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chris_mahan

1,483 karma · joined June 25, 2012

http://christophermahan.com/
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chris_mahan··on Ask HN: What is the most exciting development in your field right now?
As a writer, tech and the globalization of English are enabling the hiterto impossible. Still not clearly seen but glimpsed as shadows behind screens, they either scare the timid or thrill the brave. They are coming.
chris_mahan··on Ask HN: What is the most exciting development in your field right now?
I don't have just one field.

In programming in companies: realization that internal customers not having choice of internal IT providers hurts IT because it reduces IT's need to deliver valuable solutions effectively.

In leadership: management structure is a framework to enforce standardization and generally doesn't adapt well to change, even with the latest management silver bullets (lean, Agile, flat-orgs, etc)

Also in leadership: profound changes are occuring in society and geographies no longer define cultures.

In commercial writing: it's still early, and this takes time, but the concept of the "book" and how it's created is changing. Technologies that allow writers, editors, and beta readers to work on the manuscript simultaneously are increasing the velocity of change.

In art in general: someone else here mentioned music creation and payment is enabling entrants to sustain themselves in niche markets. This is happening in nearly all art forms, not just music. As electronic transfer fidelity increases, more art can be digitized, monetized. Look for more politicized, more global-reach art.

All these things stem from a greater understanding of the world and of human beings, starting with ourselves. It's important to realize each human being is a highly complex system and that generalizations about groups of humans are increasingly being challenged as scientifically unsound.

chris_mahan··on My Love-Hate Relationship with Stack Overflow
I was one of those who left. I let my adminship elapse after 10 years.

I also don't contribute much to SO, or to any SE properties, despite being on the early public beta. (remember the signup as a google spreadhseet). I'm ID 479 on SO.

chris_mahan··on Run Crouton in a Chrome OS Window
nice :)
chris_mahan··on Self Hell in Python
I don't test (2 + 2) to make sure it equals 4.
chris_mahan··on Amazon just told me to log into someone else's account – and delete it
Just forward them all to privacy@amazon.com?
chris_mahan··on The Real Amazons
That's a nice article. I found the style good, the content interesting.
chris_mahan··on Mac App Store: The Subtle Exodus
I've been doing debian on server for years.

I decided to go ubuntu 14.whatever on a laptop that had XP on it (Acer One) and keep it as-is, as a new user.

I was pleasantly surprised. install was smooth, all hardware works, and I just installed firefox, and it all works (99% of flash works).

I use it for gmail, facebook, twitter, ello, surfing, etc. The machine is underpowered for full-motion video, but oh well, it was $349 6 years ago.

I use terminal to ssh into remote servers, and I've done no configuration at all on the machine. it works fine.

chris_mahan··on Amazon to Open First Brick-and-Mortar Location
They ship by drone from the warehouse to the store in 30 minutes. You order something, 30 minutes later, after you drink an expensive latte and use their free wifi to watch some TV show from their network, you get your hard-to-find item, and you go home happy.
chris_mahan··on What we did about expired links on HN
I just resigned myself to stay on the first page on HN.
chris_mahan··on There Is No Maker Movement in China
It's not for everyone. it takes a while to get used to.
chris_mahan··on There Is No Maker Movement in China
follow my name to my website, then contact, then email, send me your email, and I'll send an invite.
chris_mahan··on There Is No Maker Movement in China
I have a few ello invites left.

Update 5:02 PST: All out, sorry.

chris_mahan··on Engineering management lessons
Teach them, mentor them, introduce them to people, give them exciting, challenging projects (for that person)...
chris_mahan··on Marriott Hotels fined $600,000 by FCC for jamming Wi-Fi hotspots [pdf]
Do like me. Don't go to conferences.

Besides, I much prefer spending time with my son reading Asterix the Gaul comic books.

chris_mahan··on FBI blasts Apple, Google for locking police out of phones
I say that because I have a child.
chris_mahan··on FBI blasts Apple, Google for locking police out of phones
if there was a terror group operating in the US, killing 10,000 children a week in all states with bombs, chemicals, and biological weapons, and you tried to stop the government, police, army, and other federal agencies from doing everything possible to stop that and save the lives of 4 year-old kids, you'd likely find yourself in jail or dead.

People in America who grew up on Nintendo and Xbox don't have a clue how stupidly brutal the world can be. This is why these "highly educated people" are "actually for it".

I will grant you that these activities should be under the oversight of the US government, State governments, who represent the People of the United States. The FBI is such a federal government agency.

chris_mahan··on Ways to Minimize Employee Retention
poking fun at people? It's not funny unless it's funny for everyone. Poking fun in a hurtful way is bullying.

Hopefully we never work together.

chris_mahan··on Rethinking the origins of the universe
They're complexity anomalies. Things can't resolve themselves out and so stay in.
chris_mahan··on Ways to Minimize Employee Retention
If your organization needs shaming people publicly in order to be profitable, it won't be.
chris_mahan··on Ways to Minimize Employee Retention
No. It's never, ever appropriate. Ever.
chris_mahan··on I was asked to crack a program in a job interview
What if they just tell you, because they've memorized the IP address of Google? You hire on the spot then?
chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Thanks (yesterday I found dune2 for android (not on GooglePlay though) and it works fine :)
chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Is it available on Steam? Is Dune2 available on Steam?
chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Use the keyboard shortcuts. A attack. M move. (Muscle memory)

Also, use the missile launcher. stay away from missle turret range, and fire one square away from missile tower. Enough missiles miss target, land on turret, that with enough missile launchers you can defeat missile turrets, or bleed enemy spice reserves at least.

Protect your missile launchers with a line of heavy tanks just behind, in case the enemy makes a sortie.

(Ohhh, I have to play it again now... See what you've done!)

chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Ya dune2 is dos based. Once you get used to it, though, it'll be very enjoyable. You can't rely on the Fremen unless you have 5+castles and send them all at once. Watch out or you'll run out of spice and won't be able to repair your missile launchers.
chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Watch out for the big harkonnen missile on the maps with the castle. Enjoy!
chris_mahan··on I'm Leaving Mojang
Minecraft's my favorite game, and my son's. We also both like Dune2. He's 9. (I'm not :)
chris_mahan··on Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang
ohhh, the movie is about making minecraft, like the movie about facebook.

Also, the movie could be about teens who play networked and develop relationships in-game and out of the game.

chris_mahan··on Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang
I smell franchise with movie rights, books, etc. I can imagine it being like Star Wars in a couple years.
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