Somehow I managed to miss when that article came across HN, and they auto-detect mobile devices so I couldn't read it till I got home, but it is a much better fit that the typical ones people assign. It's a somewhat flawed analogy though, if you have 6 bee stings and can relieve one, there's noticeable improvement. A better description would be "Imagine you get stung 6 times per day and you have the option to treat one sting a week". The entire problem is that they're losing ground every day and any progress they make is to lose less ground per day, not actually making forward progress.