skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
That looks super interesting. Do you have links where you show your work?
General rule of thumb for me is if it exceeds 100 lines of Bash, it should probably be a Ruby or Python script.
So in UK pay goes like this:

Salaried Developer @ £40K
£3,333.33 Gross
£2,512.89 Net

Contract Developer @ £350 per/day using a trust
£7350 Gross
£6027 Net

Contract Developer @ £350 per/day using an umbrella
£7350 Gross
£4,333.68 Net

Contract Developer @ £350 using Ltd
£8820 Gross using flat-tax scheme
You'll need an accountant to tell you what you can actually get net, if you have a wife that doesn't work it'll closer to a trust, if you don't, it'll be closer to an umbrella, but you can defer to bring it closer to the trust if you're patient.

I'm not sure what people actually get paid in SV, but £350 is fairly low end, you can pull £600 a day in London which'll earn you $250,000 assuming you never take a holiday or are inbetween jobs, which isn't a good idea.

P.S. The salaried developer probably costs the company more too.

FYI you don't need to be in the UK to contract, I just don't know the tax structures elsewhere.
> I didn't know Germany had laws about this case.

We have laws for everything.
Anyone knows why Uber has to pay 250k fines and all the other German taxi apps, such as MyTaxi that have raised $10M, don't?
Post-tax. Fortunately, it doesn't push me into another tax band.
Inspiring Sites of the Week No. 51
If you wanted to recapture that feel of an instant-on console, you could set up a computer that booted into lighttable. It supports mouse and graphics and music. But to get a web browser up, you call a function.
These rquirements are the minimum for commercial drivers.
This doesn't drive the standards process in any particular direction, this is just a broken implementation that doesn't adhere to the current standard draft!
Wait, so it's OK for one person to give a ride to another person, on the same vehicle, on the same road, at the same time, but it's not OK to give the same ride if after the ride one person gives money to another person - and the reason is that is the second case the driver and the vehicle (the same driver and the same vehicle!) is less safe? How that even makes any sense?
> if they wanted to open a taxi company that'd be completely different business.

The German courts disagree with you on that one. You can like it or not but they get to have the last say in this.
My main argument is insurance.

It doesn't matter whether Uber rides are more dangerous or not. If something happens, the victim is left in the rain when it was an Uber ride.

"Private ride-sharing" is insured. "Uber ride-sharing" isn't.

And that's not because of old laws or lobbyism. That's because of all the standard insurance contracts that state clearly that they don't cover businesses, only private driving.
When you go low carb, you cut out the onions, tomatos, and other vegetables too?

That seems excessive, and somewhat unbalanced.
If one were to use such tactics to make money - would that be considered "hacking" and be illegal?
Let's assume you drive in Germany and take an Uber passenger and get involved in an accident fatal for the pax, after you fail to reanimate him and your tires are slightly overdue for a change. The family sues you for reckless driving and causing the death of your pax, in the first instance the court finds you guilty.

Now how do you argue that the requirements are not minimum? How do you pay for the damage? Do you expect legal protection from Uber? Do you think they would provide you with that, in Germany?

Do you actually know about the legal system in Germany or how can you make a statement about the level of requirements?
"You've understood it! We Germans want this "market" to be illegal."

Not all Germans, seeing as people are actually using Uber in Germany. That's the point I was trying to make. Tyranny of the majority, I suppose, unfortunate, but apparently "the best we got".

Side note: I'm not actually American. Please don't stereotype and make assumptions based on opinion/nationality, even if it is a good one such as "focused on individual freedom" and "Germans are very safety-oriented", etc.
It could drive the standards process in a particular direction if it would compel Firefox to implement Google's HTTP2 vision, so that beta users can log into Google services again. Then, suddenly, two major browser vendors support a particular blend of HTTP2, significantly increasing the chance of that road being taken.

It sounds overly mischievous though (and I doubt Mozilla will bend), so my bet is that it's a mistake.
I know it's only test data, but "biometric" ID that suggests that the person's height is 6.5M doesn't inspire confidence!
No, the claim is that by skirting the Personenbeförderungsgesetz (Law on transporting people), Uber is violating the the law about unfair competition. Any competitor in germany can sue any competitor on those grounds: If you engage in unfair business practices you'll be fined.

Nobody claimed (at least in this case) that Uber itself should be banned - UberBlack is unaffected by this injunction. Ubers unfair business practices have been banned.
Factoring in tax breaks, you'll need £150k a year before you can compete with a £400 p/d contract.
KeePass is just an encrypted database stored on your machine. If it's compromised, your machine is compromised, so you're screwed either way. Meanwhile, if any of many online services you use are compromised (and some inevitably will be), you have minimised the cost of that.
It always amazes me that someone compare gross salaries. It should always be with some form of EBITA with normalization and net profit.
Molasses powder, molasses powder in feed area
Would you want to get into a cab where the driver had his last health checkup 30 years ago? (especially eyesight)

Here, it is not sufficient for a driver just to believe he is capable of doing the job, the state requires that he proves his capability and therefore guarantees every passenger that he is capable.
Thanks Jacques, I do understand that we are talking about laws here. I don't personally endorse Uber's business practise of breaking local laws to force the debate.

I'm arguing about the rationality of these particular laws. In essence, laws which mandate a minimum standard of a given good. I think these laws should be repealed because they restrict individual liberty and do not produce more optimal outcomes than an unhindered free market for transportation services. Just my two cents.
I can't read German, do you mind telling me the details of the minimum level of service? If it's per week or per month it doesn't solve the problem when there's inclement weather or a holiday or a conference, etc.
Actually, due to China government policy change and labor shortage, more and more major electronic manufacturers and their suppliers have moved their operations to Eastern China, such as Suzhou in the past 10-15 years and now even inland cities like Chongqing and Zhengzhou. Many of my friends have already moved out of Shenzhen.
For the last twenty years the offices I have worked in have had trees in their atrium. A few coworkers have had plants in their individual cubes. Yet I think the fact I am in Atlanta and the last two office buildings I worked in are surrounded by trees and flowers made a bigger difference. You cannot look outside any window without seeing trees, shrubs, and depending on the time of year flowers.

I won't live in a city nor work in one for these very reasons. I never want to look out a window and see concrete. Yeah I know cities have parks and fortunately cities like Atlanta have more trees than not, but its the grayness, the dirty feeling I don't miss. Which leads me into one peeve, who thought that gray cubes and dark carpet were appealing?
You keep using the word 'cartel', taxi companies in Germany are not normally considered to be a cartel, merely a professional association. Just like there is no hotel cartel against AirBnb there is no taxi cartel against Uber.

Those are simply industries that have become regulated to some degree over time and now newcomers have decided that these regulations do not apply to them because they can get away with it, leaving their operators (drivers, airbnb hosts) to deal with the consequences.

That trick works, to some extent and in countries where there really are cartels in the hotel business and taxi services I welcome such developments. Millions of $ for a medallion are ridiculous, and rules solely created to keep competitors out are so too.

But the German taxi situation is not accurately described in that way.
A brief introduction to our QA Automation
As an Opera 12.x user I noticed them dropping support the other day. There's a huge difference in dropping support for 8-10 year old versions of IE and a browser that was receiving new features until the other year (and is still on par with most CSS/JS/HTML features of current browsers[1]). Especially when it's just search results. Opera themselves still recommends Opera 12 for long time users until all features are ported to the Blink based Opera and still patch it for security issues.

It's all done by user agent sniffing though, so if you're an Opera 12 user still and haven't found a way around it, you can switch the user agent to something like Mozilla for Google sites only in Opera's override.ini file and search results work just as they did the previous week. Other sites run by Google, such as the Android developer's console and Admob will also work correctly using this method. If unsure how to do that, here's an example[2].

Users of other browsers no longer "supported" could do something similar with an extension of some sort for their browser and just change the browser version of their user agent to something newer (something farther in the future would be a good idea).

[1] http://caniuse.com/#compare=ie+11,firefox+34,chrome+40,safar...

[2] https://gist.github.com/yareally/7c6c76fb79fa5846665f
Banning Uber (or upholding laws that restrict market-entrants such as Uber) is just another example of banning "Walmart Scotch."

Recommended: http://theumlaut.com/2014/04/30/how-net-neutrality-hurts-the...
Almost every European country have payroll taxes, sometimes going up into the 15%-20% range, and those are rarely counted as part of income (the exception tends to be libertarians on an anti-tax crusade...). Withheld income tax is a different matter - that would definitively be counted.

However California has a state payroll tax that isn't much out of line with many European countries, so I don't that part affects the salary difference that much (I've not bothered to look up what the French payroll tax rates are).

Note that based on those numbers Paris is "cheap" when compared even to "nearby" European cities like London.
It's more complicated than this. At a certain level of seniority, which most engineers are, the 35h/week rule do not apply anymore. There still are restrictions but it's really to avoid abuse (make sure you get enough sleep for example, I don't have the details in mind sorry). To compensate for the extra hours, there are extra days of vacations though, call "RTT" (Reduction du Temps de Travail = work time reduction). Here too, I don't have the exact number in mind, about 7 or 8 days / year --- enough that I don't bother tracking my vacation days precisely, as you can see ;)

So the 35h/week rule is mostly for basic jobs, not for people working in high tech.

That kind of situation is quite typical by the way: the French system is over-complicated with too many options and special cases. Foreign coverage tend to stick to the high level headlines (which is perfectly normal) and as a result people often have a distorted view of reality.
No. Part of the http spec is the ability to download only a specific range of bytes in a file.
Do they?

And if they do, what exactly is insured and how high is the coverage?

Can you point out to a credible source for this assertion of yours (which I find hard to believe), which is not an Uber blog entry, or some astroturfing organization?
When I temporarily went off keto, one of the first things I did was to buy one of those huge containers of salted mixed nuts from Costco. I gorged on the entire thing for three days and my mouth hated me for the next week. I thought I had suddenly come down with bad toothaches. Nope, I just burned all the skin off my upper mouth and gums from excess salt consumption.
How FreeCallApp use Sinch to voice call on 2G networks
A free market is one that isn't affected by government laws, by definition.
Failing the startup game at Unbabel
I am in no way affiliated with Uber and I like safery and checks for car and drivers too. But not at the cost of restrictive government-granted monopolies and crony capitalism.
Your Audience aren't Fish
I absolutely cannot keep up with what we're supposed to eat? Some say low fat, some say high fat, some say high carb, low carb... no sugar, some sugar, some fats... It comes to a point where cutting one thing or another is surely futile. And that we just need to accept that there's no miracle other than eating a varied balanced diet, exercise and cut the fads. I know coming form a vegan that might be calling the kettle black (or whatever the phrase is) but I've given up on faddy diets, I just try to eat unprocessed shit and be done with it.
The 35 hours week is a mythical beast in French startups. People talk about it but few have seen it.
"Overall, I believe the computer age favors the individual and that resistance to the individual work style is the last gasp of the dying industrial age. Many software companies put their faith in committees because they believe this is the way things have always been done. In fact, most unique modern achievements have been the product of individuals or very small groups, including relativity theory, the airplane, the laser and the computer itself.
Until now, individual achievement has been exceptional in a mass society, even though the exceptions often transform that society. The deliberate cultivation of individual creativity may end up being the most important social result of computer technology. Either that, or cottage programmers like myself will simply have more time to cultivate our gardens. "

This is a view I hold but very rarely hear expressed in my day to day working environment where committees of people from various organisations work together to agree or disagree on plans that are always proposed by one, or very few, individuals. The majority, even in a committee environment, are superfluous from the perspective of productivity, though not from the perspective of governance.
This case is not about safety. It's an unfair competition case.

Transporting people for money is heavily regulated in Germany on various grounds, one being safety, others are that Taxis count as public transport in germany and must fulfill certain obligations ranging from mandatory service for anyone at the same rate to transporting disabled people to the doctor (yes, that's done by Taxis as long as those people can still enter a Taxi). Uber is avoiding the regulations in an attempt to save money and be more profitable. This has been judged as an unfair business practice and so Uber faces two options: Stop offering UberPop or comply with the regulations.

The fact that private insurances don't cover commercial rides has a multitude of reasons, one of them is that statistically speaking it's more likely that a commercial driver has an accident since he's more likely to get a significantly higher mileage and more likely to drive at night. But that's a deal between the insurance company and the driver, the law only cares that you own a valid insurance, not about the exact terms.
i lived in germany for several years - and taxi drivers werent even nearly as good or making me feel nearly as safe as uber drivers.

its like 30% of the taxi drivers are pure assholes in berlin/hamburg. (heck its not so different in other big international cities).

I had hundred of uber drives and not a single bad or even sub-optimal ride.

Thus I very strongly disagree with your statement.

On a side note, taxi stuff works like a mafia - a "legal" version of it. The regulations enforces that - not the safety of anybody.
No.

See the excellent answer here [1].
Next up on that list for me would be the 'license'. I have a license that allows me to drive every (street legal) truck, up to 40t. I'm also allowed to drive busses (they fall under the same category), IF they're mostly empty (I think up to 8 people are okay) and it's not a commercial ride (i.e. 8 friends, not 8 paying passengers).

If I want to do something like that, I need an additional license. Like every cab driver does. This isn't something that Uber can cover. The might be able to require their users to have this license (and prove it), but .. that's part of what the court is trying to say here, for all I understand.

1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8256398
> Why can't we simply let people decide for themselves whether they want to ride in insured vehicles or not? Are people too stupid to calculate probable risks and rewards and make their own economic decisions?

Yes, they are.

People are hopeless at calculating risk, especially for things like this.
Make Greater Profits Through Smarter Video Marketing
this is why attributes are really a stupid ass way to do things

<img>
<srcset>
<source><width>1024</width><src>large-image.jpg</source>
<source><width>512</width><src>small-image.jpg</source>
</srcset>
<src>image.jpg</src> <*>fallback</*>
<alt>My image</alt>
</img>
Why a little bit of hacking is actually GOOD for business
There are severe misconceptions in this hypothesis, or at least in the examples that are being presented.

When you are introducing yourself, you have to refer to yourself explicitly. You are trying to convey information about who you are and what your background is. That's not a sign of low status, it's a necessity to transport essential context. If you try to leave that information out, or if you just omit the pronoun, your introduction will inevitably sound broken or unfriendly.

I'm guessing the reason why this is being conflated with low status by the professor is simple: if you're high-status, other people initiate contact a lot more often than you do. And when they initiate contact, they need an introduction, whereas you are already known to them.

At a fundamental level, this hypothesis as it's being described muddles correlations and causes.

Secondly, I'd like to point out that clearly marking certain points as opinion does not come from a perspective of inferiority or uncertainty. Especially in a setting where discussion is warranted, such as here on HN, it's an appropriate signal.

When I refer to myself and my perspective, I'm not asking you to disregard my point of view, I'm inviting you to see things from where I'm standing, and I'm also inviting you to present other perspectives without either of us being pressured to lead with assertions like "WRONG! Here's how it really is: [text]". Instead, you are afforded the option to respond with "My experience has been different. Here's why: [text]".
100% agree.

One thing that confuses me a bit - isn't Uber in Europe focusing on professional limousine drivers? Shouldn't they be checked&regulated anyhow?

It's understandable that something like UberX wouldn't work in countries like in the SW/A/G area. We have those regulations in place for good reasons. I am sure they will find ways to comply.

ps: sorry for writing sw/a/g for switzerland/austria/germany - instead of the german d/a/ch - as soon as it's in your head you can't get it out there anymore. ;)
This is a safety thing, not a competition thing.
This is exactly what I'm working on!

Twitter demands a lot of hard manual work in order to stay interesting. It doesn't have an efficient filtering mechanism. Follow/Unfollow button will not do.

I tried showing this problem from a different point of view - we get overloaded with popular stuff that we don't care about.

"How to Find Out Who‘s Popular on Twitter. And why there’s no point in doing it" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8252252
I find this hard to believe. As a Canadian my experience is that everything is cheaper in San Francisco save for rent which doesn't begin to cover the tax and salary disparity ($2.2k for a studio vs $1.3k, big whoop). Given that France seems even more expensive than Canada for electronics, cars, fuel, taxes, etc, where are you realizing these savings?
A pity that the title was changed to the actual Wired article title, which is needlessly obscure as it does not indicate it has anything to do with space flight.
Indeed, and the children make a big difference. There's a lot of support related to raising kids in France, and as you point out the cost of education is widely different.

When I considered staying in the Silicon Valley ~15 years ago I looked into this a bit --- rough assessment, not detailed study. It seemed at the time that with up to a single kid SV was more interesting money-wise, but with 2 kids France became more attractive again. As an inexperienced foreigner I may have missed some cost factor for SV, and the sky-rocketing cost of education in the US may give a different result today.

In the end I came back to France for reasons unrelated to money: there's just no place like home ;)
In London, UK... it depends.

Late at night when the roads are relatively empty, the black cab is still damn efficient at moving you from A-B cheaply. The key is to be moving fast and not get stuck in traffic.

When there is traffic, then the minicab that doesn't meter the fare depending on time... solely distance... proves to be the cheapest. These are nearly all small, local firms, so your mileage on price may vary.

Uber do work out cheaper for the non-perfect conditions that tend to exist most of the time... some traffic, some speed.

What would be good is an app that polls Hailo, Uber, Lyft and some local firms and gives you the cheaper of all options.

But then, you know this is a race to the bottom, and service will eventually suffer if people buy purely because of price.
The law itself does not specify the level, it grant the authority do decide to the relevant authorities. (For example the administration in Berlin), so things will vary depending on where you are.

Generally speaking I haven't had any problem finding a cab in Berlin. The longest wait was after a thunderstorm took out most of the public transport a couple of years ago and that took like 20 minutes somewhere in the outskirts. I usually either flag one down on the road or use the smartphone app.
actually every time you dont leave a good feedback, uber will contact you back to clear it up and contact the driver (will not say who left the feedback) and ensure this was legitimate or otherwise reimburse your trip (on top of making sure the driver's star score is severely affected)

if you're a customer with 4-5 stars rating you'll get 4-5 stars drivers, always, all the time.

This makes the probability of bad services very low (and in fact null in my experience so far - i'm pretty sure they select 5 stars by default for your 5 first ever rides too)
Giving money is not the same as making profit as there are cost attached to driving a vehicle. It's OK if you reimburse the driver for his cost but once you start making profit things are different, then it becomes a business and as Xylakant said, the insurance doesn't cover that.

Since it's mandatory in Germany to be insured when you drive a car, that becomes Ubers's culprit, that they chose to ignore, potentially at the cost of leaving someone without insurance coverage in case of an accident.

That is unacceptable by the German rules and that's why the decision has been made in an express decision by the court.
We're going to get downvoted (and rightly so, I believe!) but I, too, read the title quite a few times before I realized what's written there.

I don't believe bigger font would help, but different font could. Ie. one which doesn't display "rn" as that visually close to "m". Bigger letter spacing? I don't know, something like that.

Anyway, I got trolled by my own eyes, a funny feeling :)