Due to a programming error, the results of the 2012 DV lottery were rescinded | Hacker News Reader

Due to a programming error, the results of the 2012 DV lottery were rescinded

en.wikipedia.org

3 pointstroels3 comments

Why do people program this stuff themselves?

    shuf -n22000 < list.all | sort > list.lucky

I am interested to know why they have the problem only this year? They are not using the same algorithm before? Or they just discovered the problem now but can't do anything to the previous lottery winners?

One article says that it was a new program. Apparently they chose to rewrite it, for some reason.

I wonder what the bug was though - They mention that 90% of those selected are from the first two days of registration.

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