hal9000xp

You can read why I strongly believe in cryptocurrencies based on my life experience (which has nothing do to with crypto):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16197475

I think HN went pretty much to the left, if not far-left. HN readers are pretty much on the side of Paul Krugman, Thomas Piketty's world view.

I'm on the side Milton Friedman, Paul Graham's world view.

The left consider what I believe as total shit and at the same time call me intolerant. And this irritates me a lot. There is no way of being in peace with left without being submissive or self-censoring. And I don't want to be either.

I believe that this cryptocurrency you mentioned is probably fraudulous

So do you believe YCombinator promotes fraud? Because cryptocurrency I mentioned was on blog.ycombinator.com.

I don’t live in US. While I understand what’s real offense (including disrespectful jokes), I have concern about “guilty till proven innocent”.

If I’m attracted to someone and I want to date. How you can ask to go out without risk of being accused of sexual harassment?

This is not sarcastic question. This is especially important if you as a male is not very good at reading subtle social cues.

P.S. I really don't see why it got downvoted. There is no hidden message here.

Thanks for mentioning DAI.

I mentioned DAI today in comment and essentially got banned for doing it.

In comment I provided link to interview with Olaf on blog.ycombinator.com where MakerDAO was mentioned.

So I got banned as spammer in HN for providing link to blog on YC.

It tells a lot about the level of average HN reader.

As tensions with USDT rise, my prediction is that MakerDAO decentralized stablecoin will take over the market in 2019. You can see how issued DAI market cap pumping up steadily all year long almost with no break:

https://mkr.tools/

So I'm accumulating position in MKR.

Here is YC interview with backer of MakerDAO:

https://blog.ycombinator.com/blockchain-investing-with-olaf-...

Andressen Horrowitz also increasing their position in MKR:

https://medium.com/makerdao/a16z-crypto-purchases-6-of-mkr-b...

https://medium.com/makerdao/maker-sells-12m-of-mkr-to-partne...

Although there are some concerns that it's economically impossible to create fully decentralized stablecoin. Historical example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Wednesday

Failed stablecoin example:

https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/nubits/

We will see as time goes on. Anyway, it's very interesting economic experiment.

P.S. So YC HN readers keep downvoting me even if I give links to interview on YC. Okay...

Usually, people who trade smarter than those who vote. So stock market is constant voting machine for expected future earnings, it's fair to say that indexes provide pretty accurate overview of economy.

With that in mind, if you look at SPY (US) and compare it with EWI (Italy) and EWP (Spain), you will see that Italy and Spain are not going anywhere since 2008 and US at that time made huge progress.

https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/spy

https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/ewi

https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/fund/ewp

Now, take a look at GDP of US:

https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

And compare it with sad picture of Italy and Spain and Greece:

https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

US has populists but their debt denominated in their own currency and on top of that US economy is very diverse and strong. US is much more business friendly than Italy, Spain and Greece. And their debt denominated in currency they can't print.

If you are anti-business and pro-welfare, then your business won't flourish and at the same time you will accumulate huge debt.

I watched EU debt crisis since 2012. In 2015, I watched this animation about EU debt crisis on Bloomberg:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4_tyEl84IQ

Since 2016, I spoke with many greeks, spanish and it looks to me that vast majority of them believe in wrong things. Therefore they will continue to vote for left or right populists no matter what. Their left and right are anti free market, anti fiscal conservatism, pro spending, pro welfare, against businesses.

In very long term, EU is unsustainable. Too many countries with different interests and huge moral hazard.

I acknowledge that Sweden has number of advantages and benevolent government with no corruption. It's certainly one of the top countries in the world in terms of development.

My guess is that Sweden might be popular choice among people who want to pursue PhD or something like that.

I fell in love with Hong Kong first time I visited it as a tourist in 2013.

"as to enforce equality of income". This is what puts me off of Europe!

I don't mind if group of people voluntarily decide to live in communism and share with each other everything they earn. Like hippies who lived in сommunes.

If high taxes (>33%) are not voluntary then it just means that social democrats are not confident that most successful people in the country will share their ideals.

If European social democracy is so cool, then it should work on purely voluntary basis.

Let's re-frame conversation from arguing to selling. I mean there are lots of top technical talents in India and China. How are you going to convince them to go to Sweden instead of US? It should be pretty damn good reason to decline $300k offer from Silicon Valley and go to Stockholm instead!

P.S. I think selling/pitching society ideals is much more positive and productive than arguing.

I think educational microcomputers should be reintroduced in modern schools, so kids would have easier time to imagine all path from programming language to hardware.

By the way, your username reminds me of great game on ZX Spectrum called Dizzy:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dizzy_(series)

I sometimes have urge of nostalgia and play such games on ZX Spectrum emulator :)

Are you asking about what I mean by "It was tough decision for me"?

You can read my post dated 2014:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8692961

In short, I was very upset by political situation in Russia and I felt that I must settle in any relatively free country even at great opportunity cost.

But now, I became more confident of my skills and as a result I became more risk tolerant and more ambitious. I decided that in order to be truly happy I should take more risks and completely abandon the idea of stable and predictable life in Europe.

When I leave the Netherlands, all my legal time till citizenship will reset. And I can't truly settle in Hong Kong because housing prices are insanely high and I can't get citizenship there but my bet is that I will become so successful that I will be able to settle anywhere I want as high net worth individual.

I was born in Uzbekistan. I lived 22 years in Uzbekistan. My parents had no money but in 1994, my father bought me russian clone of ZX Spectrum:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX_Spectrum

https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9A%D0%BE%D0%BC%D0%BF%D0%B0...

Basically, in 1990s many of us, used what was popular in 1980s in UK.

My father wasn't technical person but I fell in love with ZX Spectrum from day one! So I just learned it all myself.

Schools were terrible, I mostly skip all classes. But ZX Spectrum is very simple machine, so it's possible for 10 year old kid to learn it without external guidance.

Funny fact, I started working in Internet club in Uzbekistan in 2003 for 10 USD per month. In 2004, I discovered wonderland called Knoppix and FreeBSD. Then I learned programming in Bash. After that I learned programming in C because Kernighan and Ritchie books was so thin and at the same time all Unix/Linux was written in C.

More details on how I learned programming:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16508460

Europe will not win race for ambitious people.

I lived in Sweden for almost one year as an expat (I'm a software engineer). Now, I live in the Netherlands for more than two years.

I can say for sure that Europe is nowhere near Silicon Valley in terms of compensation for ambitious software engineers. Sweden went total nuts with taxes, anything above $6500 per month would be taxed at 55-60% tax rate. It's effectively cap to enforce equality of outcome.

60% tax doesn't mean that ultra-high salaries will be taxed at this rate. It means that ultra-high salaries will not exist in job market in the first place.

The best Swedish startup threatens to leave Sweden because of regulatory and tax burden [1].

The Netherlands recognized importance of highly-skilled expats by introducing tax discounts called "30% ruling". I do respect their efforts to attract talent. That's why I moved from Sweden to the Netherlands in 2016.

However, as non-EU citizen you can work only for publicly registered sponsors [2]. Usually, it's boring well-established companies. So I missed some cool opportunities due to this limitation.

As I learned dutch local job market, I found that almost nobody will pay you 10'000 EUR per month.

Aside from tax and regulatory burden in Europe, there are cultural things like Law of Jante [3]. I can't imagine how society with such mentality can attract highly ambitious people.

Also, talking about money in Europe is kinda taboo. And dutch automatically repeat "money is not everything". It wouldb't annoy me if someone committed to work for open source software. Or being great painter. But when recruiter respond me "money is not everything" when I'm asking "too much", it annoys me a lot.

With that in mind, I decided to abandon idea of living in Europe, getting citizenship, learning dutch language etc. It was tough decision for me but it's time to move on. It's not kind of a society where I want to spend rest of my life. Sorry dutch and swedes, I don't fit here.

So I decided to move to Hong Kong. I've just got very lucrative job offer in Hong Kong (in HFT). The size of compensation is far beyond of what Europe can offer me. Now, I'm almost on par with US (I couldn't get into US because I don't have any degree). Now, I'm just waiting for my HK visa getting approved.

You might troll me saying that, I'm whining. OK, I have answer to that. Just look at my net salary increases:

Russia -> Sweden (2015) +28%

Sweden -> Sweden (2015) +15%

Sweden -> the Netherlands (2016) +63%

the Netherlands -> Hong Kong (2018) +83% (and possible bonus up to 300% of yearly salaries!)

I will work like crazy fanatic and in next six years I will be well over $1M of liquid net worth.

So Europe lost me. Europe is perfect place for people who just want to work from 9 to 5 and put family as their top priority. It's not suited for risk takers.

Links:

https://www.thelocal.se/20160412/spotify-founders-sweden-is-...

https://ind.nl/en/work/Pages/Highly-skilled-migrant.aspx

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante

A year ago, I watched YC lecture for raising capital where Sam Altman or somebody else recommended startup founders NOT raise any capital from unaccredited investors because it may create problems with raising next rounds. In other words, current regulatory environment also promotes discrimination of unaccredited investors.

Employee compensation is different.

P.S. It's amazing how much Hacker News readers are against cryptocurrency, in favor of very big government, very high taxes up to 70% as their Piketty, Krugman suggest to enforce equality of outcome. This community became total opposition of what Paul Graham might thought back in 2007. The only thing is left is to change Hacker News icon to Che Guevara emblem.

only scammers did ICOs

This is absolutely incorrect. One of many examples - Tezos.

In the eyes of SEC, ICOs are nothing more than equity crowdfunding. It means that SEC doesn't like any sale of unlisted assets to unaccredited investors.

By SEC definition accredited investor is an investor who has either $1M of liquid net worth or stable income not less than $200k per year.

Original intent of the government was to bar unsophisticated investors from high risk investments.

While I understand logic of the law - many people are completely financially irresponsible and are not capable of critical thinking (that's what politically correct term "unsophisticated investor" actually means), I find this law extremely frustrating.

For example, I had no chance to buy Spotify when it was well under $1B valuation because the government baby-sitting me by excluding me from opportunity to invest into early-stage startups.

If you want to downvote me on "not capable of critical thinking" and at the same time support barring people from making their own financial decisions, please think twice because it's clear contradiction.

There is a compromise: Why not lower entry level of becoming accredited investor? For example, you could be semi-accredited investor with lower capital but with limits on investments. Or making some government exams on risk taking and investing? Or having special government-approved platform for early-stage investments for unaccredited investors. There are lots of combinations.

Right now, there is a huge hunger among people for early-stage investments. And if you are not making it legal, it just go underground and as a result with more dangers for unsophisticated investors.

The scary thing is that while living in Russia, I've encountered many people with similar views (face to face).

I know it's hard to believe for western people but there are lots of people in Russia who completely obsessed with ideas of "unique Russian identity", "God chosen nation", "Russian world", "saint Russia vs. soulless American imperialism" etc.

Putin understands feelings of this part of society and successfully exploits this in order to push his own agenda. For example:

http://time.com/75484/putin-the-internet-is-a-cia-project/

In 2014-2015, I've spent great amount of energy to get out of Russia. Since I left Russia in 2015, the situation with internet freedom became much worse. Especially this year when Russia blocked millions and millions of IP-addresses in unsuccessful attempts to block Telegram.

My prediction for near future is that Russia become as restrictive as China or even worse.

I don't think VPN is viable long-term solution. Look, where are VPN servers might be hosted? Amazon or Digital Ocean? Well, this year Russia just showed that they can block 20 million IP-addresses on a whim.

And I see no signs of massive public demand for free internet. Why? Because if it's popular site in Russia, then it might be unblocked in the case of accidental blocking. If it's just random site in English, it will never be unblocked. And vast majority of Russians don't speak or read English at all.

In other words, Russia has absolutely no future as a country with free internet. RIP.

My advice to fellow Russians with brains: get out of Russia, run away as fast as possible from this goddamn place.

For someone who is into old games, I would also recommend book "It's behind you" which covers a story of porting R-Type to ZX-Spectrum:

http://www.bizzley.com/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R-Type

I was always puzzled by human's experience of "seeing". When you "see redness" for example. It was very hard for me to explain it to other people before I found that there is special term called "qualia":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualia

And I have absolutely no idea how to make machines experience "qualia". Any sophisticated image/motion recognition is rather trivial stuff compared to achieving mysterious "qualia".

I'm surprised nobody mentioned LeetCode. You can start solving 100 most popular interview questions (sort them by difficulty first):

https://leetcode.com/problemset/top-100-liked-questions/

If you've never took any algorithm course and have only a week for preparation, it would be very difficult to prepare for coding interview. But I think you can at least finish all easy problems from this list. In this case, you may at least pass screening coding interview.

Right now, I'm very actively interviewing with pretty selective high-frequency trading companies. I can say that LeetCode has pretty relevant set of interview problems.

One more thing. Even if you solved a problem, always look at description of solution, if there is no description of solution, you should look at discussion.

From there, you can find references to common algorithms/themes like binary search etc.

A bit off-topic. I've noticed that P/E ratio (Price / Earnings) is pretty decent for Apple and it doesn't change much. In fact, since 2009 till today P/E stays in corridor between ~10 and ~20. What it means is that $1TB market cap is relatively cheap price for Apple. Their stock price merely reflects growing net income, so their EPS (Earning Per Share) growing steadily over years:

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/AAPL/apple/pe-rati...

Location: Netherlands (but I'm Russian citizen)

Remote: Possible, if job is very interesting

Willing to relocate: Yes, preferably: [Singapore, Hong Kong, London, Zurich]

Technologies: C++11/14, Linux

Résumé/CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/eldar-gaynetdinov-a0564b61/

E mail: hal9000ed2k+hacker+news { at } gmail

I'm working as a full-time C/C++ software developer since 2009 (before 2014, it was mix C/C++, now only C++11/14). I worked in the second largest internet company in Russia as a backend developer of ICQ Instant Messenger. Then I moved to Sweden, I worked in two companies. Currently, I'm working in the Netherlands in video streaming company.

I'm highly interested in algorithmic trading and cryptocurrencies. So I'm looking for a job related to these topics.

However, I can be open for other opportunities if they strongly match with my technical interests:

* algorithms/discrete math (I'm comfortable with classic algorithms and discrete math used in competitive programming)

* deep learning/related math (I can't offer much here, know only fundamentals, e.g. good understanding of backpropagation algorithm, willing to learn more but not willing to became machine learning monkey blindly playing with frameworks)

* CUDA/HPC programming (I can't offer much, willing to learn)

* functional programming on Haskell or OCaml (I dived deep into inner working of Haskell one year ago, I forgot most of what I learned, but I'm willing to learn again)

Rwanda seems to be first country which imposed complete ban on plastic bags. It looks they've been successful on that:

http://www.dw.com/en/ten-years-on-rwandas-plastic-ban/av-428...

Here are my advices on how to train yourself for algorithm/data structures interviews:

1. Others already recommended to practice solving problems on LeetCode;

2. While solving these problems don't spend too much time if you got stuck, look for answer or discussion after hour or two;

3. If you feel weak on some topic (e.g. dynamic programming), try to read up related material, lecture notes, familiarize yourself with classical problems on this topic;

4. Even if you solved problem, look for other answers. You often be surprised how much shorter and concise solution can be;

5. Read some books on algorithms like Skiena or Papadimitriou. I don't recommend you to read Knuth or CLRS unless you have strong math background. Skiena or Papadimitriou are much easier to read for beginner. Also, separately, I do recommend the book - Programming Pearls by Bentley;

6. Once you practised for two months or more, start taking mock interviews on Gainlo;

7. Enjoy algorithms and solving programming puzzles. Enjoying algorithms is a must because if you really want to master it to the Google interview level, it may take years;

I watched all of these lectures online. It's truly insightful!

I'm too poor to be angel investor but I do like to listen angel investors and venture capitalists because they can give me insights about how to find brilliant ideas and what's common signs of prospective ideas.

I think advices from ex-entrepreneurs who turned into angel investors or venture capitalists are much more valuable than from first or one time successful entrepreneurs because they know both sides. It's hard to impossible to distinguish talent from luck based on one time success. But if someone repeatedly find unicorns over the years, it's most probably talent and I would listen that person with great attention.

One of my key takeaways from these lectures - really good idea for startup often sounds like bad idea because if idea sounded obviously good it would be most probably already executed by some big corp.

This takeaway teach me not be overly dismissive of ideas which are not obviously good and be careful with ideas which sound obviously good.

P.S. I know that soft-skills (e.g. leadership) and team are very important for success but it's not insightful information.

I think this may be relevant to leave it here. There is also an open-source re-implementation of the classic Tomb Raider engine:

https://github.com/opentomb/OpenTomb

My first ever programming book was "Usborne Guide to Understanding the Micro: How It Works and What It Can Do" written in 1982:

https://www.amazon.com/Usborne-Guide-Understanding-Micro-Ele...

It's introduction to microcomputers and programming on ZX Spectrum.

I've read russian version of this book in 1994.

In post-soviet area in 1990, time was shifted, so in 1990s we had wave of popularity of ZX Spectrum and 8-bit game console NES (i.e. what was popular in 1980s in the west).

I recommend to watch movie based on Kevin Mitnick story:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Track_Down

I couldn't say it's very accurate story but it's still fun to watch.

In last few days, I actually wanted to order powerful laptop from System76. I want laptop with strong GPU (e.g. Nvidia) that will run Linux very well.

Aside from System76, can anybody recommend powerful laptop fully compatible with Linux?

Of course, I can buy any laptop with several GPUs and install some Linux distribution. But I don't want to spend 4000 USD and then discover that some hardware isn't supported.

P.S. This time, I really don't understand why my comment is being downvoted.

I born in Uzbekistan. My dad bought me russian clone of ZX Spectrum [1] (8-bit, 3.5 MHz CPU, 48K RAM) in 1994. Which I actively used till 2000!

The funny thing is that I didn't look at my lovely ZX Spectrum as sad outdated piece of hardware. Quite opposite, I actually lived in 1980s, it was exciting time with my ZX Spectrum.

Back to education. In 1994, I was kinda troubled 10 years old kid, who completely hated school. Along with ZX Spectrum, my dad bought me a few books for kids about programming on Sinclair BASIC [2].

In a few years, I learned Sinclair BASIC myself without any external help. Around 1998, I discovered fast world of Assembly language. Cool thing is that I had only book about Assembly language but I didn't have Assembly Translator, so I had to use machine code directly [3].

So by 2000, I knew very well my ZX Spectrum. I knew all these secret ROM subroutines, I knew all these optimization tricks like if you put performance critical code in lower addresses, then it run faster. And if you put this code to video memory, it works even faster. So I learned myself how computer works and basics of computer science myself. My dad wasn't engineer. My school was useless in every single aspect of education.

In 2000, when I switched to Windows 98 SE on Pentium 166. In just a few days, I learned myself Windows 98 interface and how to use all basic programs there. It's because I was already exposed to some simple Window-based applications on my ZX Spectrum.

However, I couldn't grasp how to program on Windows 98. I had Delphi. But it looked so bloated and complicated. Unlike ZX Spectrum, I couldn't see full picture. As a sad result, after few failed attempts to program, I abandoned programming for next 7 years.

In 2007, when I finally switched to Knoppix Linux (and then Mandriva Linux), I finally start writing programs in C language. Linux as environment and C as a language were welcoming and friendly to programming!

Conclusion for me: If I were exposed to MS Windows from day one, I most probably wouldn't self-learn programming. ZX Spectrum was very simple and very clear in order to understand basics of computers and programming. ZX Spectrum was a perfect companion in the world of programming and computers for completely uneducated kid without any external guidance. On contrary, MS Windows and these bloated object-oriented programming language with fat IDE are unwelcoming. I highly doubt that average 10 years old uneducated kid without any guidance could grasp full complexity between you and machine. I even doubt kid would even find a way to start programming in the first place! ZX Spectrum had a prompt to programming on very start! Even to load game, you have to run BASIC command [4] (I had only tape recorder, so no TR-DOS [5] till 1999!). After you master ZX Spectrum, it takes just a week to self-learn how to use MS Windows (at least Windows 98).

Talking about computer education for kids in Ghana: I honestly believe they don't need expensive computers to run bloated, expensive and programmer unfriendly MS Windows. They do need modern microcomputers similar to ZX Spectrum. And the country can afford microcomputers. In 1990s, Uzbekistan suffered hyperinflation, average salary was about $5-$10 per month. It's not the end of the world if you clever about using limited resources.

Actually going further, I would say that even in the first world, kids should start using microcomputers in order to self-educate themselves about programming.

Bottom line: CS education could be extremely cheap. Most probably, 99% of world population can afford microcomputers and a couple of old programming books (by the way, I didn't even used original books, it was xerox-copied pages, or sometimes, text was reprinted in matrix-printer!).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX_Spectrum

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_BASIC

[3] http://www.worldofspectrum.org/ZXBasicManual/zxmanchap26.htm...

[4] http://www.retroisle.com/sinclair/zxspectrum/howtouse.php

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TR-DOS

[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcomputer