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mschip

46 karma · joined April 15, 2014

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mschip··on Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index
In what way? As in financiers will pay with BTC? I don't know many people who pay for their cars or houses in one payment. Or is the suggestion that scheduled recurring monthly payments are viable?
mschip··on China wants to build an open source ecosystem to rival GitHub
The obscure American social network is not the interesting bit of information. It's that the infrastructure and delivery corporations decided overnight not to support a customer for not aligning with their values.
mschip··on China wants to build an open source ecosystem to rival GitHub
I'm sure they've always wanted this - but recent events likely made it a glaring necessity in their eyes. When Apple and Google app stores removed Parler it was a big deal, a bigger deal was AWS deplatforming them - a logical step further would be removing the hosted source code. I'm in no way commenting on whether it would be right or wrong, but its not hard to imagine a scenario where company morals begin to come into play here.
mschip··on ‘YouTube recommendations are toxic,’ says dev who worked on the algorithm (2019)
Don't forget you feed the algorithm. I use Youtube mostly for hobbies. A couple examples are cooking and small engine repair - I find it super valuable to watch multiple people do the same thing in different ways. Anecdotally, the algorithm does a really good job giving me more content/channels both narrowly related and slightly expanding the interests. Sure, it can be frustrating if you watch a clickbaity video that spawns a genre of clickbaity content recommendations - but it doesn't take long for those to stop showing up so long as you don't watch them.
mschip··on The game-day caffeine routine that powers the NBA's most frequent flyers
I would guess player travel is a bit low in the schedule makers priorities. They have a lot to account for with arena availability as they often share with concerts/events and even a handful share with professional NHL teams and their own 40+ home game schedules.
mschip··on Student Loan Debt Is Now as Big as the U.S. Junk Bond Market
The current tax reform discussions look to make it even worse be removing some of the current breaks for students paying off debt [1]. There was some talk last summer about extending the current $5200 tuition exemption as an employer benefit to include tuition repayment [2]. I guess that's now off the table. I haven't seen the math anywhere, but it sure seems like it would be cheaper to give tax breaks for paying off loans then to allow them to be defaulted on on forgiven in the case of government workers.

[1] http://money.cnn.com/2017/11/15/pf/college/tax-reform-paying... [2] https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/17/student-loan-debt-why-employ...

mschip··on Acid reflux drug linked to more than doubled risk of stomach cancer
I was on PPIs for reflux for about 6 years before realizing how damaging they could be. Getting off them was really difficult but your suggestions here, in addition to some ginger supplements, helped me to ween off them. Getting off them was a terrible experience, but I'm much better off because of it. I rarely experience reflux anymore.
mschip··on TN Could Give Fastest Internet for Free, Will Give Comcast and AT&T $45M Instead
I don't disagree that its a feeling not limited to rural republicans but they are the ones I see voting in direct conflicts with their best interest. I don't buy that its because they're voting for their "future rich self" but rather that they're voting to keep other people beneath them.
mschip··on TN Could Give Fastest Internet for Free, Will Give Comcast and AT&T $45M Instead
> Many of those who would receive help are most concerned in making sure there's still someone else in a worse situation than themselves.

This sums up the majority of rural republicans in my area. It's a sad realization that people so often put not being at the bottom above their own best interests.

mschip··on Waymo: Google's self-driving car company
My point was that regardless of the dollars and cents for Uber to transition from staff to cars, or even if it works out at all, Uber still has the information to decide it will take X cars in Y region to make Z revenue. The only other player with that kind of information (on a smaller scale) is Lyft.
mschip··on Waymo: Google's self-driving car company
Uber will continue to hold a lot of the chips in this race. Consider the Tesla or GM examples - a regression in revenue will not be acceptable. So if they're currently selling x cars at y $ a year they will need to continue that revenue without actually selling cars. This means they'll have to get really good at understanding how many rides over the span of a vehicle will continue that revenue and provide just the right amount of vehicles to meet a regions needs. Uber has that information in spades.
mschip··on Bose Hearphones
I wonder what the side affects of prolonged usage would be. As in, would my ability to block out ambient noises without the device decline from not using the ability?
mschip··on New MacBook Pro Is Not a Laptop for Developers Anymore
I'm no Apple fanboy nor apologist, but this sentiment is everywhere and overtly dramatic. They continue to provide a 13" model with function keys as an alternative. If that machine isn't fast enough you probably aren't a "developer" anyways. Also, I rarely use the keyboard on my mac because I use it on a stand with an additional monitor. If you want to complain about the new Mac, complain about price or the fact that the touch bar is unusable in an ergonomic setting, just don't act like you can't still use VIM.
mschip··on Search the DNC email database
Greg Sargent of WaPo seems to have a pretty friendly relationship with the DNC. I'd like to know what they were trying to damage control here: https://wikileaks.org/dnc-emails/emailid/11242

edit: Seems they were just scared of the narrative after platform concessions with the Sanders camp: https://wikileaks.org/dnc-emails/emailid/13370

mschip··on Ask HN: What non-technical skills make a senior dev and how to develop them?
There are a lot of comments here that are under the umbrella of getting old and sticking with the same company which are probably true for a lot of subpar companies. If you're talking about a good company that has a lot of good engineers to choose from I would look for:

- The ability to communicate clearly

- The ability to understand team members with empathy

- A unique penchant for foresight

mschip··on How to get hired at a startup when you don't know anyone
I put a much higher priority on the people I work with. So I would add to that risk the scenario where I get the job but it turns out to be a bunch of bros. Maybe there was some public insight to the kind of people this person would be joining to mitigate that risk.
mschip··on A Truck the Russians Make for $50K
I enjoy ice fishing, and while it's a bit heavy for normal use it would be nice to have a back up plan for if the vehicle goes through the ice.
mschip··on A Little Gear That Could Reshape the Jet Engine
And noise reduction is actually a really important benefit of this engine as some airports have restrictions on noise.
mschip··on A Little Gear That Could Reshape the Jet Engine
It's more of a 'The concept is 30 years old' thing. Some of the reasons driving the commercial development only became factors in the market more recently; things like fuel efficiency and airport noise restrictions. Also, one of the less discussed advantages (as a customer) for the geared turbo fan is the decrease in expected maintenance/repair costs on the life of the engine. That's big business for engine manufacturers and there will be less of it with this design.
mschip··on Speed as a Habit
I see what you're saying, but maybe if you didn't go so fast you could have had properly tested code that didn't break something in the first place. I'd argue that not breaking it in the first place is better than speeding up to find the break.
mschip··on Speed as a Habit
I guess I see 'Speed as a Habit' and take the article as culture setting and a negative. It seems like you see the article as a way to avoid poor decision making and planning habits and a positive. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.
mschip··on Speed as a Habit
You read my mind. Points from this article need to be taken in context.. especially all the examples from Google. It's one thing to say 'Do it faster!' and have unlimited resources at your disposal (Google), but it's whole different ball game to harp on your 5 member startup. One adds hours via bodies and the other ruins work/life balance. That can really set a negative tone for an early startup trying to attract talent.

I enjoyed the 'GM is slow' comment. While that may be true in terms of innovation, it is the opposite when it comes to manufacturing. I've worked in those plants where the 'speed above all else' sentiment is eerily similar to this article, and is largely the reason I chose a different career path.

The one thing I take away from this is the accountability perspective. It's ok to ask why things will take the amount of time projected. Things often do get tacked on that don't need to be.

mschip··on Ask HN: Mechanical engineer that wants to work in the programming field
I have a BS in Mechanical Engineering and fell in love with coding after having to write some pretty basic VB macros in Excel. If your goal is to just live on the West Coast then I would recommend looking for a job in your current field. If your passionate about coding, the best thing you can do in the next 6 months is to build something meaningful that you can speak to. My route was a little different.. I struggled to find the time to learn/build while working full time so I decided to fully dedicate 3 months via Hack Reactor. I highly recommend checking out Hack Reactor if you have the means and interest in that branch of programming.
mschip··on The volume is too damn high on flights
I used to work for a major jet engine manufacturer. Noise reduction is right up there with fuel consumption in consideration with new model development. Not because of complaining passengers though.. A lot of the push comes from certain airports that aren't far enough outside of major cities (I can't remember which ones exactly, I think it was mostly a few major asian cities). They actually restrict certain models from using their airport.
mschip··on Software engineers should write
Great article. As somebody who has always identified with the "math" kid, I've never dreaded nor disliked writing. In fact, I often have the urge to write. My biggest issue is confidence in my vocabulary. After years of schooling for engineering I feel as though my non-technical vocabulary hasn't progressed much since high school and always seems to fall to the bottom of my personal studies.
mschip··on Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters
Things like this is what leads to billion dollar valuations for companies like Slack. Corporate communication is finally evolving from email and voicemail.