idoh

I wasn't super involved, but they (the office in Ukraine) liked getting USD and people who visited would often carry an envelope with cash in it when traveling for business trips from the US to there.

There was some other thing with using US based debit cards over there, apparently it was an easier flow to fill up the US accounts and have them use it over there than to do a bank to bank transfer.

Having done some amount of business in Ukraine, I can attest to how hard it is to move money into that country. Crypto really solves that use case, provided that there's some trading inside the country as well as flowing in.

Yup, a nice MacBook Pro. I have no use for it though, I'm probably just going to wipe it and sell it or give it to someone that needs it.

I was one of the 17% laid off from CircleCI today. It's true, we did get to keep our laptops :) As for reasons, it doesn't seem to be from any current woes in the numbers (or at least from the stats I saw).

So, um, anyone looking for a PM with experience in security or data privacy? Hit me up!

I'm happy to answer any questions I can, and good luck to all those who've been laid off recently (at Circle or otherwise).

It's difficult to say whether Google should be worried about AI-powered chat. However, as AI technology continues to advance, it's likely that we will see more and more AI-powered chat systems that are able to perform a wide range of tasks. While this may pose a challenge for Google and other companies in the tech industry, it could also open up new opportunities for them to develop and improve their own AI-powered chat systems. Ultimately, the success of AI-powered chat systems will depend on how well they are able to meet the needs of users.

(the above was generated by GPT Chat …)

Fascinating. Dude needed to crack open a Taleb book.

That’s an amazing article. It sounds like the he’s never heard of the kelly criterion, just makes massive bet after massive bet and then blows up. He does have ~1 billion more than me even after this mess, so maybe it all worked out.

What crime was committed? I'm asking in a neutral way. Simply losing billions of dollars of other people's money isn't necessarily illegal.

As far as I can tell there are no hr monitors that can connect to chest straps. If one did then instant purchase. But I like the other tracking and sync of Apple Watch too, that would be a bonus.

Same - something like a headless Apple Watch would be ideal. I legit just want HR tracking and connecting to a chest strap HR monitor, and no watch display, other than the current HR.

I took it more along the lines of "this advice is not generally applicable" as opposed to dunking on Wolfram.

I've tried both. While I enjoyed the setup with Anarki better (in particular using the repl to make live inspections and changes), Racket is vastly more supported by docs and the community. So if you are a CS pro and don't mind figuring out everything for yourself then Anarki is plausible, otherwise it's kinda crazy to go that way.

If you have a tool that can generate great returns, then why fall back to a newsletter?

Can you elaborate? When I think of tech I think of venture funded (equity side), not debt funded.

Hey, sorry this is happening to you. I've been there, and it is no fun. Probably time to start looking for something new. Maybe it says something about you, maybe not. I've seen people who change managers or companies and really blossom, so it can be about fit.

In any case, reading between the lines it sounds like you've worked at places before, so just have confidence in your skills and move boldly and confidently into the future. If you can't do that, just fake the confidence vibe as much as possible.

Apple is amazing at solving problems customers wished they had.

Can you elaborate more on making pens with a lathe? I'm a total newb but have some ideas on what I want (steel pen with a knurled grip, for example). What am I looking at if I get into this?

I work at Circle, but not on this specifically, and echo the same experience. This (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khazzoom–Brookes_postulate) was cited last week in a meeting that I was in, for example.

What a fascinating and sad article. $0.10 an hour is an unreal, unreasonably low rate. And the lack of necessities like soap is startling.

I happen to be really good at passing the product sense part of PM interviews. There's a bit too much to cram into a single comment, but the general outline is:

A - make sure to really understand the question, the constraints. Write down the question, and ask about every word. Have a cheat sheet of questions to ask. E.g. what's the timeline, what's the target OS, what's the goal, etc.

B - segment the different possible users. Use MECE for this. The more insight the better.

C - pick a segment and explain why, e.g. not well served by the market. As a bit of a trick pick a community that's generally not well served. Never segment on age, that's boring.

D - segment their pain points, again using MECE.

E - pick a pain point, describe why.

F - brainstorm solutions, pick one, explain why. Make sure to only pick one!

G - talk about how you'd measure success.

... and there you go. There are lots of online services that can give you practice. I used Exponent, seemed reasonable. It's not crazy to spend $50-100 bucks to get better at this given the return.

You can increase density.

I was able to do it somewhat on Twitter. There is a disallow list that you can add entries into. Every time you see a tweet that seems political, find the key word and add it to the list. Trump / Biden / red / blue / gun and so on.

Just speculating, but if you create a new account and then spam some positive reviews people will notice and downvote / get you banned from the sub-reddit. If you have some built up history it looks more legit to the other community members.

site:reddit.com works and I use it often. But I do wonder how long it will be until reddit starts to get gamed as well (if it isn't already).

Agreed, and that's kinda what I was saying. Theoretically it could work, in practice, not so much.

The caveat is that I've never actually spent time in a prison, my understanding of the setup is that the base level experience is that you stay in your cell / rec room, and can go outside to the yard like an hour a day. Beyond that, you can volunteer (or get paid some small amount) to help out in various ways, like working laundry, barber shop, kitchen, library, etc. I don't think any of these pays minimum wage. Adding another thing that prisoners can opt into doesn't seem crazy or exploitive, if it is truly just another choice that they can make.

A question for the field: If working in a prison factory is completely optional, e.g. you can choose to work in the factory at $1 per hour, or the barbershop, or the kitchen, then is this OK?

If executed well it seems OK, but given what we know about how well prisons are run it seems like the temptation for abuse is too great to allow.

Agree that this was not in line with selling books and other things, but that's more of an expansion and not a pivot.

Amazon always had ambitions to go beyond books, that's not a pivot.

That's a funny joke. It does make me think about concepts and organizations and how they can drift. I don't think the Ship of Theseus has drifted much, but I think it totally applies to organizations and who is a member, e.g. people who supported the French Revolution / a school board / people who identify as liberal or conservative, etc.