Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Working on databases from prison

turso.tech

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 567 posts

Re: Working on databases from prison

#101

Post by myrmidon »

awongh wrote: post #76
eddieroger wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From your link: > The defendant, Preston Thorpe, appeals his conviction for possession of a controlled drug with intent to sell He may have done other things, but his conviction was for possession with intent, and that seems to be why he's locked up. It doesn't make anything else he's done acceptable, but in America he's innocent until proven guilty, and it doesn't seem he was found guilty of assault.

I feel ok that there's a distinction between legal rulings and other circumstances of the case that I as an internet person can use my judgement to understand. Just because someone is guilty or not doesn't separate other facts of the case. In an extreme example: I'm ok with the court letting someone off who murdered someone, because the police didn't follow proper procedure wrt evidence/confessions/witness testimony.…

Sure, but bjorkandkd unpromptedly accused Preston of being a liar, which is just incorrect as far as I can tell.

Everyone is of course free to make up their own mind, but when making public accusations I would at least expect an honest effort to keep those accusations factually correct.

Re: Working on databases from prison

#102

Post by jrvieira »

UncleEntity wrote: post #31
chatmasta wrote: post #6

How does the compensation work? The US prison system has a bit of a nasty reputation when it comes to exploiting prison labor, so I hope those practices aren’t carrying over into these more forward-looking types of initiative… but at the same time, surely Turso isn’t paying full SWE salary?

/me putting on my Law & Order hat Why should the taxpayers be burdened by the results of his bad decisions? /me takes off hat

how does the taxpayer benefit from the inexistence of rehabilitation programs?

Re: Working on databases from prison

#103

Post by kelstar18 »

abxyz wrote: post #89
kelstar18 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Purporting that to be a "claim" would be - in my opinion - an incredibly disingenuous reading of the poster's comment. Remember the HN commenting guidelines: "Assume good faith."

That is the good faith reading. The comment isn't open to interpretation. What could the meaning be if not that Preston is an uncommon example of a prisoner?

If you don't believe that language is open to interpretation I'm not sure there is anything more to be gained from this dialog. Have a good day.

Re: Working on databases from prison

#104

Post by [deleted] »

kelstar18 wrote: post #64
abxyz wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're going to extend kindness to Preston then perhaps a little kindness towards others wouldn't go a miss either. Preston isn't rare, the prison system is filled with normal kind hearted people who were unfortunate in life and things went awry. Everyone deserves a chance, not just someone who can provide economic value to you.

Showing compassion to one person doesn’t deserve criticism for not saving everyone.

[deleted]

Re: Working on databases from prison

#106

Post by shermantanktop »

code_for_monkey wrote: post #34
wffurr wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 13th amendment specifically allows slavery of prisoners. Edit: I don’t mean to imply the author isn’t paid fairly by Turso. A few posts down, the CEO of Turso asserts that they do pay fairly. The OP in this thread might reasonably wonder about this because several states do in fact use prisoners as unpaid slave labor.

finally, someone who took a humanities class!

There are dozens of us. Dozens!

Re: Working on databases from prison

#107

Post by prh8 »

qualeed wrote: post #46
abxyz wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...in America he's innocent until proven guilty... ...in a court of law. Innocent until proven guilty doesn't extend to internet comments.

> Innocent until proven guilty doesn't extend to internet comments. That's not a good thing. Edit: I cannot really believe that this, of all comments, is controversial. Living life treating everyone as guilty until they prove themselves innocent is... just shitty, let alone exhausting. Do people forget about how many times reddit and other ruined innocent people's lives? Sometimes HN amazes me with new technology, in…

unfortunately the average quality of thought process of hn when it comes to life and common sense is the opposite of its technical knowledge

Re: Working on databases from prison

#108

Post by catigula »

eru wrote: post #81
nilamo wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that it is nice to keep in mind as a general philosophy, however I also think it's important to keep in mind that the people who originally wrote "innocent until proven guilty" were all treasonous sepratists, and their philosophy may or may not always align with my own.

Yes, violent insurrection against the lawful authority of the Crown is no laughing matter. (And many of them were slaveowners, so they did not have moral authority neither by the standards of their day nor by ours.)

It's ambiguous. The concept of slavery being bad was quite novel and mostly comes from English philosophy/legal theory which America has a direct lineage from.

Re: Working on databases from prison

#109

Post by frakt0x90 »

TheGrumpyBrit wrote: post #29
laufey wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious, why would you expect him to be paid less? I know historically pay is bad for prisoners, but if he's working the same hours and is just as productive as any other employee, shouldn't he be paid the same? I could potentially see paying someone less if they were coming in with much less experience than what's usually hired for in the role, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.

You can make the exact same argument about employers paying different rates depending on the country the employee is based in, and for all the same reasons. Is there a good reason why a developer in Thailand or India should be paid less than their colleague who works on the same team, but is based in the US? Many companies believe so - there's a significant difference in the cost of living between those two employees…

Except prison has some very key differences from living freely in another state or country. You cannot leave and so don't have a choice about where you work. Even if cost of living is low in prison, you often still have to pay for being there and wages are far less than the cost. A prisoner will be released one day and their cost of living will skyrocket overnight. Do we want motivated hard working people leaving prison with nothing so they end up back in the same environment that got them there in the first place?

Re: Working on databases from prison

#110

Post by tmoertel »

TheGrumpyBrit wrote: post #29
laufey wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious, why would you expect him to be paid less? I know historically pay is bad for prisoners, but if he's working the same hours and is just as productive as any other employee, shouldn't he be paid the same? I could potentially see paying someone less if they were coming in with much less experience than what's usually hired for in the role, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.

You can make the exact same argument about employers paying different rates depending on the country the employee is based in, and for all the same reasons. Is there a good reason why a developer in Thailand or India should be paid less than their colleague who works on the same team, but is based in the US? Many companies believe so - there's a significant difference in the cost of living between those two employees…

> Is there a good reason why a developer in Thailand or India should be paid less than their colleague who works on the same team, but is based in the US?

Yes, and that reason is that people in most of the developed world are free to say yes or no to job offers based on their individual preferences. And, it just so happens, in Thailand and India there are many people who will happily say yes to offers that people in the US would say no to. The cost of living explanation that companies give is illusory; the reality is that they have to pay enough to get people to say yes.

Now, you might ask why people in different countries say yes to offers at different compensation levels. But I think the answer is self evident: people will say yes to offers when they believe that there are lots of other people who will say yes to it. Under those circumstances, saying no won't earn a higher offer but cause the company to give the job to someone else.

Ultimately, then, regional prices are set by what the locals are generally willing to say yes to.

Post reply on HN