vitalychernobyl

I think the lead they are burying is the huge decline in the quality of TechCrunch and that it has become the same as any generic tech section, in any generic publication. It used to be my front page - but I don’t bother anymore.

The unique articles about startups are gone - replaced by a repackaging of press releases, the optimistic tone of supporting entrepreneurs has been replaced by the cynicism of writers that dislike the companies/technologies/founders they write about, etc.

If anything, this article shows many examples of other publications that are successful with just that kind of coverage, while TechCrunch has unfortunately made itself generic.

TLDR; Guy performed at festival where they had pay-by-bracelet, spent 30m figuring it out how to add money to buy a beer. Turned out beer was free backstage.

You have been saved from wasting 10m of ur life.

Could you share with me as well? :) Thank you!

Yahoo web-hosting.. didn't know that still existed :)

Gotta love how he does stuff :) It's like the Twitter profile for Robert Downey Jr "You know who I am." Just baller :)

This is a tough one to make sense of - are they just getting killed by reddit on one side and tiktok on the other and cashing out? Anyone have any insight? (also anyone know the purchase price? just for fun)

<rant> Having worked in warehouses back in the day, I (and probably anyone) can tell you that it is not a glamorous job, most of the time you are working in a tough environment and often treated like crap, and if you are gonna work warehouses it’s not even close to what Amazon provides. They should always improve, but they deserve a lot of credit.

Most warehouse operations are not well organized, with little continuous investment. It can be back-breaking work (sometimes literally), you are not provided the safety equipment you need, there is definitely no AC, a lot of employee turnover, and a lot of sketchy employees and managers - all for cheapest possible pay. This is the default almost everywhere; there are exceptions of great operations, but they are just that - exceptions.

I would venture to say that the vast majority of warehouse operations in the country (and the world) do not provide even a fraction of the benefits of Amazon. Does the job still suck? Probably. Should they keep improving? Definitely. But they pay a decent wage (warehouse jobs are often minimum wage) and it’s a well run operation that actually cares about the workers (whether it’s for corporate interests or whatever reason).

How many warehouse jobs pay $15+? How often do you think an average warehouse worker got tested for Covid at their job? In fact, how often was their paycheck late or not correct or delivered (because that happens everywhere)?

Working warehouses isn’t great, but before blaming Amazon for inventing warehouse jobs, we should compare apples to apples. My 2c. </rant>

Ps - Not affiliated with anything Amazon related (but people probably won’t believe that ).

So it sounds like the Australian government set the best terms it could with a bunch of providers (including oracle) so that each individual agency doesn’t have to negotiate for the best deal or reviewing contracts. Is that how it works?

This may be a case of “too little too late”. These guys are trying to become too big to fail. I think good publishers can be a good thing .. but only if they understand the new reality.. and unfortunately I don’t think they do. I think this is kind of like Sears merging with Kmart.

I have to say, Om Malik is great, but that entire article just says “I like San Francisco and even though others have left, I am staying because I like it and have been here for a while.”

I wish it had a bit more perspective on what he thinks will happen with the city, recovery, reasons not to go, a way to use this as an opportunity, or anything.

For that matter, I would love to hear anyone’s perspective on why to stay and how it could be a good thing now.

I’ve been gone all of Covid and keep coming back to visit, but don’t see a good way back. I wish I could hear some optimism from anyone about why it’s a good idea to be there or to go there now (or soon). Any thoughts welcome :)

Interesting, it hadn't occurred to me, but of course between Zoom meetings and getting way more informal, this is gonna be a rough spot for them.

Paywalled - so here's the takeaway:

"One in six dry cleaners have closed or gone bankrupt in the U.S. already, and many won’t survive without more stimulus"..."the industry is likely booking only half the $7 billion in revenue it did pre-Covid-19" ... "a plea for corporate executives: institute a dress code for Zoom calls."

I'm surprised they didn't use the remnants of Google+ to create a reputation system. It would be a good thing, we'll see if they follow his advice sooner than later.

More consolidation, but probably belated. The publishers are hoping to survive by making themselves big enough. Ironically, I think good publishers are a good thing, if they figure out the new reality .. which unfortunately I don't think they have.

It’s paywalled - here’s the TLDR:

They are starting to raise at a reported valuation of $70-$100B, but no one has paid this yet, reporting is preliminary. Their last private valuation was $36B in April.

Saved you reading 500 words..

My 2c - It’s basically a smaller NYC, decent tech scene, not quite as pricey (but still pricey), and the winters are coooold and windy.

I’ve been looking at this and traveling/living it during the Covid craziness - here are my conclusions of top places FWIW:

Austin - it’s grown to be a mini-SF (in the good things) - lots of tech, people, nightlife - but in Texas - so lower taxes, much cheaper (and likely to stay that way, because lots of room for sprawl). Very nice. A bit empty during Covid like all cities, but nothing like SF right now.

Boulder, Colorado Springs etc - a lot of Bay Area people have come here recently (and in the past), beautiful nature, tech scene - but fairly expensive (not SF, but still), and real winter here - I don’t know if I see it becoming a big hub, and I don’t know if there would be enough good jobs going forward, but definitely a nice spot.

Salt Lake City/Park City - very underrated until recently, affordable, lots of tech people have come out, fairly affordable, beautiful nature and town, very nice vibe, decent tech scene. Real winter here too. Could see this becoming a real contender in the future.

Boise - haven’t been personally, but I hear good things from friends of mine. Affordable, decent tech scene, great cost of living.

Honorable mentions:

San Diego - great place, a bit crazy during Covid and city is a bit shut down (like most cities), it’s a bit expensive (not SF, but still), ok tech scene, beautiful weather.

Raleigh/Durham - nice, decent tech, good lifestyle. Pretty spread out (a triangle of three cities), so a lot of driving.

Hawaii - this should be the best remote tech hub, but it isn’t yet. Beautiful place, not that expensive (relatively). But you gotta work remote (not much tech locally) and wait a week for Amazon.

—

Hope this helps! Please add to this list if you have good ideas..

The cap is high to begin with, but later they will begin to lower it and increase the cost. At this point, based on examples of other cable companies and wireless providers, it is almost a given.

Unless of course you believe that Comcast is a benevolent company that tries to help its customers instead of trying to gouge them at every opportunity (former customer, lots of hard feelings) :/

Fingers crossed for Starlink to put a serious dent into their business.

Womp womp..

Can anyone with real knowledge of the subject corroborate or dispute this? Genuinely interested. The article makes a lot of sense, and if true, disputes the popular narrative. But there is a big "if" and I am not qualified to know if this is true (hopefully) or just really well crafted to hide the truth.

Yeah - they said that.. but then they had the whole $629k+ in the actual ask in the suit.. there is either more in addition, or they don't "accept" the pay-back (or just trying to make it look bigger to benefit the case)

No :) (i read it that way too at first)

It's $2MM + 2mo + 40k

Looks like it was more than that (plus he's now trying to claim he owns a part of the company and/or entitled to $2MM.. again, according to the doc)

"[redacted]'s at-will employment was terminated for the reasons herein explained, and [redacted] left Toptal’s employ unjustly enriched, and with amounts owed by him to Toptal in the form of unpaid loan amounts, unreimbursed credit card charges of a purely personal nature, and restitution for amounts caused to be embezzled and diverted to his girlfriend and for an unapproved, self-awarded bonus, totaling at least $629,850.46."

Just read through the whole thing (don't know why) - here is the synopsis:

It doesn't really talk about any ownership issues regarding the CEO - it's basically saying that [redacted] (an early employee) embezzled/mis-used money and when fired, started claiming he owned part of the company or was entitled to compensation.

According to the thing - [redacted] was hired a COO as an early employee with no equity, they claim he was unhappy, and that he embezzled a bunch of money by paying his girlfriend, getting bonuses, and misusing the company credit card (some of this he repaid). But once they found out, they fired him, and he started claiming he owned equity and/or was owed severance.

They want the money back, him made to shut up, and possibly drawn-and-quartered.

So it doesn't look like this is much broader than that .. again - according to the doc.

Does anyone know why?

We tried working with it and this isn't really a thing - the support is non-existent, the documentation is lacking.

When contacted, they admitted that the only apps published using the Shoutem platform are ones that the company custom-built for some clients (their services are $10k+ a pop).

It sounds like this is just a marketing ploy and a way to get around Apple's new rules about app-builders.

Very very disappointing. Parse was a great platform and Facebook killed it. I guess it's going to be full stack AWS all the time forever. They shouldn't have bought it if this wasn't going to be a core part of the business going forward. Boo, Facebook!!

This may help - http://lmgtfy.com/

(Sorry, couldn't help that :-D)

I hate to state the obvious cultural argument - but how many of us just don't like Microsoft, and all things being equal, would prefer to work with open source? I sure do.

I love that this made it on Hackernews so as to prove the non-techies point! :-D

He is right too - when dealing with the hard sciences it's most important to BE RIGHT (it's either a 0 or 1 - and it matters), but when dealing with relationships it's much more important to BE EMPATHETIC.

If you aren't - you'll be seen as a contrarian/confrontational.

I think we need to practice "being ok with being wrong" when the relationship matters more than the subject matter. Cheers!

For any of you Washington DCists - following up on demand, I just published The DC Founders list of Top 10 Coffee Shops for Entrepreneurs in Washington DC - http://dcfounders.com/top-10-coffee-shops-in-washington-dc/ . Let me know if you have some others. Enjoy!

So fyi, just published the new list of Top 10 Coffee Shops for Entrepreneurs in DC (http://dcfounders.com/top-10-coffee-shops-in-washington-dc/). For when you need a break.