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qserpent

21 karma · joined June 24, 2015

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qserpent··on Cutting ‘Old Heads’ at IBM
If it's all about the money, companies should offer voluntary pay cuts. I know a few folks who'd take that over "voluntary" retirement any day.
qserpent··on A radical idea to improve family life in America: babysit your neighbor’s kids
What a bleak perspective.

What are the odds of being neighbors with a child predator? I'd bet they are incredibly small.

If a neighbor is nice, friendly, and you get to know them over a little bit of time, I'm betting problems arising from having them watch your kids is right around 0%.

qserpent··on An ER visit, a $12,000 bill – and a health insurer that wouldn’t pay
I agree with everything you said. That still doesn't equate to "nothing except for $100 yearly preventative checkups are covered" though, which was my point.

Keeping heated discussions honest is important, regardless of which side you are on (and I'm on your side).

qserpent··on An ER visit, a $12,000 bill – and a health insurer that wouldn’t pay
I agree that Anthem is in the wrong by denying ER coverage in some cases, but let's keep the discussion free of hyperbole like this:

> insurance companies are dropping support for expensive ER visits, and instead supporting "preventive care" by only covering a $100 annual checkup instead

This is quite far from the facts of the story and does not belong in an honest discussion (note: I'm not arguing that Anthem is in the right at all, I'm just arguing that this is not a good description of the situation at all).

qserpent··on Obamacare’s sinking safety net
I don't know anything about the details of this situation. But maybe someone else here does.

How is the US so inefficient at healthcare? We spend more per person (or per GDP?) than many (most?) other countries and we get less in return.

Where is this money going?

qserpent··on Ethereum Developers Launch White Hat Counter-Attack on the DAO
More evidence that nothing is ever fully out of human hands.

The promises of Ethereum are gone. If you write a smart contract and want to rely 100% on the code to be the source of truth, and a large enough piece of the community doesn't like what your contract is doing, they may fork and revert/rewrite history.

And forget it if your smart contract isn't perfect. The good and bad will be fighting to exploit it from both sides.

RIP.

qserpent··on Pycon 2016 videos now available
If you had written a comment which summarized a recent BMW convention that you enjoyed and wanted to share links to interesting things discussed at the convention, and you ended it with "On the other hand, some other cars are too obsessed with <insert irrelevant opinion here>", then yeah, I would consider that snark.

If you instead say "BMW prioritizes horse power, which is why I like it better than X, which seems to prioritize <insert something else here>", then (1) your tone is much less snarky, (2) you've given context to your comment (the BMW horsepower - without that, it is much more snarky), and (3) you've opened up the thread to encourage discussion and alternative opinions, instead of shutting it down with your original tone and phrasing.

qserpent··on Pycon 2016 videos now available
I wish HN had less snark.

Who cares what language communities obsess over what?

Snark ruins otherwise informative posts.