Hacker News: prsimp

New comment by prsimp in "Obsidian plugin was abused to deploy a remote access trojan"

prsimp — Mon, 11 May 2026 13:40:31 +0000

> when someone comes up with excuses for not making something open source

This is a wild take even coming from HN. Nobody needs an excuse to not make something open source.

This sort of entitlement does, and has done, far more damage to the OSS movement than anyone's "excuses" for not open sourcing their code. Full stop.

You can absolutely prefer open source software and choose not to trust closed-source apps. That’s all fair. But treating closed source itself as evidence of deception or impending betrayal is exactly the kind of ideological purity test that makes these conversations exhausting.

New comment by prsimp in "Product vs. Engineering"

prsimp — Tue, 18 Oct 2022 19:22:35 +0000

In my experience, there is a thin line between "blameless" cultures and "responsibility-less" cultures. Blameless cultures accept that we are all human, make mistakes, have off periods, etc. "Responsibility-less" cultures are as you describe -- they eschew honest conversations about the actual forces that affect projects. Instead they tend to repeat the same process discussions ad nauseum, typically discussing symptoms rather than the actual causes.

Since we as humans often prefer to avoid conflict (sometimes at all costs), it's not uncommon to see companies tilt towards the latter. This is exacerbated in "scale up" environments when rapid personnel changes make it difficult to build the kind of trust necessary for direct, honest communication.

New comment by prsimp in "Biggest drop in Facebook organic reach we have seen"

prsimp — Mon, 23 Oct 2017 16:29:02 +0000

> One sort of answer would be how people are convinced that their data is not important.

When I'm wandering through my yard watering plants, I like to imagine a world where our personal data, or more precisely access to it, is treated more like mineral rights today.

Companies would be required to pay a small micro-payment royalty anytime your data was used to make them money, and you would be able to transfer/split the rights just as you could mineral rights today. This micro-payment world would supplant the current "your data is the price of admission" world we live in.

New comment by prsimp in "The New Faces of Coke"

prsimp — Wed, 30 Sep 2015 22:51:35 +0000

While not limited to the Soda industry, this sentiment is expressed pretty vividly (even comparing testimony, marketing etc.) in the documentary Fed Up[1]. Worth a watch if this sort of thing is interesting to you and currently available on Netflix.

[1] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2381335/

Harvey: Add a Second Face to Your JavaScript

prsimp — Fri, 08 Jun 2012 23:04:41 +0000

Article URL: http://techtime.getharvest.com/blog/harvey-a-second-face-for-your-javascript

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4086544

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

New comment by prsimp in "Giving.github.com"

prsimp — Mon, 14 May 2012 21:03:34 +0000

Original Discussion from it's first appearance on HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3906143

Also, blog post from presumably the author about how the idea hadn't really taken off: http://williamedwardscoder.tumblr.com/post/21266287229/givin...

and discussion of said post: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3852413

New comment by prsimp in "Wisdom I picked up from Eloquent Ruby, Chapters 1-9"

prsimp — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 16:25:18 +0000

In all fairness, it makes it pretty tough to take your comment seriously when you consistently refer to Rails when you mean Ruby.

Also, I have to disagree. Like the author of the post, I found Olsen's book to be a delightful read. It is certainly not a great "first book" on Ruby, however. I think you ought to read it once you've gained a little better understanding - its wonderful for smoothing out edges and cementing some of the more advanced concepts.

New comment by prsimp in "How large is github. Is there a legit way to download it all?"

prsimp — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 00:13:27 +0000

According to an Oct 2011 answer by Zach Holman on Quora[1], they only release publicly the number of users. According to the homepage, that number is currently at 1,455,656 (hosting 2,444,052 repos). You could extrapolate from their with an average repo size, but I haven't seen any good information on what that size would be.

[1] http://www.quora.com/What-is-the-size-of-GitHubs-userbase

New comment by prsimp in "Coding Horror - Welcome to the Post PC Era"

prsimp — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 01:34:46 +0000

It's not impossible to remain a creator while using an iPad (or other tablet) - at least not when it comes to development. There are certainly people who are happily developing on an iPad (albeit with a more powerful remote backend)[1]. I think we are likely to see even more of a shift in this direction as these devices become even more capable.

[1] http://yieldthought.com/post/12239282034/swapped-my-macbook-...

New comment by prsimp in "Scaling GitHub"

prsimp — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 21:50:09 +0000

Snide comments aside, I think you're missing a lot of value in slides 26 through 34, the section on communication. Reducing the 'spin-up' time for new employees and documenting even the one-off conversations seems like a great way to increase productivity.

New comment by prsimp in "Show HN: I built an easier way to browse ThemeForest"

prsimp — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 01:59:24 +0000

User westiseast posted a blog post[1] about A/B testing a grid vs. list product displays on his online tea shop, Min River Tea, which lead to a pretty good discussion on the topic[2].

[1] http://westiseast.co.uk/blog/product-listing-ab-test-results... [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3223092

Dear Rupert Murdoch: Let’s Talk Piracy & “The Simpsons”

prsimp — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 05:46:18 +0000

Article URL: http://daggle.com/dear-rupert-murdoch-talk-piracy-simpsons-2944

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3499258

Points: 95

# Comments: 27

New comment by prsimp in "[dead]"

prsimp — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 06:17:38 +0000

I sleep ~4 hours a night during the week. I find that if I sleep more (~6-8), I am not tired again by the time the remaining hours have passed and it is time for me to sleep again. For instance, when I sleep 6 hours, I am not ready to sleep again 18 hours later. This becomes a real problem after two nights or so, at which point I have a lot of trouble falling asleep.

I do tend to sleep more on the weekends, but I often end up essentially forcing myself to sleep come Sunday night.

New comment by prsimp in "I too know the websites you visited"

prsimp — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 20:54:30 +0000

Doesn't appear to guess correctly in Chrome 15 on OS X (10.7.2). I'm not sure exactly what the 'whoops' means for google - but I've obviously visited HN and have visited a few of the others as well.

Screenshot: http://cl.ly/1i0921270W2b1u190b0W

New comment by prsimp in "What if Occupy Wall Street Protesters Did Startup Weekend?"

prsimp — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 17:04:54 +0000

I read this more as being about creating jobs than making money for one's self.

New comment by prsimp in "Mpd + ncmpc - perfect combo for iTunes replacement - Tuan Anh Tran"

prsimp — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 23:01:19 +0000

While it's not drag & drop, you should take a look at beets (http://beets.radbox.org/). It's written in Python and has fairly active development. It uses the MusicBrainz database for cataloging music and is pretty customizable as far as directory structure etc.

New comment by prsimp in "So you're considering a liberal arts degree"

prsimp — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 18:29:03 +0000

Exactly. All of the points made about free or semi-free education can just as easily be applied to the 'harder' subjects, and while there are plenty of examples of well-versed, successful, self-trained members of all disciplines, they are generally the exception and not the rule.

New comment by prsimp in "Why has Steve Jobs' death got more press than Ralph Steinman's?"

prsimp — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 04:19:20 +0000

I'd say it has at least a bit to due with sampling bias - many of the more prolific content-creators on the internet are more likely to comment on the passing of Jobs than Steinman.

New comment by prsimp in "Feedback on our Launchrock Beta Invite"

prsimp — Sun, 18 Sep 2011 05:25:58 +0000

Clickable Link: http://www.flamecourt.com

I agree that it does seem a bit vague. I get the idea of wanting to pique interest, but I'm also loathe to give you my e-mail address with so little information about what you mean by delivering internet justice.

How to Assess the Market Potential of Your Idea

prsimp — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:50:29 +0000

Article URL: http://www.inc.com/guides/201109/how-to-assess-the-market-potential-of-your-new-business-idea.html

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2970247

Points: 1

# Comments: 0