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cantastoriaon Why Java? Tales from a Python Convert

Bingo! Coming from C# and C++, I had exactly the same realization using Python (before I switched back). I always ask Python programmers "but are you just keeping track of the types in your head?" because it's impossible to keep myself from doing that. If Python (and dynamic languages in general) are just pushing the type checking into the programmer's lap, I'm not sure what the advantage is other than less verbose (looking) code.

cantastoriaon Carl Sagan's idea for Contact video game (1983) [video]

Was I the only disappointed that the game play description didn't include having to use an "Ok to go!!!" audio command to start each mission?

cantastoriaon The Simons Foundation and Open Source Software

I think they made the right decision. I've seen way too many open source projects run by academics die a sudden death when the two or three professors that were maintaining them decide they didn't want to do it anymore (or retired). In my experience, most academics are using open source tools not because they are better or even "open" but because they are free. Few users (if any) ever contribute code back to the project beyond the occasional bug report making them essentially just as dependent on the core maintainers as they would be on any commercial company.

cantastoriaon Citi's Chief Economist Recommends a Universal Basic Income

I'm curious what HN readers think the yearly UBI would be (in US dollars) if it were actually implemented?

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

Good night gents.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

No. I simply refuse to adopt his/your standard of proof. If that makes you think you've won the argument then so be it.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

I'm not concerned about how often it happens. I'm concerned about the potential for it to happen. The Richard's example shows that potential. Your insistence on more examples as some metric of proof is none of my concern.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

What are some others?

Why is the one example not enough to prove my point? I could name a hundred and you still wouldn't be happy. Why bother.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

Thank you for taking the time to address my concern.

I'm glad we both think it's an important issue in spite of what some other commenters have said.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

I'm doing nothing of the sort. The code of conduct was clearly cited as one of the steps taken. I have issue with that step. And I have as much right to comment here as you do. You're free to ignore me. Please do.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

Can you cite any examples of people who have been silenced or shamed by a conference harrassment code?

You mean besides the Adria Richard's example?

At a professional conference, it should not be that hard to control your behavior.

The conference organizers seem to disagree with you in this case.

a conference martyr good one.

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

Ah in gallops tptacek on his trusty steed. Dead horse indeed.

As usual, any submission concerning improving the ratio of women to men in our industry immediately becomes a coatrack for digs about "radfem".

Just because they don't appear controversial to you doesn't make it so. And am I not allowed to take issue with the "table stakes"?

cantastoriaon 47% of applications for our Hacker Retreat were women. Here is how we did it

Harassment includes verbal comments that reinforce social structures of domination related to gender, gender identity and >expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, religion, sexual images in public spaces, deliberate intimidation, stalking, following, harassing photography or recording, sustained disruption of talks or other events, inappropriate physical contact, and unwelcome sexual attention.

And who gets to determine if I'm doing any of these things? The conference organizers? If I attend this conference, how can they assure me that I won't be at the mercy of conference attendees that suddenly decide I'm harassing them simply because I say something within their vicinity they disagree with a la Adria Richards?

Although I guess Richards would have been taken to task for "harassing photography". Although by that point it would have been too late anyway.

The problem with these speech codes is that they're just as easily used as a way to silence and shame people who's views differ from those of organizations like geekfeminism (i.e. not radfem).

You don't have to be a feminist to treat women respectfully.

cantastoriaon Snapchat: another example of the hubris of privilege and systematic bias in tech

Fine. You could have made that point without bringing his race, class or gender into your argument.

cantastoriaon Snapchat: another example of the hubris of privilege and systematic bias in tech

So if Evan Speigels had been female, black and poor (i.e. not privileged) he would have taken the money and that would have been the right thing to do? Why because people without privilege are incapable of being stupid or greedy?

cantastoriaon The Long-Term Unemployed Are Doomed

This is the typical response (and there is evidence to back it up) but then are these people really deserving of long term unemployment benefits? If you've been unemployed for five years and I say to you "hey there are jobs in xyz" and your response is that taking that job will "ruin your long-term career prospects" (it's almost funny) maybe unemployment is no longer serving it's intended functions (as a stop-gap between jobs).

cantastoriaon The Long-Term Unemployed Are Doomed

Ok but if your problem is that no one will look at your resume because you haven't worked in five years surely one of these jobs will solve that at the very least.

cantastoriaon The Long-Term Unemployed Are Doomed

It would be interesting to see what the socioeconomic/educational attainment breakdown of the long-term unemployed looks like (Link anyone?).

I think the assumption is that most of people in this group are unskilled high-school drop outs but I wonder how many of them "have some college" or a degree and are just unwilling to "lower themselves" to working on an oil pipeline or any other kind of work associated with being blue collar. The assumption that people will take any job they can get, at least in my experience, is just plain wrong. For instance (I know this is just anecdotal) but I know quite a few people in NYC who attended elite schools that are perfectly happy to collect unemployment while they wait for a high prestige job opening (e.g. "I'm waiting for the New Yorker to have a job opening"). The thought that a government grant would get these people to go work in an oil field in South Dakota is absurd most of them are horrified at the thought of leaving Brooklyn. I was thinking of this article from Mike Rowe:

http://profoundlydisconnected.com/cnn-viewer-has-questions/

"Right now, in the manufacturing sector alone, 600,000 jobs are currently available."

If that is indeed the case there is something else going on.

cantastoriaon Academia.edu slammed with takedown notices from Elsevier

I wonder if it's because ResearchGate is not based in the U.S.?

cantastoriaon Academia.edu, The Social Networking Platform For Researchers, Raises $11 Million

I'd love to see their business plan.

Academics on the whole are not a good demo for advertising and don't want to pay for anything related to their jobs/research unless they have absolutely no other choice. How are they going to make money? I can't even see them being a good acquisition.

cantastoriaon Introducing Quip

So? If his argument for why this is good is that it's "killer" and from "legendary engineers" then he deserves it.

cantastoriaon [dead]

>You are a threat, remember? You are Schrödinger’s Rapist.

Aaannd scene...

cantastoriaon Climate change: A cooling consensus

Depends on the record you're looking at. If you look at the temperature records from ice cores you can see that the entire 21st century has so far been within the historical range at this point in the cycle.

http://www.wmich.edu/corekids/images/icecoredatahistorical02...

However the 21st century has been an outlier in that temperatures have suddenly (for some reason :) failed to correlate with the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.

cantastoriaon Yahoo's Mayer gets internal flak for more rigorous hiring

It's funny whenever I hear someone say "We only hire people who went to X" I always just assume that person is insecure about their own abilities. Hiring based on credentials doesn't require you to be good at the job yourself.

cantastoriaon How Etsy Attracted 500% More Female Engineers

-ism implies institutional bias of a society

Sexism/racism et al. can exist outside of institutions no? "Hate crimes" for instance clearly do not involve any recognizable institutions yet clearly involve an -ism of some kind. Nor do -isms only exist at the society level. For instance it would be possible for a female owned company to not hire men (female hiring bias/sexism) which would run counter to larger societal biases.

cantastoriaon How Etsy Attracted 500% More Female Engineers

But the author is stating that "woman are x" by stating they bring more "cognitive diversity" to a team. In order for this to be true, woman in fact "must" approach problems differently than men or there would be no diversity benefit (whatever that may be in this case).

cantastoriaon How Etsy Attracted 500% More Female Engineers

I would think it's controversial when applied to engineering. This implies that the basic tools of software development are somehow viewed/used differently by people of various genders/ethnicities/etc... solely because of this "diversity" which I think most people would disagree with. And if one were to argue that being asian/female/poor somehow effects how you develop software I would love to know how those differences manifest in day-to-day software development.

It's not really a question of believing one gender/etc... is better at something here it seems to be a question of not believing it as the author seems to think "cognitive diversity" can be achieved simply by adding women to your dev team.

cantastoriaon How Etsy Attracted 500% More Female Engineers

Want cognitively diverse teams? It’s not as simple as hiring more female technologists.

I'm sorry, is the author implying that men and women approach engineering problems differently (i.e. they think differently)? Is there any evidence of this? I thought "essentialism" was anathema in contemporary diversity circles.

Eighty percent of Etsy customers are female, but the company itself used to be known in startup circles as engineer-centric and something of a dude-fest

So the fact that eighty percent of Etsy users were women despite having an all-male engineering team apparently means that you have to hire more women engineers to attract female users? Again I'd love to see evidence that once a core of female engineers were hired significant changes where made to the site that could only have come from a "woman's intuition" (natch). It seems to me that having a female dominated user base in spite of an all male engineering team disproves the assertion that you need hire women to achieve "cognitive diversity".

cantastoriaon Shut Up and Listen

Great, another guilt ridden diatribe against John Scalzi from John Scalzi. I've never read someone who is more obsessed about being a "privileged white male" than he is. I wish he would take his own advice or at least the first part of it. I'm not going bother arguing with him because really what's the point, this self-flagellation obviously gets him off and as usual it's all about him. Is "self-hating narcissist" a thing?

cantastoriaon Announcing Kiln Harmony: the Future of DVCS

Are there really that many dev teams that use Mercurial and git at the same time? Honest question....