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othersideofcoin

29 karma · joined September 26, 2017

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othersideofcoin··on Choosing between names and identifiers in URLs
Minor nitpick, I'm not sure if exact match in URL slugs matters from Google's perspective very much. I do read that searchers' eyes can be drawn towards the exact match (which are frequently bolded in the SERPs), possibly leading to a higher clickthrough rate.
othersideofcoin··on The war to sell you a mattress
Specifically, if sales = Sales Dev Rep + Closer, then affiliate sites (leadgen) is like outsourcing the SDR and them getting a commission or referral fee.
othersideofcoin··on New Research on How Ride-Hailing Impacts Travel Behavior
It's also to speed things up. Many drivers want to hit their timetable; having to give change to 3 or 4 different people per stop is going to kill that.
othersideofcoin··on Airbus Corruption Scandal May Lead Straight to the Top
I'm writing this as a thought experiment, so please don't respond if what I say angers you. I'm hoping to possibly seed an interesting conversation from which I can learn, not trying to make any specific points.

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why is corruption bad? Well, it definitely feels dirty, and it probably usually directly harms someone (who has to pay, doesn't pay, etc.)

But what if we looked at it from a trust based perspective? Single incidents of corruption have an outsized impact on the overall trust a society has in itself, and others.

So, what if the cost isn't created by the act of corruption, but by the perception / dissemination of corrupt events?

From that perspective, the best overall utility to society after the VW scandal was both to make it appear like someone is watching (disincentivize others) but also downplay the size of it (maximally maintain trust).

This isn't particularly thought through, but I was hoping to invoke Cunningham's Law to learn more about something I know very little about.

othersideofcoin··on Gluon – Deep Learning API from AWS and Microsoft
It's a common denominator, few downsides, speed handled in lower level code/libs. Really good "get shit done" language, best GSD lang I've used. Scientists + programmers, data engineers and PhDs, all are cool w/ the syntax. It's open source, has a shitton of supporting libs.

Outside of speed, I've read very few valid criticisms. What other languages are cross-platform, great lib support, delegate easily to lower level libs for perf, are there?

(FWIW, any MS based language is probably excluded from consideration depending on its cross platform ability. Many data people -- like me! -- won't use a MS based OS)

othersideofcoin··on Magic Leap raising up to $1B in new round
Are there 20 companies worth funding to that amount? I dont imagine you or I can determine.
othersideofcoin··on Magic Leap raising up to $1B in new round
Fun to make fun of, but what do their financials look like? Mall cop and dorky tours could be a really good market.
othersideofcoin··on Magic Leap raising up to $1B in new round
From a risk perspective, incorrect. Its only from the hindsight, where the iPhone development could be perceived as linear, that this is correct.

Fingerworks, and any others, were acquired after risk factors went down. Never forget your own hindsight bias, where the pdf collapses to 1.

othersideofcoin··on The rise of drug overdoses in New Hampshire has created a backlog of autopsies
Because the 12 hr formula was part of a huge marketing push to reduce doctors' "opiphobia" and get them to prescribe more. Doctors were likely unaware of the roller coaster ride of withdrawal they were sending patients on.
othersideofcoin··on Ask HN: I received a great offer, but am unsure about relocating
You will grow the most if you choose the more difficult path. Second, it is worth growing a lot while you are young; this process is more painful in your 30s.
othersideofcoin··on The Yamaha NS10 Story – How a Hi-Fi Speaker Conquered the Studio World (2008)
Mate, I gotta say your responses make me dismiss your comment. You misinterpret "good in certain respects", to shout "GOOD?" to an empty room. Caps with a lot of punctuation is a red flag for me, seems very CNN.com political. Finally, you criticize the core argument ("why does the NS10 have such a reputation") without giving me, an ignorant third party, any evidence.

Even if you owned your own studio, aren't there lots of people with that same resume line who were terrible at mixing?

You may be 100% correct, but it was not communicated in a style that would let someone to that conclusion.

othersideofcoin··on Puerto Rican Hospitals Battle Life and Death Daily
Useful to project authority.
othersideofcoin··on Puerto Rican Hospitals Battle Life and Death Daily
Isn't it a fallacy to do nothing because you can't do everything for everyone?
othersideofcoin··on Implementing faceted search with Django and PostgreSQL
It also excels at storing logs for later aggregation and analysis.
othersideofcoin··on iOS 11's Misleading "Off-Ish" Setting for Radios Is Bad for User Security
Ya, so accept that Apple decided your hyper aware use case doesn't need to be the default. Seems like you know what is up, so they are working to prevent unnecessary charges to the far larger, far less aware segment of the population. All seems good, no?
othersideofcoin··on Y Combinator's Founding Principles
That effectively sets the average valuation at $1.7 million for every startup accepted into YC. While I'm sure there are exceptions, startups with really strong initial traction, that seems like a fairly reasonable (if not elevated) valuation.
othersideofcoin··on Why It Took Google So Long to End Shady Rehab Center Ads
Think of it as less of a binary. It's not "scam operator" or "legitimate operator". Much more nuanced -- the stories are about the clear scam operators, but that may or may not be the long tail. And that long tail may or may not be what we want to optimize for.

One of the major characteristics of a "scam operator" is this situation: Andy runs a treatment center that only takes Cigna. He gets a call from Bob, who has BlueCross. Bob can either do private pay at Andy's Center, for $20k. Or Andy can refer Bob to Mike's Center for BlueCross Patients, where Bob can get treated for $5k out of pocket.*

If Andy and Mike have a business relationship where they refer patients to each other, and either end up benefitting, they are breaking the law.

* Option 2: Andy tells Bob "sorry, we can't treat you. Try calling someone else."

othersideofcoin··on Google Thought I Was a Man
As an advertiser, it is awful when the right to be advertised (accurately) to is impinged upon.
othersideofcoin··on Why It Took Google So Long to End Shady Rehab Center Ads
Datum: medium and large treatment providers are willing to pay around a $5,000 CPA in sales and marketing costs. A huge amount of this, on average, goes to Google.

Just by removing AdWords from the equation, Google could reduce per-admit costs by thousands of dollars. (Of course, those costs would likely just go to third party lead resellers, who are in the grey area of patient brokering IMO)

othersideofcoin··on Why It Took Google So Long to End Shady Rehab Center Ads
I work in the addiction industry, on the marketing side. I can tell you that the licensure requirements are generally a joke. Only Florida, California, and maybe a couple other states are tougher to open a treatment center instead of, say, getting licensed as a hair stylist.

Until the past year or so, all levels of government were unable to track down the shady operators. IMO, it's not Google's job to do what law enforcement was unwilling to do. (Now, Google could be extra ethical on this, but why would they be? Generally, we expect corporations to follow law enforcements lead, rather than hold them to a higher standard.)

othersideofcoin··on The Montreal Protocol was a landmark environmental success
I have studied the science on AGW and believe the central hypotheses to be true. However, I reject the moralization that has become the bread and butter of environmentalists. I've had many "ends justify the means" conversations with people who believe they can/should make energy usage a moral issue.

It's a science and engineering problem, not a moral one. The religious fervor around much of the environmental movement (complete with significant social virtue signaling) turns me off both the person and the message by association.