98% isn't much • Hacker News Board

Re: 98% isn't much

#51

Post by trjordan » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:19 PM UTC

I was heading to dinner with a friend who worked in infra. Google maps said we could bike across town in 20 minutes. He suggested we leave 40 minutes ahead of time and grab a drink at the bar if we got there early. When I raised an eyebrow, he goes:

"What, do you not live your life based on 99th percentiles?"

I tend to think of work as upside-based on downside-based. Most feature work is upside. 10% lift on conversions is great, 40% adoption is winning, and you're playing for the moonshot of 10x. Infra work is downside-based. 98% secure, 98% available, 98% acceptable performance -- that'll all failure. Winning means the thing works as expected and nobody notices.

Not everything sorts cleanly into upside vs. downside, but a lot does. Allocate your risk accordingly.

Re: 98% isn't much

#52

Post by MichaelRo » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:20 PM UTC

>> But a restaurant where clients don’t get of food poisoning 98% of time is getting people sick on a monthly (or even weekly) basis.

Objectively, I think it's impossible to work in the food industry and avoid food poisoning 100% of the time. One of the reasons I never attempted several of my food industry business ideas. I'm certain they would be at least profitable enough to keep going, would be rather trivial to access EU subsidy money in the €50k, but the amount of regulations and inspections terrifies me. And I'm sure at some point, some salmonella or what else would slip through and don't wanna deal with the consequences.

Easier with programming computers since a "bug" won't make people expell waste simultaneously through both incoming and outgoing food orifices, like it happend to me last time I ordered sarmale from a local restaurant. Like in the food industry a "bug" is literally that.

Re: 98% isn't much

#53

Post by aaron695 » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:20 PM UTC

[dead]

Re: 98% isn't much

#54

Post by aaron695 » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:20 PM UTC

[dead]

Re: 98% isn't much

#55

Post by qarl2 » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:20 PM UTC

rossant wrote: post #40

qarl2 wrote: post #23

It's just mathematical expectation. Don't look at the simple probability - look at probability * value.

aka expectation

Yes. That's why I said "expectation".

Re: 98% isn't much

#56

Post by mellosouls » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:21 PM UTC

Off topic (and at risk of being downvoted), I don't think I'll ever get a better chance to insist here that

"99 and a half won't do"

https://youtu.be/1QVJCjbgM-s

Holy Disciples

Trying to Make a Hundred

Re: 98% isn't much

#57

Post by pixl97 » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:21 PM UTC

kgeist wrote: post #31

theragra wrote: post #10

Pragmatically, often users without new browsers and OSses are not the best clients. In ideal world, sure, I want to support everyone. In a world with limited resources, I would better spend my time elsewhere.

>Pragmatically, often users without new browsers and OSses are not the best clients Hmm, it could be fat enterprise clients with locked-down software versions (legacy, security etc.) That's where most of the money is, isn't it?

If you make enterprise software then, ya, target that.

If you're selling tickets to a venue, then your site is blocked by them anyway.

This article is a weird extremist take.

Re: 98% isn't much

#58

Post by Certhas » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:22 PM UTC

MatekCopatek wrote: post #32

While I agree with the general sentiment, the problem here isn't developers not being familiar with statistics, it's the simple fact all of this is profit driven most of the time. I tried to purchase tickets for an event last week. I had to go through Ticketmaster as it was the only official way. They forced me to verify my account using a phone number, but whoever they were using for messages wasn't able to deliver…

Infrastructure should not be (purely) profit driven. To improve profits for train operators, the simple option is to cut lines serving small and rural communities. The economics are much worse than serving large cities. Same for cell coverage and broadband internet. Most profitable is to just not cover a few percent of the population.

There is a point where technology becomes foundational for participating in society. And then it needs to be regulated to be available to everyone.

Re: 98% isn't much

#59

Post by zero-sharp » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:22 PM UTC

eknkc wrote: post #8

I agree the general premise but do not agree when it comes to browser support. I feel like we should be building for the 98% or even 95% and force the remaining to upgrade their browsers. I've built for the IE6 - IE11 era for a painful and long time. I do not give a shit if you want to use a 3 year old browser at this point. Go look at a blank screen.

I have a gripe with this attitude because it goes beyond browser use. Inserting the new fancy thing everywhere is often unnecessary and affects accessibility in a negative way for a nonneglible number of your users. And that was the point of the article, right?

Taking the conversation slightly outside the original context: if I go to a restaurant, should I have a phone and an app ready so that I can order food? If I go to the gym, should I have a gym app ready so that I can sign in? I don't like having to do that. But that's just another instance of this same attitude.

Re: 98% isn't much

#60

Post by cj17382 » Tue, Jul 07, 2026, 1:23 PM UTC

This whole article is a categorical error. Whether something is good or not entirely depends on the frame of reference and the context. You can argue endlessly by shifting the topic that 98% is used on. I guess that's what people are doing here.