freddyc

Pandora acquired Ticketfly and The Next Big Sound a couple of years back so they're not just a music streaming company. I still can't tell you what they all do though!

> All this arises whenever H1B tries to change the job

Yes, getting fired sucks if you're on an H1B but your comment doesn't apply to job changers generally. H1B visas are transferable (with a little paperwork) so an employee looking to move jobs just needs to ensure that they have their ducks lined up and that any required paper work is filed - usually that means lighting a fire under the HR team of the new employer to make sure it doesn't slip through the cracks.

Yeah, a circular saw + square will get you a long way and provide an inexpensive way to determine whether you like it enough to invest in the more expensive tools. Of course you could end up like me, still using that same circular saw years later while routinely promising yourself that next year you'll invest in a good table saw ...

It may have, but I haven't encountered the issue with my device.

I briefly used a 5X that I was given for free but quickly abandoned it in favor of my trusted Nexus 5 after experiencing similar issues. Despite being 3 years old (!!!) it's still rock-solid and super smooth running Nougat. I used to get a new phone yearly (if not biannualy) and the Nexus 5 is the first phone I've had where I don't have the urge to upgrade to the latest and shiniest device as soon as it hits the market.

> Bonuses are fun but I have seen a lot of misconduct in the pursuit of a bonus. Maybe its just banking...

It's not just banking. I was horrified at some of the behavior I saw from the sales folks at a software start-up I worked for (including the CEO). As a sales lifer, our CEO came up with some pretty generous comp packages for the sales team that promoted bad behavior and short-term "wins" that the rest of us would be cleaning up for months.

> Also a wok looks expensive as an experiment, like a couple meals worth of food, but unless you do something crazy it never wears out and its cheap compared to something like a complete all-clad stainless steel cooktop set

This a thousand times. My wife and I cook most of our meals at home and whenever someone asks me how to get started I always recommend a good quality (read $20-30) carbon steel wok that will last for decades if cared for properly. The ease/flexibility of cooking in it is amazing and healthy stir fries are close to idiot proof for beginners so long as they follow a couple of simple rules.

EDIT: the other tip I generally give is learn the base of a vinaigrette (one part vinegar to two/three parts oil) and it will absolutely slash the amount of worthless calories and sugar you consume. When trying to eat healthy so many people will prepare a salad (good) but then drench it in store bought salad dressing without reading the label (bad). With the base recipe you can experiment with different vinegars and acids (e.g. lemon juice) plus flavor boosters like garlic and shallots which will produce a super tasty and healthy dressing at a fraction of the cost of buying something at the store.

Towards the end he did admit that he was overlooked for a number of roles because of the "flight risk" warnings on his resume, but the market was frothy enough that it didn't impact him too much given he was damn good at what he did and companies needed talent.

My thoughts too. I was "yawn .... holy hell another billion accounts". It will be interesting to see where Verizon lands on this.

I had a friend who moved from start-up to start-up every 12 months after his initial tranche of options vested. He knew how much cash he required to live (with a little buffer for emergencies) and then traded cash for more equity in his salary negotiations with a view to building a diversified portfolio via sweat equity. He did this for 5-6 years, and one of the companies has already exited with another looking likely within the next 12 months. He obviously left a lot of (potential) money on the table by walking away at the one year mark, but he figured having a handful of smaller bets was better than going all in on one company and it looks like that strategy is going to work out pretty well for him!

> I'd be curious to know what others have found the learning curve to be—how long it takes to "break even" and whether efficiency continues to improve for months

I've been using a swype keyboard for so long I can barely remember hacking away with both thumbs, but the adjustment period for me was pretty quick. The key is to just trust the software to detect your swypes and then correct any errors after the fact (vs real-time). After a while both you and the keyboard's recognition ability will get better and your accuracy will improve. Special characters are a pain, but a pain you'll learn to live with given the potential efficiency gains.

I had the same experience. If I remember correctly, when the phone first launched anyone who bought it directly from the Google Store got one free replacement no questions asked. It's still the best devices I've ever owned and with the AOSP Nougat release I find myself just saying "nope" whenever I look at newer devices with the thought of upgrading.

Wow, poor guy.

As a side note, it's frustrating how email ceo@company.com is fast becoming the only way to get real customer service. I'm a T-Mobile customer and recently had a billing issue that required me to interact with their customer support who were thoroughly unhelpful and just added to the frustration. I had heard about the tactic of emailing John Legere so I did, and sure enough the issue was sorted out promptly by a US-based exec response rep. I was happy to get everything sorted, but the fact that customer service reps apparently didn't have the power to fix a relatively straight-forward issue still frustrates me.

> You're going to carry your phone with you anyway

The ability to not carry my phone is the only reason I'd be tempted to try a wearable device again (I had a gen 1 Apple Watch and sold it within a month). I'm not really interested in using it as an "always on" watch, but if I go for a run or take the kids to the park I'd love to be able to leave my phone at home and rely solely on my watch to stay connected. I wouldn't be using it for browsing or meaningful work, but to be able to receive calls, text messages and scan emails without carrying my phone would be great (cracked screens make the playground an expensive activity!).

That's entirely possible and a fair point.

The beauty (in my eyes at least) of Hacker News has always been that the most interesting/relevant stories and discussions find their way to the top of the feed. I've discovered topics and perspectives (including those I disagree with) that I otherwise wouldn't have been exposed to if it weren't for HN. I've always felt there is something of a built-in filter present, so this move feels a little forced and unnecessary to me.

John Oliver will be devastated ...

Seriously though, this strikes me as a significant blow for New Zealand. From what I've seen of him, Key is one of the better world leaders and seems to have done a good job down there. I'm not surprised the markets reacted with a downgrade of the Kiwi dollar.

Because, for a television production company, ratings fundamentally are more important. Cuban knows it's an entertainment show first-and-foremost and he bought into that (and frankly, from what I can tell, loves that aspect of it).

I've never looked into the details, but I imagine the paperwork Shark Tank entrepreneurs sign includes something along the lines of "all deals agreed are non-binding and subject to completion of satisfactory post-show diligence blah blah". I'd be shocked if a decent percentage of the deals featured don't ultimately fall through for one reason or another at the diligence stage with zero impact on the investor's reputation, so I don't think Cuban will lose too much sleep over it.

Great point - too often realism is mis-labeled as cynicism by those who have drunk a little too much of the Kool-Aid. It's one of the things about SV that gradually wore me down over time: the constant need for people to declare everything great because to admit otherwise (i.e. accept reality) went against the prevailing start-up ethos.

At almost every start-up that I've been involved with, the approach has been to grant employees ISOs which have a strike price (albeit very low) that the employee must pay if they want to exercise the options. They then have to run the AMT gauntlet and take on the potential tax risk. So while employees don't have to pay for the option itself, I'm not sure it's entirely accurate to say that employees don't have to shell out hard cash for the actual equity.

I personally don't think it's great advice - you're effectively working on the promise of a third party you don't know without any structure around deliverables, timing, payments etc. What if they turn around in 6 months time and say "Oh! We don't really need that. But no worries, we don't have a contract so we're all good."

Better advice IMO is for service providers to spend a little money up front and develop their own standard form contract that they can serve up at the beginning of any engagement. If the buyer insists on using their form (say, if they're a big company) then at least they have a template to compare it to and make sure they're covered in the areas that matter.

I guess CNN is backing on his current fanbase (mainly teens) staying loyal to him as they graduate from HS and move to college. CNN knows that demographic likely won't have a cable subscription, so this feels like an alternative platform to capture that audience or at least try to. Time will tell if it's a successful strategy.

We'll likely never find out the terms, but I doubt anyone made money out of this deal with the exception possibly of Casey via his new contract with CNN. With over $6m raised, best-case scenario is the investors were made good and the employees walked away with greater long-term certainty and a stable paycheck.

That's obviously a massively wide field - any particular business topic that you're interested in? Given we're on HN, the VC world is often of interest - I can recommend Brad Feld's 'Venture Deals' if you want to get an easy to digest "anatomy of a venture deal" book. If you want something more geeky on the finance side, you'd be hard-pressed to overlook the Allen & Brealey bible 'Principles of Corporate Finance.'

> one cannot sign a contract electronically

This obviously varies by jurisdiction, but if you're US based you can absolutely sign electronically (there's an entire Act that enables it). The easiest way is to use services like Echosign or Docusign which most people are pretty familiar with these days.

Loved using Skyscanner when I lived in the UK - great news for them!

This is certainly a promising sign. A few years back I consulted for a company trying to make a push into the Indian market and the payments piece pretty much killed us. Dealing with HDFC became a daily nightmare and the amount of bureaucracy and red tape involved was soul-destroying. Based on my (very) limited knowledge of Indian payments, my guess is HDFC probably still sits behind these new solutions but if they can somehow streamline the process and shield customers from most of the BS I really hope they flourish.

> Charles & David Koch didn't endorse or fund his campaign or use their political entities to support him.

Maybe not directly, but Pence has pretty strong ties to the Kochs and his nomination as VP was widely seen as a nod to them.

If threatening to quit is the only way to get the raise that you (presumably) deserve, then it's probably a good sign that it's time to, you know, actually quit and move to a better opportunity where your contribution is properly valued.

> How many passwords do you have to type and licences to accept to do that on your Apple cloud?

I made the switch to Nexus last year for work, but my wife is still a devoted iPhone user and recently upgraded to the 7. As I was setting it up for her I was shocked at how poor the UX was and the number of times the iPhone asked for a password (in some cases asking for the same password multiple times). Just a week earlier I had set-up a new Android device and I entered my Google login details once and that was it. The contrast was jarring.

Agreed. I was staunchly anti-Android until I was given a Nexus 6P last year and alternated between it and my 6S for a couple of months before finally ditching the 6S altogether. A lot of it comes down to personal preference of course, but I found the Android system to be more intuitive and overall a better experience (by a whisker).