271–280 of 355 posts
Things that assume/require that I have exactly one physical address. That includes banks, insurance companies, government agencies, utilities, and pretty much every business that I need to deal with to do anything. 90% of the pain I encounter during my life on the road stems from the fact that I don't own or rent property in the US, and therefore don't have a fixed address. There are tons of people in my situation (e…
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I want a global movement to make the acceleration pedal actually affect acceleration, not horsepower as it does now. Imagine a pedal with a dead spot in the middle that represents 0 acceleration. Pushing down on the pedal increases the rate of acceleration. When you get to speed, ease back to the dead spot to maintain. Lift past the dead spot to decel. Think of it as a hybrid cruise control. I'm convinced it would so…
How do you solve this problem for those of us in Colorado (or other non-flatlands) where nearly every drive involves mountains and hills. Would the idea be that in the dead zone, the car is smart enough to increase or decrease horsepower to adapt to these conditions and retain 0 acceleration or...? I think you would run into the same problem that cruise control runs into in the mountains - we don't have variable rati…
Banking - My bank has a website that the 90's would be proud of, it gives me little to no information about my spending habits, transferring money is a nightmare, and using kublax (similiarly mint) had my account banned for security purposes.
I'd like to add that if you are/were in the U.S. Military at some point, (or even your parents, I'm pretty sure) then you should check out USAA. They have a fantastic website and awesome customer service. note: I have no affiliation with USAA other than I use them and really like them.
Their credit card (which she still has) isn't much better. Huge delays posting payments, and the customer service has a huge chip on their shoulder whenever she needs to call them.
ageism. It's so common today that people who would never exclude women or minorities or the handicapped or whoever have no problem excluding people over forty.
When a male turns 18 in the USA, he is allowed to sign up for the Army, get a gun, go kill human beings in the Middle East and perhaps die for his country. BUT if that man dares drink a single beer with his dad before being shipped off to war, he will be treated like a criminal. His dad may be taken to court and punished for letting a minor have alcohol. The 18 year old could face severe punishments, including not be…
Being a good soldier and being a responsible drinker are two very different things. Just because you make a good soldier does not immediately imply you will make a responsible drinker.
Quite frankly, 18 is a pretty darn good age to start soldiering, but I know a TON of < 21yo who are not responsible, so my idea doesn't seem completely baseless.
1. Seeing a traffic jam where every car has exactly one person in it. This is just a tragedy. 2. Job interviews that require quizzes and an "intensive" multi-stage interview process. As a candidate, I've just sent you a bunch of links to open repositories where you can review my code and offered to give you other code examples from my private repositories on request. I give you links to my previous work and letters o…
Large corporations are so risk-averse that they are usually afraid to fire people, even when they can't do their jobs. Also, the ones that stick around have gotten so good at working the political system and getting others to do their work that they can't fire them, because they will just say "you didn't ask me to do it in writing", or any number of other excuses why they didn't do their job.
Not to mention, let's say you do want to fire a programmer who can't program - you can't just fire them, they have to be given a verbal warning first, then a written warning, it needs to be documented with HR, then they are put on a 90 day probationary period, or "improvement plan." They claim they don't have enough training for the job, so then they need to be retrained, at additional expense.
The other factor is that some managers like to keep 10-20% dead weight around because it pads their department. Everyone is fighting for more direct reports; apparently whoever has the most employees wins some kind of management contest. So, they keep 10-20% slackers on staff, knowing that if layoffs come around, they can cut the dead weight and keep the good programmers.
It's frankly amazing that anything gets done at all in a large corporation.
Reading posts with a lot of comments in HN. I never know what comments are new without looking to the date (sometimes they are hundreds).
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Personally, I'm offended by the popularity of "Classic Rock" and the fact that marketing channels have broken down to the point where there's no connection between great music being made today and many listeners. I grew up listening to "Classic Rock" in the 1980s, and it took years for me to realize that this had deprived me of the authentic music of my youth... It was the music of somebody else's youth, which makes…
Do you by any chance live in New England? I recently traveled there and in several hours of driving over two weeks, could not locate more than one or two radio stations (per area) that did not play classic rock. I completely share your frustrations.
Food. I miss the healthy, affordable, sociable dining halls from university. There are people who cook better than I do, and who should be able to make great food at a reasonable price by buying fresh ingredients in bulk. My options for eating are * Cook it myself [1]. Cheap but takes time and effort to make good food. * Restaurant. Good food but expensive and takes time. I don't always want table service and small p…
It's not quite the replacement for a dining hall, but learning to cook is not only cheap but really enriching in other ways as well. 1. It's easier to be healthier (and in time this transforms to "impossible to not be healthier". 2. It's an impressive skill for attracting relationships both friendly and romantic. 3. Once you're confident, cooking for a party of friends and second degree strangers is a GREAT way to me…
Food. I miss the healthy, affordable, sociable dining halls from university. There are people who cook better than I do, and who should be able to make great food at a reasonable price by buying fresh ingredients in bulk. My options for eating are * Cook it myself [1]. Cheap but takes time and effort to make good food. * Restaurant. Good food but expensive and takes time. I don't always want table service and small p…
What university are you referring to? Personally, I find university dining options to be overpriced, with low food quality. Sure, they often try to be healthy, but I've never felt a draw to them. The only good aspect I can see to them is the social aspect, which (as another poster mentioned) is solvable by simply learning to cook and using it to create a social hub.
Maybe that was the idea.