numakerg

Sounds like Canada Computers. I'd start by introducing source control and tests. Those are low cost with a high impact on stability.

Having a following on social media has great benefits for regular techies, not just influencers and entertainers, etc. It lets you magnify your resume to reach people with authority who you normally couldn't connect with. It helps you get spots at conferences, seats on cool new projects or positions that you can further leverage to increase your online fame and bump up your compensation. You can also use your following to get preferential treatment with companies and authorities, have your problems solved faster. Got your app removed from the Play Store with no explanation? Raise a stink on Twitter.

That's one of the reasons why people are so quick to join the fray and throw a punch. They want to be that one quick Tweet that goes viral, gets them thousands of followers and builds their brand.

I'm curious, what's the obstacle? Can't they take the display from the hololens, make it smaller and integrate it into one eye of an existing headset that the military uses?

I don't work with the tech, but is there a use case for operating drones in the field?

You want to peek around a corner or under a door, drop a tiny robot. Operate it with a handheld joystick and get a camera feed into your headset while still maintaining your regular field of vision.

Final product won't necessarily take the form of the hololens. Might just be an attachment to whatever standard equipment they have, more like a Google glass.

ViewTube is also a userscript that offers the same functionality and more.

http://sebaro.pro/viewtube/

> losing half of his fortune in the case of a failed marriage

Marriage isn't a necessity for this to happen. In some jurisdictions (e.g. Canada) you even don't have to have been married to pay alimony in the case of a split.

I don't know what it is, but I actually find a visual of the speaker to improve the tutorial, even if it's not strictly necessary for the material. I think it helps with engagement.

> sold over a million books

Perhaps I was the one stretching with my "cursory search", because I missed the pseudonym. A million sales is certainly "famous" from any reasonable standpoint.

> famous sci fi author

If it's the same author I found based on a cursory search from your profile, then "famous" is a bit of a stretch.

> Where I think it hurt was we didn't do any group social activities and lived in remote places

I got a similar feeling reading about Chris Paolini. Homeschooled, raised in a remote place. Fed a lot of his early life experiences, particularly travel, into his novels but felt alienated from other kids.

>Then I just got tired of having to Google obscure Linux issues, edit config files, and reboot all the time.

So is this the normal state of Linux then? Every few years I'll take some time to try and "learn Linux" by installing a distro and try to use it as part of my regular workflow. It's always been a never ending train of very specific and obscure, time consuming issues. My personal motto for Linux is "It Just Doesn't Work" (at least for desktop). Even basic stuff like Wi-Fi and the login screen often doesn't work correctly and requires more tweaking. Using MacOS, it's different and you have to get used to things. But it's not an bottomless pit of time sunk into fixing configurations. Windows isn't perfect, but at least I don't feel like I'm wasting my time.

To be fair I don't think Linux is bad (obviously or it wouldn't be widely used), just that those who like it, either enjoy solving these issues or started with it during a time when they could spare the effort, and so they built up enough experience for it to no longer be a chore.

>I did get one of those telemetry killer apps

Which one do you use?

Here's a concern I'd have investing in this space. What percent of the population* prefers receiving physical photos from loved ones instead of digital ones, and how do you expect that group to change within the next few decades?

* Within the geographic area that you plan to serve, e.g. USA and potentially Canada, West Europe

I really have to applaud your courage to start in a space that's already occupied. I know I couldn't do something that wasn't absolutely novel because the marketing chops aren't there.

EDIT: Absolutely brilliant. Your service is the top result on Google for "send photos to grandparent" and you snuck an ad into the featured result listicle. Not to mention this very "informative post" that doubles as an ad.

How did you develop your marketing skills?

I recall the GeForce Partner Program raised some controversy, although I couldn't say whether or it was bad or good or why.

There's also the issue with them refusing to open source Linux drivers. Supposedly this is because they throttle workstation GPUs to create a market for higher-end versions while reducing the manufacturing diversity, but I haven't heard a definitive source for this.

> I founded Amazon 26 years ago with the long-term mission of making it Earth’s most customer-centric company

I wonder if he still thinks that's the case.

> Symptoms among others include anxiety, depression and irritability.

It wasn't until the late 1800s that the miasma theory of disease was overturned in acceptance by germ theory. At some point in the next century, computers will become powerful enough to closely simulate the entire human body. We'll be able to hook up our bodies and compare them to a common model in a sort of "debugging" process. I think what we'll find is a diverse host of viruses and parasites, or other curable abnormalities that are responsible for mental health problems.

Even if that's the case (and I disagree that it is), I'm sure there are "satellite families" with the breadwinner working in Europe.

Then shouldn't the government be closing this loophole and taxing whatever vehicle they use to transfer wealth?

I'd criticize an individual for evading taxes, but a "group" of people is just doing what people do.

EDIT: If you want to talk about the "functional" value of immigrants, then you need to get to the root purpose and bring in whoever is having the most kids.

In what part of my writing did I suggest that it was exclusionary?

> It's not a case of, OK let's hire 20 more black people and it's over. The reality is that, well first you have to find them, and then you have to see if they qualify for a job you are actually hiring for.

I was addressing this statement from the author, suggesting that if my perception of the education system is accurate then it could be difficult to find those developers if barriers at school aren't also broken. Maybe my perception is wrong, but that's why we have discussions.

> I have almost no say at what happens at my local University. Do you?

I do. I am an alumni and can contribute to scholarships that fund students in underrepresented categories. As a student, I published articles supporting my (what I would consider progressive) political positions that opened up discussions but also received significant criticism.

> Seeking out how to help POC programmers in the workforce doesn't mean we can't also work to improve the American education gap. We have a lot of time in the day, after all.

Hopefully. I'm not American, so I can't say much. Best I can do is listen and think about what I do and say.

Thank you for writing this. If there's at least one thing I hope everyone can agree is a positive, it's people sharing their perspectives like this.

> look around the office, you immediately notice that black people aren't there.

You're right, there aren't. One in ten people in my city is black, but I would estimate* fewer than one in forty developers at my work are. But there were just as few in my college classes, in my tech clubs, advanced mathematics classes, and any other place that would lead a person to software development. I think we need to address the problems with diversity in those place at the same time as we deal with the workplace problems.

* All the obvious caveats apply. I'm not going to project an identity onto someone else.

> My masseters were huge

I wonder how perception of one's own face changes the way people seek treatment for bruxism. A lot of men would view large masseters as a good thing in their own face.

Despite it being written in English, I think this letter is intended for a more domestic audience.

Comparing Russia to the USA is like comparing potatoes to oranges. One is a child of royalty, chasing their dreams and living the in the lap of luxury while the other is a child of poverty, struggling for most of their life, a fleeting moment of success before their past catches up to them.

Mark as spam doesn't notify the sender

I'm glad you asked. Just two examples off the top of my head:

1. No timestamps on chat. Returning a product can require multiple chat sessions over the course of a week, where each representative swears on their mother's grave that in the next 48 hours we'll get an email and everything will be sorted out. They leave out timestamps so you can't clearly see that they've left you hanging for 15-20 minutes between each message.

2. Switching back to the recurring (vs. one-time) purchase option for some products each time you make a change to the order.

Numerous other issues, many of which are features that sellers exploit (mostly around reviews) and that Amazon isn't interested in fixing because they profit from those sales.

The intolerable frequency of dark pattern on Amazon's site has made me very bitter. If I can find another store to fulfill the order online, I'll go there, even if it costs a little more. Retailers like Costco and Bestbuy have comparable shipping speeds anyways.

My naive suggestion. "Hard" unsubscribe button that tosses all future emails from this list in the trash and mails the sender a note that the address has unsubscribed from this list and all future emails will be ignored.

Gmail has over a billion active users. Mailing lists will probably adapt to whatever crumbs Google leaves on the doorstep.

Wouldn't that link the account to the device's hardware ID and by extension, all the other accounts you've made on that device?

> Are you advocating for profit sharing/wealth redistribution in a really indirect way?

Why not? I would support mandatory stock options based on the number of employees. In reality though, I think it would be defeated by creative accounting just like taxation.

I disagree. It's more of a drought where the smaller trees with low reserves die out, and in the recovery the large trees grow even larger and take up the remaining canopy space.

The economic consequences of the pandemic will make things fundamentally worse for the average person. The wealthiest entities will accumulate even more wealth, because they have the resources to survive, to petition the government for assistance over smaller players, and to buy out the leftover pieces of those who couldn't survive. In the end, the majority of the bailout will go to the rich, because they are the ones with the bargaining power. The result is lower competition, which is worse for almost everybody.

The only upside could be a shifting technological landscape. Work-from-home and physical distancing could create demand for new solutions which would be capitalized by smaller, agile companies, creating new competition. That's what I'm hoping for anyway.

EDIT: I don't know if that's how a drought actually works. The demand for new tech is already here, it's a question of whether it will stay long-term.