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Re: Questions

#371

Post by jgamman »

L_Rahman wrote: post #305
chucky wrote: post #35

> Why are there so many successful startups in Stockholm? Several reasons. First, you need to recognize that any Sweden-based startup will, when it gets to be known internationally, have a Stockholm-based office. So it's not about a city of 1 million inhabitants, it's a country of 10 million that's the true number here. As an example, I believe Spotify opened their original offices in both Stockholm and Göteborg more…

It's interesting the quite possibly the most important condition didn't get mentioned. Sweden's social safety net is among the strongest in the world. If the floor on failure is that you still have access to food, housing and healthcare then quitting a full-time job to start a company becomes much more possible. More people starting companies, more attempts at big targets, more outlier successes.

maybe the opposite is true too - SV/US has more innovation because there's absolutely nothing to lose and you can't expect to eat/medical because US.

Re: Questions

#373

Post by lisper »

uxp wrote: post #258
jstimpfle wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Why can't I debug a function without restarting my program? > Because you use C or one of its derivatives instead of Lisp or one of its derivatives. In Common Lisp you can not only debug a function without restarting your program, you can redefine classes without restarting your program. It is truly awesome. You should try it some time. There is no technical reason why it shouldn't be possible in C, if you are wil…

There is no technical limitation why it is impossible in C, however the raw details of how C is implemented make it entirely impractical. A super generalized description of a C function might check if a register contains a positive value. If so, it will then jump to address 0x42, which is a memory offset, which is the beginning of another function. Its near impossible to "swap" out what lies at 0x42 since that was de…

> There is no technical limitation why it is impossible in C,

Yes, there is. You can't trace the stack in portable C, so you can't build a proper garbage collector.

Re: Questions

#374

Post by carapace »

ttty wrote: post #358
carapace wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I would [make the national speed limit 25] if I could. (With some hopefully obvious qualifications.) The current traffic system as an insane "death and mayhem lottery" that we force ourselves to play, with out respect of youth, age or anything. The current interest and action towards bike-friendly cities is a symptom, I think, of a healing of societies' psyches. We have been pretty brutal to each other since th…

Ok, so from 50 to 25 will reduce some deaths. That's right. But now we can reduce to 20, will reduce even more deaths. Then 15, 10... Where do we stop?

Fair point, and I have two answers for you.

The real thing I would advocate (if this weren't a beautiful Sunday afternoon, calling me from my keyboard) is a design for traffic that began from the premise of three (or four) interconnected but separate networks, one each for pedestrians, bikes, and rail, and maybe one network of specialized freeways for trucks and buses. Personal cars would be a luxury (unless you live in the country) that few would need (rather than a cornerstone of our economy) with rentals taking up the slack for vacations and such.

But if you're interested in this sort of thing, don't bother with my blathering, go read Christopher Alexander.

My other answer is really just an invitation to a kind of thought experiment: what if we really did restrict ourselves to just walking, biking, and trains? How would civilization look in that alternate reality?

Re: Questions

#375

Post by dang »

nextstep wrote: post #61

I wish I could be this uniformed on so many subjects and be considered a thought leader.

We've already asked you to stop posting unsubstantive comments to HN. This one breaks multiple site guidelines in addition, such as this one:

Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something.

If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it.

Re: Questions

#376

Post by Liron »

> With Visual Basic, you can readily write a quick script to calculate some calendar analytics with Outlook. To do the same with Google Calendar is a very laborious chore.

Google Calendar has a good API. The setup friction adds a notch of complexity relative to a VBA script, but I wouldn't call it "very laborious".

Re: Questions

#377

Post by StanislavPetrov »

robfitz wrote: post #320
jjeaff wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other major thing (and I would argue more important than the others) is Sweden's wealth and social safety net. Wealth is one of the most important factors for someone to found a startup. You aren't going out and starting a company if you have to work 80 plus hours a week to live. Just look at the clueless opinions of so many tech founders about how "you shouldn't pay yourself a salary at first after you take inve…

I agree with your first 2 paragraphs, but the third is being overly simplistic (or potentially just not understanding the trade-off at play). The scenario is that (roughly) 90% of the hypergrowth-style startups which raise a first round will fail to achieve enough momentum to successfully raise a second. And due to the business model choices they've committed to, failing to raise at that point is equivalent to going…

You are completely missing his third point. For people without wealth (or a social safety-net which provides you the resources you need to survive), it isn't optional to work for free. You have to eat and have a roof over your head, which means taking a salary if you are working full-time on your startup. Its not a strategic decision.

Re: Questions

#378

Post by mhjas »

mercer wrote: post #209
chucky wrote: post #35

> Why are there so many successful startups in Stockholm? Several reasons. First, you need to recognize that any Sweden-based startup will, when it gets to be known internationally, have a Stockholm-based office. So it's not about a city of 1 million inhabitants, it's a country of 10 million that's the true number here. As an example, I believe Spotify opened their original offices in both Stockholm and Göteborg more…

Most of the things you mention also apply to The Netherlands, except for possibly the tax-free computer scheme (not sure about that one). As far as I can tell we're not really all that note-worthy startup-wise. Assuming that's true, any ideas what might be the differentiating factor? From what I understand, both Holland and Sweden are culturally similar enough that I can't immediately think of other factors that make…

That is a hard one. They only thing I could come up with off the top of my head is that Sweden a bit more consensus oriented, which could be quite good for creating commercial successes. Like for example I would say that the Netherlands has a stronger electronic music scene, but the big names are still a bit less commercial than Avicii and Swedish House Mafia. Maybe that is because between the Netherlands and its neighboring countries you have a pretty big market. While for Sweden it is Sweden and then the world.

Re: Questions

#379

Post by StanislavPetrov »

philwelch wrote: post #353
sakoht wrote: post #147

"Why are certain things getting so much more expensive?" Because we are lying about inflation. It's not a conspiracy, just a mutually agreed-to delusion. By pretending inflation is lower than it is, the poor feel like they are standing still instead of sinking ...though instinctively they know. And the people just keeping up get to feel richer. Since technology and efficiency improve, the people staying in the same p…

So why are other things not getting much more expensive? Why are things not getting more expensive at the same rate? Monetary inflation affects all goods more or less uniformly, but the price of milk hasn't skyrocketed as much as the cost of education or housing or healthcare.

Because monetary policy is only one of a multitude of factors that influence inflation. Regulations, subsidies, tax laws, trade agreements, labor laws, immigration policy are just some of the other things that have wildly disjointed effects on industries, markets and prices.

Re: Questions

#380

Post by _hardwaregeek »

hyperpallium wrote: post #44

> Is Bloom's "Two Sigma" phenomenon real? ... one-on-one tutoring using mastery learning led to a two sigma(!) improvement in student performance. When I tutored, I found students often had some misunderstanding, somewhere. So my task was to listen , to find that misunderstanding, so I could correct it. This "teaching" is listening, more than talking. The idea is they are lost, but to know what direction they need, I…

Tutoring is often the only time that a student will sit down for a dedicated amount of time and study without distractions. As much as I want to believe in my own value as a tutor (and I do think there is some value), I will admit that a fair portion of the benefit is just having someone force the student to study.
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