonable, from a cursory view). My comment mostly comes from the frankly ludicrous financials that have been making headlines in the last few years.

<comment><USER4> Agreed. Also noteworthy that Buffett points out the shortcomings of GAAP's mark-to-market rule whether it makes Berkshire earnings look undeservedly good (2019) or bad (2018).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> After reading all the positive comments about BRK in this thread I came across this article: [https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/hypocrisy-berkshire- hathaway...](https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/hypocrisy-berkshire- hathaway-2015-11-11) For somebody with little knowledge of financial services (i.e., me), how would you recommend that I interpret this?

<comment><USER6> The BRK official position on Valeant is that they take advantage of sick individual's life-or-death need for drugs to price gouge them since purchasing decisions are not made on price (medication is "price inelastic").

Clayton homes is criticized for having bad or misleading loan terms. BRK (and many financial services individuals I know personally) often see just about any loan term as fair as long as no-one was forced into the loan at gunpoint. Is it the responsibility of the lessor or lessee to make sure the lessee is signing to something in their best interest? Loans are not life-or-death and purchasing decisions are frequently made on price (loans are "price elastic").

The article you've linked presents these two cases and makes the argument that they are equivalently immoral, making Munger a hypocrite. Personally, I think they're both fair criticisms, but they definitely come from different places. I don't see necessary cognitive dissonance in having the opinion that only one of these is immoral.

With regard to cutting costs: I see no indication that BRK criticized Valeant for firing people, so I suspect this is a personal issue for the author of the article, so I haven't addressed it here.

<comment><USER7> Criticisms on valeant don't seem fully justified. Sure valeant had questionable business practices in the past, but they've changed due to law enforcement. Plus, the other criticisms can be applied to almost every pharma company

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> From the bottom of the first page in the report: Overall Gain – 1964-2019 .................................................... Berkshire: 2,744,062% S&P: 19,784%

Huh? 2 million percent vs. 19k ?

<comment><USER9> Although interestingly heir performance in the last 10 years has roughly matched/slightly lagged the S&P index.

Tough game managing that much money.

<comment><USER10> 10 years ago they were avoiding tech stocks, and I think they mostly still do.

Perhaps matching S&P without investing in some of the biggest gains is quite a notable outcome?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Buffett and Munger (the combination) are national jewels.

They demonstrate sound investing principals, and they exemplify humble and humorous manner. We're lucky to have them.

</comment><comment><USER12> Any book recommendations for someone who would like to learn more about GAAP, accounting, operational earnings, and/or how to evaluate stocks?

<comment><USER13> Read the last twenty years of Buffet's letters.

No snark intended. His letters intended for investors are the best use of your time rather than a book someone wrote for vanity.

<comment><USER14> The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham is a classic.

Graham's approach shaped Buffett's. Personally, I found The Intelligent Investor to be more clearly written than Buffett's letters. It more clearly left me with a framework for how to approach value investing.

<comment><USER15> Security Analysis by Graham and Dodd was what Buffett used, since II wasn't out yet. A more difficult read as well, also seemed a bit dated when I read through it a decade ago.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Unspoken in Buffets letter is the problem that these unrealized gains cannot be realized in a short period of time. The size of Berkshire Hathaway's holdings is such that, if they were quickly sold, they would fetch a lower price - they would saturate the available buy orders and move the reported valuation (average sale price) down.

<comment><USER17> And if you had to liquidate all of Apple's assets, or Google, or Microsoft, or any public company in a short period of time, you'd realize a much lower value than their reported book values. Your point?

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> > In 2019, Berkshire sent $3.6 billion to the U.S. Treasury to pay its current > income tax. The U.S. government collected $243 billion from corporate income > tax payments during the same period. From these statistics, you can take > pride that your company delivered 11⁄2% of the federal income taxes paid by > all of corporate America.

</comment><comment><USER19> "Shareholders having at least $20 million in value of A or B shares and an inclination to sell shares to Berkshire may wish to have their broker contact Berkshire's Mark Millard at 402-346-1400. We request that you phone Mark between 8:00-8:30 a.m. or 3:00-3:30 p.m. Central Time, calling only if you are ready to sell."

$BRK.B holder myself — What is this? Is this essentially if you have a big enough position you can sell us your shares directly for a better price than on the open market? Doesn't that seem unfair to retail/small investors who have to trade on the open market?

<comment><USER20> Selling 20 millions would cost you a little fortune in broker fees. In turn BRK are buying back and paying brokerage. It makes sense to sell directly. And I don't think you get a better price than the market even selling 20M, you just sell at market price.

This saves money to YOU, the shareholder, so you should be happy with it.

<comment><USER19> Broker fees? I assume you mean the individuals entity that manages their portfolio charges a fee. Obviously when you have that much wealth you aren't using E*Trade or Schwab $0 commissions trades.

<comment><USER21> You can certainly have that many shares in a normal brokerage.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> "In reviewing my uneven record, I've concluded that acquisitions are similar to marriage: They start, of course, with a joyful wedding – but then reality tends to diverge from pre-nuptial expectations. Sometimes, wonderfully, the new union delivers bliss beyond either party's hopes. In other cases, disillusionment is swift. Applying those images to corporate acquisitions, I'd have to say it is usually the buyer who encounters unpleasant surprises. It's easy to get dreamy-eyed during corporate courtships. Pursuing that analogy, I would say that our marital record remains largely acceptable, with all parties happy with the decisions they made long ago.

</comment><comment><USER23> Despite the (2019) in the submission title, the letter was published today (2020-02-22).

</comment><comment><USER24> Have to love the clarity and direct openness, as somebody with experience in the underwriting market, his honesty and pragmatic insight is spot on.

</comment><comment><USER25> It's interesting that Berkshire seems to have entirely abandoned oil and gas equity positions though they did provide financing for Occidental's buyout. Wind and solar on the other hand, they do own a lot of. Warren's finally found a tech investment that he understands.

</comment><comment><USER22> Mirrors:

[https://www.scribd.com/document/448355008/2019ltr](https://www.scribd.com/document/448355008/2019ltr)

[http://media.graytvinc.com/documents/Letter+to+Shareholders2...](http://media.graytvinc.com/documents/Letter+to+Shareholders2.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER26> Who else here loves the Berkshire Hathaway website? Yes it's outdated and not exactly pretty but it's so 'cut to the chase' and easy to navigate. I see why they never changed it. A bit like Warren and his house that he has lived in since 1958!

</comment><comment><USER27> " _The result was significant property damage and a major disruption in Lubrizol's business. Even so, both the company's property loss and business- interruption loss will be mitigated by substantial insurance recoveries that Lubrizol will receive. But, as the late Paul Harvey was given to saying in his famed radio broadcasts, "Here's the rest of the story." One of the largest insurers of Lubrizol was a company owned by...uh,Berkshire._ "

Whoops. I wonder if they're going to introduce a policy against such self- insurance?

" _Mistakes in assessing insurance risks can be huge and can take many years – even decades – to surface and ripen. (Think asbestos.) A major catastrophe that will dwarf hurricanes Katrina and Michael will occur – perhaps tomorrow, perhaps many decades from now. "The Big One" may come from a traditional source, such as wind or earthquake, or it may be a total surprise involving, say, a cyber attack having disastrous consequences beyond anything insurers now contemplate. When such a mega-catastrophe strikes, Berkshire will get its share of the losses and they will be big –very big. Unlike many other insurers, however, handling the loss will not come close to straining our resources, and we will be eager to add to our business the next day._ "

This is somewhat concerning. Property/casualty has been a relatively stable insurance market, as Buffett notes. (Major hurricanes not withstanding. I seem to recall reading that, if life insurance had been more common among gay men when the AIDS epidemic occurred, the life insurance industry would have been bankrupt.)

But, there are large-scale new things trundling down the pike. Global climate change, for one. I don't know if BH is involved with flood insurance damages, but large regions of the world are likely to be exposed to them that had not been before. There aren't any statistics to cover those changes. It's gonna be interesting.

" _Over the years, many new rules and guidelines pertaining to board composition and duties have come into being. The bedrock challenge for directors, nevertheless, remains constant: Find and retain a talented CEO –possessing integrity, for sure – who will be devoted to the company for his /her business lifetime._"

"Devoted to the company for his/her business lifetime?!" A CEO's business lifetime is much more than 18 months! This is clearly an outdated and obsolete (if not completely archaic) idea. How ridiculous!

(A significant chunk of my assets are in BH stock. No baby seals were harmed in the production of this comment.)

" _Frequently,the possession of one such directorship bestows on its holder three to four times the annual median income of U.S.households. (I missed much of this gravy train: As a director of Portland Gas Light in the early 1960s, I received $100annuallyfor my service. To earn this princely sum, I commuted to Maine four times a year.)_ "

Uh, oh. Warning! Warning! Socialism incoming!

" _In past reports, we've discussed both the sense and nonsense of stock repurchases. Our thinking, boiled down: Berkshire will buy back its stock only if a) Charlie and I believe that it is selling for less than it is worth and b) the company, upon completing the repurchase, is left with ample cash._ "

I just thought I'd copy that one.

<comment><USER28> _But, there are large-scale new things trundling down the pike. Global climate change, for one. I don 't know if BH is involved with flood insurance damages, but large regions of the world are likely to be exposed to them that had not been before. There aren't any statistics to cover those changes. It's gonna be interesting._

As long as they have a granular understanding of the perceived vs actual risk profile across geographies over time, they'll be able to make huge sums of money by staying _just adjacent_ to the high-risk areas.

Imagine three houses in a row. The risk of fire may be the same for all three. That changes as soon as the leftmost house catches fire. They would never insure that house; it's already on fire. The middle house has a statistically higher chance of catching fire than the rightmost house, yet the relative proximity to the fire drives fear up among both adjacent owners—actual risk vs perceived risk in a nutshell. Both are more likely to want to buy insurance, with the middle owner willing to pay more. The insurance provider can set premiums that take into account both the actual risk profile and the perceived risk profile.

It's reductive, but it illustrates a point: money is made when there is a delta between the perceived value and actual value. That usually happens when there's a fundamental transition that is unrecognized by the market. If you can spot the wave, you can ride it.

Climate change isn't a random event—it's an observable transition. And it's going to cause one hell of a wave.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I've been enjoying this letter when this weird outdated analogy stopped me cold in my tracks:

"In reviewing my uneven record, I've concluded that acquisitions are similar to marriage: They start, of course, with a joyful wedding – but then reality tends to diverge from pre-nuptial expectations. Sometimes, wonderfully, the new union delivers bliss beyond either party's hopes. In other cases, disillusionment is swift."

What's bizarrely archaic about this is that if he had simply said "Dating" or "relationships" he would have been equally correct, if not more so. And unlike a marriage, he can trade portions of his company holdings back, which in a sense makes it more like dating than a marriage proper.

<comment><USER30> I'm missing your point here. Do you not like marriage analogies? Or you don't think his analogy and very well known life experience doesn't apply (he has an interesting personal experience with marriage)? Or do you think most of the people who read his letter have no background in marriage?

I find the analogy very appropriate and well stated. Much like a marriage he can't just give back a portion of an entity he's involved in without legal pain and the pain of explaining it to his investors and board members and the company he is having trouble with. I guess that's like dating but to me it's closer to a marriage and divorce.

<comment><USER29> I guess what's strange to me is not the idea that, as you become more committed to a person you discover their flaws and the relationship gets worse. That seems self evident to me and seems to be a common theme both in theory and in practice.

But how many marriages resolve with discovering the person is _way better_ than you imagined? I'm not familiar with this, either through the idealism of poetry or romantic movies, nor through practical experience provided by observing marriages around me. I thought most people assume that you have a honeymoon phase and hopefully that never ends.

<comment><USER31> _That seems self evident to me and seems to be a common theme both in theory and in practice._

Only if everything you know about marriage and family you learn from television and the internet.

 _But how many marriages resolve with discovering the person is way better than you imagined?_

My guess is almost all of them, because as people grow older, they grow wiser, more interesting, smarter, and have more life experiences on which to draw.

My wife today is not the person I married, and I'm happy for that because I've had the privilege of seeing her grow and become a better person. I the person I was back then met her today, I wouldn't even consider her in my league.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


El Niño vs. the Drought - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@joshuajenkins/el-ni%C3%B1o-vs-drought-190fc3b131d9#.f1s8c1u1y <comment><USER2> Didn't do the homework.

The first thing to know about the California Water Project is that it's designed to store enough water for three dry years. Last year was year four. The last time that happened was 1976-1977. Agricultural water customers have had huge cutbacks in their water deliveries.

Right now, rainfall is more important than reservoir level changes. It takes time for the water to reach the reservoirs. Rainfall so far this year is slightly above average, after four years of below average. This is not enough to recharge the reservoirs; that will take about two wet years. It's also not that important how much is in which reservoir; most of them are connected.

Here's the drought contingency plan updated to February 13, 2016.[1]

Household water isn't a big problem. It's agriculture that's hurting. Especially low-value crops such as rice and alfalfa.

Orange County is already recycling water from their sewerage disposal plant into drinking water. San Jose has that capability with a new plant, but isn't using it for drinking water yet. (But if you take the tour there[2] you can drink some.) San Diego County's desalinization plant opened last December and is now providing about 10% of their water. There's a lot going on to deal with the problem.

[1] [http://www.water.ca.gov/waterconditions/docs/2016-DroughtCon...](http://www.water.ca.gov/waterconditions/docs/2016-DroughtContingencyPlan- CVP-SWPOperations-Feb-Nov_1.19.16-FINAL.pdf)

[2] [https://www.eiseverywhere.com/event_calendar.php?accountid=5...](https://www.eiseverywhere.com/event_calendar.php?accountid=5289)

<comment><USER3> Excellent points - here are a couple more factors:

\- Often reservoirs are filled via gravity from elevations that are higher. If the precipitation at those higher elevations is falling as snow, you have to wait for it to melt before seeing the benefits.

\- When the ground is dry and the aquifers depleted, less of the rainfall will make it into the reservoirs. I'm from central PA and _MOST_ of our water is actually stored in the natural aquifers (under my area of the state, it's water-fllled limestone caves). So to be fair to el Nino, you have to look at how the aquifers are responding to the rain.

\- California would be an unpleasant place if four years of drought were reversed in a single year.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I remember hearing last year that we'd need something like 3-4 wet years in a row to counter the many years of drought.

This article is confusing level with flow rate. For Lake Shasta in particular, it looks like we're trending upward faster than the previous average.

</comment><comment><USER5> -> The historical average reservoir storage level is the hard-to-see aqua in the background, and the thick blue line that stops around today's date is the current storage level.

I'm really not sure if this is an appropriate criticism, but if you are trying to plot something like this and you don't like the color contrast because it's hard to see then change it. For me, the cyan-on-grey is tough to see.

<comment><USER6> He has lifted the graphs from here[1]. I'm not sure if the underlying data is available.

[1] [http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/resapp/resDetailOrig.action...](http://cdec.water.ca.gov/cdecapp/resapp/resDetailOrig.action?resid=SHA)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Lake mead outside of California is also one of it's largest sources of water. [http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp](http://mead.uslakes.info/level.asp)

</comment><comment> dj-wonk See also: "Insights for California water policy from computer modeling" (California Water Blog, February 9, 2012, by Elena M. Lopez)

[http://californiawaterblog.com/2012/02/09/insights-for- calif...](http://californiawaterblog.com/2012/02/09/insights-for-california- water-policy-from-computer-modeling/)

I find the Lopez article to be a better read because it is detailed and level- headed.

</comment><comment><USER8> The author talks about a recent "onslaught" of precipitation. Hardly. In Silicon Valley we've had a few mildly damp days, with sprinkles here and there, and a small handful of days with real rain during part of the day. Compared to some rainy years in the past, this year has been remarkably dry given it's supposedly an El Niño year. "Onslaught" it is not.

<comment><USER9> That's an interesting perspective. I would think it's the amount of precipitation at the major watersheds and reservoirs that would be indicative of an "onslaught", rather than what happens in Silicon Valley.

<comment><USER8> Silicon Valley lies alongside a large watershed with several reservoirs. Many people don't realize this. Hearing the name "Silicon Valley" makes one think of miles of tech buildings, but that's just part of it. I supposed "major" is a relative term though, so you're still right.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> What an odd mix of meaningful data with meaningless commentary about it.

</comment><comment><USER11> yo im just happy about all the snow in tahoe, has not been like this since 2009-2010. Hopefully we get some good snow melt. The Alameda Creek also looks like it has good flow to it, have not seen that in a while, from this past summer of walking around in the dry bed.</comment>


Temporally Coherent Local Tone Mapping of HDR Video - <AUTHOR> http://www.disneyresearch.com/publication/temporally-coherent-local-tone-mapping-of-hdr-video/

<comment><USER2> I'm afraid I feel the same about results of this as I do with basically all attempts at tone-mapping. It makes the world look like a bad late-90s video game. Depths of light and darkness are what make a scene appear real.

Maybe we just need to wait for HDR displays before we expect to see the full details of HDR imagery in a realistic way.

<comment><USER3> > " _Depths of light and darkness are what make a scene appear real._ "

But sometimes you also want to see what's going on. You don't _have_ to turn the filter up to eleven. The fact that this filter performs so well even at exaggerated settings bodes well for its usability at tasteful, restrained settings. And it will probably make it a lot easier on cinematographers, so that they have to worry less about carefully lighting the set and can rely on being able to balance things out in post production.

<comment><USER2> Tone-map me sceptical.

<comment><USER4> Where it benefits is trying to represent in video something perceptually close to how the eye/brain perceives a scene.

It would have been nice to see some scenes with dialed down settings more "natural" results.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Ascii Art to Data URI - <AUTHOR> http://jollo.org/ascii2uri.htm <comment><USER2> This bit is great:

      box = box.replace(/#/g, function() {
      	i++
      	if (str[i]) {
      		return str[i]
      	} else {
      		return "";
      	}
      });

It would be cool if you could select which characters (or all characters except for space) will be replaced with the data URI.

<comment><USER3> Just replace that /#/g with /[^\s]/g to replace all non-whitespace characters.

<comment><AUTHOR> be forewarned that the reason it's asking you to use only #'s and spaces is the effect only works if the ascii image is very contrast-y. if the ascii art makes use of gradients (....:::;;;iiii@@@@) the effect won't be as obvious or work at all.</comment></comment></comment>


Be a Jerk: The Worst Business Lesson from the Steve Jobs Biography - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/11/be-a-jerk-the-worst-business-lesson-from-the-steve-jobs-biography/249136/

<comment><USER2> Hilarious, for a minute I thought I was reading an Onion article. I can't believe there was a paper written titled _"The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't"_.

Hilarity aside, this article was great. But I felt the use of Steve Jobs as the main vehicle for the argument was a little clunky. I think the point about asshole management style could have been made with Steve Jobs as _one_ example.

<comment><USER3> Not just a paper, but an entire book. It's easy reading, and if you've been negatively affected by assholes at work, worth a read.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The very same book has quotes of employees saying that if not for asshole Steve they wouldn't accomplish what they did. Like when the design was "perfect", Steve would come and say it was shit and then they made it even more perfect. There are two sides to the medal</comment>


Support Indie Mac Developers and Charity.  Save $. - <AUTHOR> http://www.macheist.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> MacHeist groups a bunch of small Mac software publishers together, they each put one application into a discounted bundle, and then they give 25% of all sales to charity. You get to choose which of 10 charities you support (or you can split the money evenly between them.) A few of the apps are "locked" out of the bundle until sales quotas are met.

The publishers get extra exposure and incremental sales, the charities get a sizable donation, and the customers get a deal (assuming, of course, that they were going to purchase any of the software titles at full price.) It's a neat marketing scheme, especially when you factor in the "Locked" software aspect which promote a slight viral effect. I bought the bundle mainly for a new copy of Snapz Pro X, which is still locked...which is approximately 5% of the reason I'm here pimping MacHeist (I said it was viral, dammit!)

I doubt this is completely new to most people, but it may serve as a reminder to some. It may have even been posted here already...? I personally missed out on last year's bundle because I kept putting it off and then forgot about it until the promo was over. I thought I might help others avoid the same fate this year. (I bought my bundle early this year, just in case.)

</comment><comment><USER2> The developers are probably not getting much money, if last year is any guide.

<http://daringfireball.net/2006/12/iniquities_of_the_selfish>

<comment><AUTHOR> I appreciate the link wmf...I read Gruber's blog, but I missed that post.

I agree with John's premise that "Just because someone is satisfied with a bad deal doesn't mean it isn't a bad deal." I'm not, however, going to get morally outraged over another person's business decision to participate in a transaction just because a third-party doesn't think the remuneration is equitable. The indie developers that are participating obviously liked the deal they were offered well enough, right? Otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to participate. I think griping about a deal that you agreed to after the fact is unprofessional. If you were a schmuck and agreed to a bad deal, you just have to suck it up and learn from it.

I can think of one great reason I would personally consider participating in this "inequitable" arrangement if I were a Mac shareware developer: any future revenue from upgrades are not shared with MacHeist. I don't see where Gruber takes that into consideration. I had never heard of a few of these applications until MacHeist promoted them, yet I'm likely to upgrade any of the apps I actually like as they release new versions. MacHeist is a form of advertising, and all advertising is somewhat of a calculated risk...this promotion will probably pay off for some of the developers and be a waste of time for others. Either way, it's not my job to count my neighbor's coins for them.

<comment><USER2> Yeah, I'm not outraged over it either. I suspect that MacHeist and the participating developers never anticipated selling as many copies as they did, so they didn't consider that MacHeist might walk away with most of the money. Since this is the second year, developers are probably a little smarter in their negotiations. I think it's worth discussing since "how to not get ripped off while starting your business" is a popular topic here on YC.

A few developers have reported that they got virtually no upgrade sales after MacHeist/MacZot: [http://reinventedsoftware.com/blog/2007/12/17/so-thats- why-i...](http://reinventedsoftware.com/blog/2007/12/17/so-thats-why-it-was- called-pinprick/)</comment></comment></comment>


Qantas QF32 flight from the cockpit (dealing with exploded engine) - <AUTHOR> http://www.aerosocietychannel.com/aerospace-insight/2010/12/exclusive-qantas-qf32-flight-from-the-cockpit/

<comment><USER2> Site seems dead, Google Cache: <http://goo.gl/a216o> EDIT: Apparently there are pictures of the cockpit with the error messages etc, text-only doesn't do this article justice.

<comment><USER3> I think it's just very, very slow to load. It loaded for me about 30 minutes ago, shortly before your comment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Very interesting.

It's amazing how the pilots can remain calm in such circumstances. I wonder what they told the passengers. "One of our engines blew up and two are not working in full capacity, but don't worry everything is fine".

I would also be interested in knowing why the engine blew up in the first place. Seems to me that the ECAM messages were less than helpful sometimes. Which reminded me of how we approach error reporting in the applications that we develop where we report on individual problems and not necessarily relate that to the overall state of the system.

<comment><USER5> _I wonder what they told the passengers. "One of our engines blew up and two are not working in full capacity, but don't worry everything is fine"._

Wonder no longer, there's a video!

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyEJCg9etBg>

"We do apologise. As I'm sure you're aware, we have a technical issue with our number two engine..."

The guy actually did a damn good job of maintaining a calm and reassuring tone; the fact that bits of the engine can be clearly seen sticking through the top of the wing is the only thing that detracts from the everything-is- fine message.

He did a much better job than this other Qantas pilot, dealing with a less serious (though more spectacular-looking) engine failure earlier in the year, who let his own stress show:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI_5qDrMuK0>

"...as you can imagine things are a little tense in the cockpit... please be assured we are trained for this situation. Of course it's usually in the simulator but we are trained for it..."

<comment><USER4> Kind of reminds me of how the hostess of a recent flight was telling us how terrible the flight would be. "There's a big storm that we will be flying through. It's going to be a bumpy flight, and we're taking on extra fuel because we might be diverted to another airport. Oh, and I also might have to bump someone off the plane because we're too heavy."

My initial thoughts were: "keep that kind of information to yourself. I don't want to know." It was more like a roller-coaster ride rather a flight so she was right, but i still didn't want to know.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for posting this @davi. I look forward to reading the full article when it comes back online (the link by @oomkiller is a good start, but I really would like to see the source article).

I don't know about everyone else, but reading about these kinds of incidents from the pilot's perspective makes me _more_ confident about flying, not less. I have zero doubt that those folks are professionals.

</comment><comment><USER7> It's interesting just how many different systems needed to be considered by the pilots after the incident. I've read articles before about how a pilots routine job can be very boring but it's good to know they have built up all that experience and training for moments like these.

<comment><USER5> What strikes me is that the software he's talking about appears to be badly designed; or at least, not well designed for this rare situation where you've got dozens of error messages coming up at once and they're not prioritised.

Also,

 _...once we'd extended the undercarriage using the alternate system we had no indication it was down until we'd gone to the system page to make confirmation of that._

(What, there's no big-ass mechanical dial with "Gear up" and "Gear down" on it?)

and

 _In the Airbus and the A380 we don't carry performance and landing charts, we have a performance application. Putting in the ten items affecting landing performance on the initial pass, the computation failed. It gave a message saying it was unable to calculate that many failures_

<comment><USER8> I think this is one of the primary religious debates between Airbus and Boeing pilots - Airbus is a much more highly computerized experience inside the cockpit vs. Boeing which is still a more mechanical/tactile experience. For some fascinating background, see the NOAA on the recent AirFrance crash. They cover this issue specifically and essentially concluded that the pilots were likely overwhelmed with the number of error messages and warnings coming at them from the plane's computers and it became paralysis by analysis which they ultimately couldn't recover from.

<comment><USER9> Paralysis by analysis is one of the most common ways more intelligent opponents are beaten by less intelligent ones. From what I understand, this seems to hold true in chess, warfare, and a lot of other contexts. This might be good for us to remember in the coming years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This must be getting hammered from somewhere with a bigger audience than here. Doesn't load for me.

<comment><USER10> OK, it finally loaded.

It's an interview with a senior, "Check Captain" who happened to be in the cockpit at the time in addition to the normal crew.

This was a _major_ emergency and a lot more than just a single engine explosion.</comment></comment>


Software Update changes in the latest macOS releases - <AUTHOR> https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/software-update.html <comment><AUTHOR>
      Ignoring software updates is deprecated.
      The ability to ignore individual updates will be removed in a future release of macOS.

Fuck this.</comment>


How an app developer helped Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez make history - <AUTHOR> https://mashable.com/article/reach-alexandria-ocasio-cortez <comment><AUTHOR> Traditional GOTV apps and phone / door-knocking procedures certainly worked well for the Obama campaign, but that was in a different era where people weren't saturated by pushy telemarketers and the like. I briefly tried volunteering in the last election and stopped because I disliked the pushy scripts that we would work off of to do targetted get-out-the-vote.

Seeing this article about Reach and its effectiveness was really refreshing; talking to random people on the street and organically generating interest was exactly the kind of volunteering I wanted to do.

</comment><comment><USER2> I think she offers a fresh perspective in American politics. I hope she continues to do so in the future.

</comment><comment><USER3> Said app developer (who's primary source for the quotes and claims) undermines the premise of the article:

 _> I'd like to think that there was an impact, but you can't see who votes for who. I think it played a big role, especially in bringing out folks that had not voted before._

<comment><USER4> He didn't undermine himself. He's reminding the interviewer that the app/tech isn't a magic window that allows him to know how voters voted. The full quote which you excerpted makes clear that he thinks there was a "big role":

> _After we won, we looked back, and Reach accounted for about 10 percent of > our total positive IDs, or in other words, pledged voters. Reach was only > deployed in the last three weeks before the primary. And the difference in > the number of votes between Crowley and Ocasio was about 15 percent. So, I'd > like to think that there was an impact, but you can 't see who votes for > who. I think it played a big role, especially in bringing out folks that had > not voted before._

Keep in mind that ACO was seen as a massive underdog to the incumbent. A 10 percent increase in identified pledged voters is huge in a primary.

<comment><USER3> _> He didn't undermine himself._

I didn't say this.

His quote (with or without the context of the paragraph) necessarily means that his app's impact is not understood. If all we have are self-quotes, that's weak support, too.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Maybe the NY primaries were different, but I don't know that turnout numbers bear out any real material impact from efforts to turn out non-traditional voters.

</comment><comment><USER6> Was there really any doubt that she would win, after she won the primary? Isn't that area so reliably democratic that any primary winner is guaranteed to have the seat?

<comment><USER7> It's about the primary upset.

>When Ocasio-Cortez faced off against 10-term incumbent Joe Crowley in the Democratic primaries in June, the app played a pivotal role in her upset victory, according to Sussan.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> People like Cortez will only hurt the Democrats by moving them further left and moving voters from the middle to alternatives other than democrats

<comment><USER9> Like the Green party? If it's the Green party you should say what you mean, you know.

<comment><USER8> maybe, but 2016 told us a different story.</comment></comment></comment>


"Modeling" isn't the scientific method, folks! - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/JohnCornyn/status/1248581686352318464 <comment><USER2> John Cornyn, Republican Senator from Texas, writes: > could we have a good faith discussion about the uses and abuses of "modeling" to predict the future?

I feel like Republican national leadership, which includes Cornyn, has not acted in good faith since the Clinton administration.

The entire Ken Starr investigation seems to have been a large smear of both Clintons, with a gloss of "principles" to get the media to repeat it endlessly. Yes, Bill Clinton committed perjury. But that was subsequent to a very long, apparently politically motivated investigation of a lot of other stuff that turned up nothing.

The N Benghazi Inquiries seems to have been conducted to smear Hillary Clinton, again with a gloss of "principle" to get the media to repeat Republican claims uncritically.

The entire Republican Tea Party seems to have been a propaganda effort to capitalize on Obama's race.

McConnell seems to have kept the Obama administration from doing anything effective about Russian interference in the 2016 elections.

You can dispute these things on some technical grounds, but there's nothing other than "bad faith" that explains all of them.

So why should anyone try to have a "good faith" discussion with Cornyn about scientific models? Beyond that, what models are we going to delve into? Biological/epidemiological only? Thermodynamics? Mechanics of materials? These latter 2 topics are filled with models, and they work reasonably well, allowing modern engineering. I think Cornyn isn't really even acting in good faith asking for a "good faith" discussion of scientific models.</comment>


A nanotube material conducts heat in just one direction - <AUTHOR> https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614856/a-nanotube-material-conducts-heat-in-just-one-direction/ <comment><USER2> Headline is misleading. The nanotubes conduct well along the longitudinal axis (in both directions :) parallel to their alignment, but transverse conduction is orders of magnitude lower.

This could lead to very useful materials.</comment>


Repokémon – Showcase of GitHub Repos with Pokémon Names - <AUTHOR> https://cheeaun.github.io/repokemon/ <comment><USER2> These are some of the best repos actually _about_ Pokemon

[https://github.com/pret/](https://github.com/pret/)

</comment><comment><USER3> I had a project[1] that was named after a Pokemon. It was a mustache[2] parser so I named it Entei because he has a very fashionable mustache. I changed the name[3] to chevron because I didn't want to deal with Nintendo's lawyers.

[1] [https://github.com/noahmorrison/chevron](https://github.com/noahmorrison/chevron) [2] [https://mustache.github.io/](https://mustache.github.io/) [3] [https://github.com/noahmorrison/chevron/commit/42a028f597171...](https://github.com/noahmorrison/chevron/commit/42a028f597171e3ef9eacad8be5b79099c048c75)

<comment><USER4> If you're worried about lawyers, why change it to the name of one of the largest companies in the world?

<comment><USER5> Chevron is also a generic dictionary word. (A line or stripes as an inverted V). Its used on military uniforms.

And the term "chevron" was used in the game starship titanic, where I learned its meaning.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Related: My company recently announced that they were phasing out our VMWare licenses in favor of something called Metapod:

[https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/cloud-systems- managem...](https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/cloud-systems- management/metapod/index.html)

I still can't take it seriously.

</comment><comment><USER7> Would a company send a DMCA notice for a github repo whose title is a trademarked character's name? (Is there a MickeyMouse project?)

<comment><USER8> I don't think DMCA can be used for trademark infringement, just copyright.

<comment><USER9> In theory that's true, but in practice it gets used for that.

<comment><USER10> And if they do that, they commit a felony.

That is, if it's actually a DMCA claim and if that DMCA claim is patently invalid (trademarks are not covered by copyright, so filing a DMCA claim on trademark grounds would be obviously invalid).

Most of the time the things people call "DMCAs" aren't actual DMCA takedown requests, though. For example YouTube blocks a lot of content based on automated flagging which doesn't even invoke the DMCA -- illegitimate flagging isn't illegal, it's often not even a violation of the ToS, even if it causes lost revenue.

<comment><USER9> SFAIK (IANAL), the perjury bit only applies if they claim in a DMCA takedown to represent a copyright holder they do not actually represent, so I'm not clear on what you're saying about a felony.

While I certainly agree that abusing DMCA notices is a bad thing, I have only ever seen a few really egregious filings get punished and even that was marginal. I'm honestly surprised that there hasn't been more pushback. I've seen some pretty idiotic filings...

<comment><USER10> IANAL either, but filing a DMCA takedown request to claim copyright infringement where there is none is always perjury. You don't have to claim you own something someone else does, you merely have to claim infringement where there is none -- that's far easier to mess up.

So using a DMCA takedown request because of a trademark infringement if there isn't also a copyright infringement would be perjury because you're making a bogus claim. AFAICT this would only matter if both sides ended up pursuing legal action (i.e. the DMCA counter-claim is resisted).

The only example of DMCA abuse being punished I've seen so far is the infamous YouTube drama between thunderf00t and VenomFangX (who ended up reading a prepared statement as part of an out-of-court settlement with tf00t to avoid facing legal consequences).

I think most people aren't willing to actually sue DMCA trolls or are unsure about their actual legal position. It's certainly understandable why a company like Google might be more likely to just follow the rules instead of taking a stand as long as they're not affected directly. And tools like YouTube's automated content claims completely circumvent the need for "content owners" to invoke DMCA and risk legal consequences.

<comment><USER9> Well, the only part of a DMCA claim that you swear to be true under penalty of perjury is simply that you are authorized to represent the copyright holder of the work you're claiming is infringed upon.

Not saying you can't get in trouble for anything else, I just haven't seen that yet, other than some out of court settlements (I don't remember yours, but I've heard about others).

I certainly do wish that more people would bring some of the utterly bogus claims to the attention of the relevant courts or bar associations (assuming they bear the signature of an actual lawyer).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Ever since learning how Java's Swing got its name[0], Pokemon are actually my go-to for project codenames. They're fun and memorable, and Nintendo is litigious enough that there's no way you can actually release something with the name of a pokemon.

[0] [https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing...](https://blogs.oracle.com/thejavatutorials/entry/why_is_swing_called_swing)

</comment><comment><USER12> Related: I had an evening project making a Pokémon Go icon set / emoji pack for Slack:

[https://github.com/israelvicars/pkmn-go- emoji](https://github.com/israelvicars/pkmn-go-emoji)

@andyjiang / @lambtron was kind enough to add them to the emojipacks project:

[https://github.com/lambtron/emojipacks](https://github.com/lambtron/emojipacks)

<comment><USER13> Lambtron? Named after the Chinpokomon?

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> What happens when many repos by different Github users have the same pokémon's name?

<comment><USER15> Yeap, the one with most stars. I was thinking of getting most forks if say multiple repos with exact same number of stars, but I guess I was lazy.

<comment><USER16> Why don't find a way to list them all? You can click a Pokemon and a list pops under just like an iTunes album.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm sorry but could someone explain to me the point of this?

I can see it be amusing to have repos with pokemon names, but for practicality, I would have no idea what they are for by reading the name.

<comment><USER18> There are a TON of names for projects and companies that are not related at all to what they do. Is Apple a fruit company?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> This is cool! Is there a way to sort by popularity?

<comment><USER15> Thanks! Currently no sort/filters. I'm planning to add those soon :)

By popularity, do you mean the repos or the pokemon?

<comment><USER20> > By popularity, do you mean the repos or the pokemon?

Yes :)

(I would assume repo popularity, as pokemon popularity can already be found elsewhere)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> How does it find the repositories?

<comment><USER15> I wrote a script to call the GitHub search api for every single name [https://github.com/cheeaun/repokemon/blob/master/scripts/rep...](https://github.com/cheeaun/repokemon/blob/master/scripts/repokemon.js)</comment></comment>


Facebook's Own Estimates Show Declining Student Numbers - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebooks_own_estimates_show_youth_flight_from_sit.php <comment><USER2> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Z29STlNh1w>

<comment><USER3> lol, if true facebook will be in a lot of trouble.</comment></comment>