Article is spot on about mongodb being ideal for online games. We use it as the main datastore for our latest game, and it has worked out very well for us. My main gripes with it has been key values taking up too much space and how difficult it is to shard. I think Rethink DB will be even better once that matures.
Bad comparison because squabbling in China is more like between brothers in that they are trying to gain power over the family, and not trying to break away from it. Chinese Nationalism is probably as strong now as ever, and I think the chances of breakup among the core provinces that aren't already independent are very low.
I think your reaction is mostly an emotional speculation based on your dislike of their technology. As you pointed out yourself, we do not know the financials, their adoption rate numbers or other relevant facts to make a sound judgement on the valuation.
I absolutely would buy the stock if I had insight into the relevant information and liked what I saw.
The result of this experiment would be mostly useless unless the results were stark and causation can be traced back to this policy via other methods. It doesn't control for the millions of other factors that could affect the outcome.
Sigh, I'll bite. Tired of cable news quality comments presenting very debatable opinions as fact, especially without any concrete arguments, evidence, sources or otherwise real facts. On top of that being tangential to the post. Here is just one indicator that points in the opposite direction of your claims.
You're mistaken on workers rights being a response to asymmetric information, it's a response to asymmetry in power. However, whether or not an IB worker's power position is exploitive is more arguable.
IANAL, but I doubt that threatening someone with actions that are legal is against the law. I can threaten to eat a Twinkie unless you give me one million dollars if I feel like it. Or a more relevant example is a patent troll blackmailing for licensing fees.
So is this production ready? Excited about this, but I don't have time at the moment to dabble on things I can't use and the last comment regarding this is a post on Quora from the founder saying that it is not production ready yet. 1.0+ version numbers makes you think this isn't beta software anymore, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
It's not a mental block, it's because it is plausible. Just because it hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean it won't happen. In the extreme scenario, if technology advances to the point where it does nearly everything better than humans for practical necessities, it is unknown how much that will affect employment and society as we know it. In my mind, it's not a matter of if it will happen, but how far away we are from that reality. We could be 100 years away or 1000 years away and that's where the more interesting argument lies.
As a mobile app developer, We've been threatened by trolls before as well. So far non of them have followed through and filed suit and the strategy of ignoring them has worked out for us. However, our lawyer helped us gauge the litigation risk before we made the decision to do nothing.
Yes, I agree. However, I don't think website designs have as much of a smart cow problem as say pop music, so your "DRM" is more likely to succeed its goal.
Because it makes very little business sense to do so. The upside of selling is near zero because it would not make a dent in their bottom line or their future outlook, while there are many downsides to selling, some of which you have mentioned.
You're right that his mathematical assumptions are wrong, but I wouldn't hand wave away sound financial math reasoning if you want to make informed investment decisions.
Your analysis is incorrect because having to spend 25k + inflation 30 years from now is not the same as spending it today. To calculate properly, future expenditures need to be discounted according to return minus inflation compounded over the duration. So unless you're claiming that you can't safely get a return above inflation, his parents will come out ahead.
Another thing that is annoying about it is the fuzzy text when you zoom in. They must be using web views in a non standard way because the built in HTML viewer usually re-renders text as you zoom.
Hate to be a Debbie downer, but I have a hard time seeing the economics of this working out for the publisher although I'm sure it's a great experience for the kids. Most of these apps probably won't break even so they will need to have a mega hit to make it work, which seems unlikely given the competition of professionally made large budget (comparatively) games and extremely talented and dedicated indie developers.
Awesome work! But I have to agree with cantankerous. This is more about programming than computer science. If the premise is that a student should learn programming before computer science that's fine, but the curriculum should be labeled as such. The drawing tutorial video highlights this point for me when it makes a false assertion about coordinate systems in "computer science". More than just arguing semantics, this could create false expectations among students of what they are learning compared to university computer science programs.
Don't know anything about the Pet Rock, and you can poke fun all you want, but it doesn't change the fact that this title has significant revenue that is more likely to go up than down under Zynga in at least the medium term due to reasons such as:
- Cross promotion
- platform leverage
- historical performance of similar games
- and all of this operating in a market segment (mobile gaming) that is exploding not contracting.
Yes, I would pay $200mm for a game that nets $250k/day or $91.25mm/year. Assuming Zynga does nothing but maintain the revenue, it will make back it's investment in a little over 2 years. How many investments opportunities are out there that net you a ~40% yield!? Of course there is risk with an investment like this, but this is after all, their core business and they are probably very good at mitigating those risks.
Cool game and concept. Lots of fun. Now some feedback:
1) The touch logic on the blocks is frustrating for me on the iPhone. It takes me several tries to move a block. It thinks I want to scroll half the time, or doesn't register the touch with block. Maybe the block touch zone should be bigger than the block itself.
2.) Putting ads directly in the level seems distasteful to me and ruins the immersive experience. Would rather have them in-between levels or at start up.
I only have limited experience with things like this, but my advice would be to not let them pressure you into anything.
As a rule of thumb though, you probably won't be able negotiate a good deal unless you're willing to walk away from it. They will have way more leverage over you if they know you are desperate to sell.
When negotiating, I find it very helpful to switch positions and think about it from the opposing perspective. What are their motivations for acquiring your company? What is it worth to them? How much do they want your company? Could they easily acquire someone else or duplicate the same functionality. Knowing the answers to these questions and gathering as much relevant information from them can help you gain more bargaining power. Ideally, you want to sell your company at what it is worth to them, and not you, because there could be a gap in your favor.
Disagree that having a broad incentive is good enough for this case. This is an example of how hard it is to create an effective broad incentive. Since drugs can be created under the shelter of limited liability of corporations, people will just find a way around it. Shell corporations would be much more likely to risk other human lives than the FDA would. In addition to that, if the expected value of a risky drug is still positive, then many corporations may still rationally opt to proceed with the drug.
Yeah, the landing page sold me on clicking "start reading", but was sorely disappointed after I clicked. Too much friction just to read a page. To your point about limiting anonymous access in order to create a community like HN. HN doesn't require an account for reading. You are more likely to convert users if you allow some kind of anonymous access.