casralad (u/casralad)

casralad commented on CNN+ streaming service is shutting down a month after launching wsj.com/articles/warner-b... · Posted by u/cwwc

ComradePhil · 4 years ago

They chose terrible timing to launch it.

They should have either done it while Trump was in office or whenever Democrats lose the election next time... because that's when their primary audience seems to seek comfort in their stories about how they are in the right and how the opposition are the bad guys.

In CNNs defense, they propably planned this with the expectation that Trump would win the second term.

casralad · 4 years ago

>their primary audience seems to seek comfort in their stories about how they are in the right and how the opposition are the bad guys.

Jesus fucking Christ. What would the opposition have to do for you to believe they are the bad guys? Like a coup or something?

casralad commented on Ask HN: How different is it to make an Android app vs. an Apple app? · Posted by u/taurusnoises

rkangel · 4 years ago

The received wisdom was that for many years it was easier to make money from Apple customers. Despite the fact that there were fewer iPhones compared to Androids the theory was that iPhone customers tended to have more money and were willing to spend to get things. The Android ecosystem was also much larger and you had to test on more phones to get confidence in the performance of your app across the customer base. So from a developer point of view, you're solving a simpler problem for more money.

In practice actually iPhone 'fragmentation' is surprisingly bad in terms of how UIs would render unexpectedly on different phones - still probably easier than Android but levels the playing field a bit more, Android market share grew and went more upmarket, cross platform frameworks improved and the whole practice has become less common.

casralad · 4 years ago

>cross platform frameworks improved

No serious mobile application is built with a cross platform framework. It's a development strategy that relies on the product being "good enough".

Please prove me wrong. I would love to see counter-examples.

casralad commented on The off-screen workers who keep the adult webcam industry running restofworld.org/2022/colo... · Posted by u/imartin2k

casralad · 4 years ago

It's a little like AOL in the 1990s. A great business model, but one that won't outlast reliable internet access from service providers. Businesses like webcam studios bridge the gap until internet access catches up.

There are unsexy, short term business models for entrepreneurs.

casralad commented on Ask HN: Are the 2020s the decade of peak homogenisation? · Posted by u/spiffotron

casralad · 4 years ago

No.

"Netflix / Disney etc seem to have copped onto one idea that works and just release the same tv show / movie over and over again with a slight tweak as it brings the money in without any worries."

This is the golden age of streaming. There's more diversity in show types on Netflix alone than across all platforms (movies, tv, direct to video) in the 90s. Paramount is almost entirely devoted to new Star Trek properties and HBO Max releases a new movie every month. If you aren't seeing innovation in story-telling its because you are a Philistine.

This question has real "kids today" energy.

casralad commented on ‘We’re a Cult’: Inside Bitcoin’s Shameless Hypefest thedailybeast.com/inside-... · Posted by u/throwaway4good

exdsq · 4 years ago

> In more than a decade, crypto has still not found a viable use-case.

In my eyes, having an alternative to high-inflation currencies around South America and Africa is one hell of a use case.

casralad · 4 years ago

It's not usable as a currency except in the most dire circumstances and no one is working to fix this. Transactional currency has been abandoned as a goal by every major crypto project, and it doesn't make a sensible replacement for currencies in functioning economies. If the only use case is as a currency alternative for people in a failed state, it's not a compelling technology, and it's not even doing that right now.

Dotcom companies were offering services that hundreds of millions of people could use around the world. There was a bubble and many tech valuations were stupid, but people used Webvan to solve a problem. No one is using crypto for anything other than speculation on the price of crypto.

casralad commented on ‘We’re a Cult’: Inside Bitcoin’s Shameless Hypefest thedailybeast.com/inside-... · Posted by u/throwaway4good

spaetzleesser · 4 years ago

Crypto is basically the same as the .COM bubble in the end 90s. There is some real technology that may be useful but most fanboys don’t have the slightest idea what this is about other than it being supposed to make them rich. They complain about people not “having faith”, they latch on some vague news, “gurus” everywhere. It’s exactly the same.

Add real estate in 2008 and now to the list. It’s kind of sad that our economy focuses so much on bubbles and get rich quick schemes while eroding the benefits for workers who do a solid job on real things.

casralad · 4 years ago

Pets.com and WebVan were exemplary of the dotcom bubble. They had insane valuations and a problematic business model, but investors poured money in because of hype. But both those services are legitimate, profitable through other companies today. They were just too early, maybe too hyped.

I got groceries from WebVan in the 90s. I bought books from Amazon in the 90s. I used Yahoo.com to find information in the 90s. These were services with value even if the companies didn't make it.

Crypto has provided no value other than making some people money. It has solved no problem. In more than a decade, crypto has still not found a viable use-case.

casralad commented on The state of burnout in tech, 2022 edition [pdf] f.hubspotusercontent30.ne... · Posted by u/mooreds

kelseyfrog · 4 years ago

End overtime exemption. If an org can push workers for more work without paying them more, why wouldn't they? Solving this problem requires systems-level thinking. Understanding the incentives that result in burnout-creating interactions is key to creating new incentives that don't induce burnout.

The quickest way to not fixing burnout is assuming that it is a natural part of software development, that it's up to individuals to manage their own boundaries, or that the industry is impossible to change. None of these are entirely false nor entirely true, but they do nothing to affect change.

Is the end of overtime exemption a silver bullet? No, but it is a critical step toward creating incentives that do address worker burnout. It shifts a manager's choice from "push the team harder to get out a feature and deal with the consequences later" to "push the team harder and it costs $X."

There is a key piece of perspective that helps to understand this - management rarely has clarity in their business decisions. What drives management toward pushing workers to work more and ignoring burnout is that building product has a more tangible result than burnout. You may ask, "no, management weighs the costs and benefits!" Maybe yours does, but when the benefits are easier to quantify than the costs, the decision is clear.

This is why putting a dollar amount on the decision is so important. It shifts the decision to "possibly build it faster for $X" where the dollar cost amount has more clarity than the benefits. It doesn't mean management chooses not to build faster every time, but the decision framing does change the response. Anyone in management knows what clarity in business decisions means and how it affects outcomes.

casralad · 4 years ago

I support this. Overtime is free labor and the market should be regulated by the government to prohibit this.

That said, I've been a software engineer for over twenty years and most of those years I've worked under 40 hours a week and rarely worked overtime.

casralad commented on Ask HN: Books to read when you transform from SWE into SWE Management? · Posted by u/DDerTyp

casralad · 4 years ago

Software Engineering at Google [https://abseil.io/resources/swe-book]

casralad commented on What to do if a cop tries to scan your face during a traffic stop gizmodo.com/can-police-us... · Posted by u/danso

casralad · 4 years ago

Abolition is the only path forward. You can't reform this.

casralad commented on Ask HN: Where do you get your non-tech news from? · Posted by u/bonhasgone

casralad · 4 years ago

Twitter.