morganf

Think up, and think down, the tree: you thank your parents for being awesome by, being awesome parents to your own children. (Think of the last line of Shakespeare's Sonnet 13: "You had a father; let your son say so.")

I interviewed my parents, grandparents, and relatives to write a family history for my children. (And my wife's, too.) It was one of the most powerful things I've done, and this process brought our entire family closer together -- and it wasn't easy, there are many tough, painful moments in my parents' and grandparents' lives, including still unresolved fights.

I'd strongly urge any fellow hackers to record their parents' stories for posterity.

Remember, in the third ("developing" they now say!) world, more often than not, factors like who you know, who just likes you, who you bribe, how you get through the bureaucracy -- are much more important than what the law theoretically says. I'm being euphemistic: a difference between developed and undeveloped countries can be seen in how much the letter or the spirit of the law actually matters.

Take Argentina, a case I know far too well. As INC magazine pointed out, the tax rate on businesses goes up to 108% of your profit. (< http://www.inc.com/magazine/201106/doing-business-in-argenti... >). How's that possible? Here's how: the government purposely passes endless contradictory laws thus ensuring you are always breaking the law, just to survive. (A business can't pay 108% of its money in taxes and still survive!). Therefore, you live in a state of somehow doing something illegal. The result? If the government doesn't like you, they find the illegal thing you're doing (that you have to do, just to survive, since the laws are contradictory and unreasonable, like that 108%), and then punish you for "breaking" the law.

Welcome to the jungle, we've got fun and games ;)

Conclusion: If you step into the third/developing world, the key isn't what the law actually says -- but _how sh*t gets done in practice_.

Wow, the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon at work! I just re-read Ecclesiastes 5 minutes before reading your post -- and in the opening lines it says (KJV translation), "One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever." In my previous readings, I had never thought about the phrase "the earth abides" but in this morning's reading I did, and now I just saw it used here in the book title! :)

(PS: yeah, I know this isn't a super on-target tech web 2.0 scalable infrastructure comment like most on HN -- I'm just always in awe of baader-meinhof at work!) :)

I was once arrested and in jail for 12 hours.

I saw a big machine opposite my cell. I asked the guards (standing opposite my cell) what that machine did. They light up with excitement that someone showed interested in and could have a coherent conversation. They spent all night explaining to me and showing to me all the cool technology in the system. That big machine -- apparently for electronic fingerprints to take them and transmit them to some national database but it never worked, they kept on mocking the NYC police dept for adding layers and layers of technology and bureaucratic forms and none of it worked, including that machine. We ended up having an all-night conversation, we got along great. I asked the guards all these things I always wanted to ask policemen but never had the chance to: have you ever bee in a chase (yes, once, on the BQE!). What is the pay like? (Horrible, so they all have second jobs; he also worked at Radio Shack! But they all want to get jobs on Long Island, where the police pay is awesome!). It was a very fascinating and enlightening conversation.

12 hours later, when I was released, the policemen I spent the night talking to, offered to drive me back to my apt. He did and when he dropped me off, he got out of the car and shook my hand. Bizarre experience.

Conclusion: I think the police treated me well because I treated them with respect, and I showed in them.

(And because I'm white and dress well. When I went to the court for the court date a few weeks later... I was the only white person in the entire courthouse, excluding the lawyers and judges. No exaggeration. The judge ended up throwing out my case before the trial even started.)

Unqualified Reservations, by our very own Moldbug: http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/

Interesting. I'm living in Argentina - where the Internet connectivity is particularly slow. Therefore, my preferred setup is: everything local but backed up near-instantaneously onto the cloud. (I heart Dropbox.) Does anyone else have this problem? Are there other Dropbox-like cloud services to use for those of us with slow Internet?

This sounds like it might just be what I'm looking for!!!

Thanks for the suggestion. I'd love some solution like xpensr or texthog that lets me just email in receipts, like less everything's accounting system to reconcile everything with a book-keeper quarterly, etc etc... maybe just all these different accounting-ish systems hacked together!

Wow, all of those suggested URLs are awesome! Thank you!!! Do any of you know of something similar, but that can apply to other RSS/Twitter feeds other than HN??? Thank you!!