I was just talking about this with a friend the other day. We both agreed that to date, it was the most fun either of us have had with a computer football game. Watching your fictional players develop,get hurt etc added an rpg-like element that was addictive. I am surprised and disappointed no one has made a comparable modern version.
I bet the next developer that makes a sports game with a Fire-Emblem spin (character relationship elements, individual personalities) will make a solid amount of money.
My experience was similar. I sold a 2006 to them that had major visible rust issues. The KBB was 1650, they gave me 1600. I was surprised they bought it at all to be honest.
1) asking a user who had signed up for the Obama campaign if the campaign could contact their friends Johnny and Sue (discovered via their Facebook API) to ask them to support the Obama campaign.
2) Obtaining Facebook data by a professor for an academic study, who then turns around and sells said data to Cambridge Analytica, who uses it for targeted fake news propaganda. All of this without any consent from any user.
Add to this the fact that CA was also self-admittedly conducting political blackmail and bribery, and allegedly hacking election results, and you have a pretty ugly picture.
While I agree that the professor acted unethically, above and beyond the original problem with the Facebook API. This depiction of the Obama campaign is too rosy:
> 1) asking a user who had signed up for the Obama campaign if the campaign could contact their friends Johnny and Sue (discovered via their Facebook API) [...]
The idea that Alice has any right to consent to the dissemination of other people's (Bob and Charlie) data is just ridiculous. Just because they're called "Facebook friends" doesn't mean they have any more rights to give out my information than any other stranger. The entire concept is busted. To my mind that is still unethical, even though Facebook permitted it, and the Obama campaign was clearly the user of the data (rather than a fourth-party).
>The idea that Alice has any right to consent to the dissemination of other people's (Bob and Charlie) data is just ridiculous.
I agree. However, I think it's ridiculous to claim that what the Obama campaign did and what Cambridge Analytica did is ridiculous. And by the way, you mention it was unethically of the Prof to sell the data, but what about CA buying it? Do they get a pass?
> And by the way, you mention it was unethically of the Prof to sell the data, but what about CA buying it? Do they get a pass?
I think CA's (or any company's) micro-targeting of advertising using detailed profiles of the person is unethical in general, but whether or not CA is in the wrong for buying the data depends on whether they knew it was given them without the consent of users (I haven't followed whether we know that). But CA has a lot of other unethical things they do, so they don't get a pass in general.
But I feel that the bulk of the blame for this should be on Facebook's shoulders as well as the Prof who sold the data -- they both provided outside parties data for people that had no reasonable ability to consent to that dissemination.
Not exactly, they obtained data of friends of people who consented. That doesn't mean the friends consented. That is almost the same as Cambridge Analytica did with their quiz. I don't see much of a difference.
Not to mention I find Spotify's discover weekly feature to be worth at least 50% of it's monthly cost. Every week it generates a 30-song playlist tailored to my tastes and I end up saving probably 10 of those songs on average to my collection. I find it to be really well done.
Okay everybody has raved about discover weekly; I've only had 2 of them now, but have yet to hear a track I don't already know, much less an artist. I mean I enjoyed them but it hasn't lived up to its name of "discover" yet; it's so far been popular tracks of fairly well known artists.
Quickly browsing through the current list, about half of them are songs I've heard on the radio in the past month.
Although I agree with you that many pension funds have been mismanaged, it's not 100% your fault if your 401k plan only offers poorly-performing, high fee funds as many do. I'm not sure either model is a good solution going forward.
> it's not 100% your fault if your 401k plan only offers poorly-performing, high fee funds as many do.
Well, IRAs and Roth IRAs are the competitor in that realm. I don't trust most people to handle their own funds in an "automatic" 401k plan however. How many "normal" people do you know who has a Roth IRA for example?
Not a lot. A ton of people I know even pull money from their 401k early for luxurious reasons. (It makes sense to do so in an emergency. But not for like... a Euro-trip or Cruise Vacation like some people in my circle...)
Honestly, each time I hear about stupid personal finance stories like that, I wish that those people were on a pension instead. There's a lot of stupid out there.
That's exactly the problem. We've moved to a system where the individual bears all the risks and is supposed to know what he's doing. But what if the individual doesn't? Are we going to just accept an explosion of old-age destitution? Are we going to pay to mitigate it some other way?
Are there plans that actually only offer actively managed funds? Even the bare bones bottom tier Fidelity plan I had years ago from a notoriously tight pursed startup gave me a few index tracking funds.
Have a look at the total fees for your account/index funds. My experience is that they are not always competitive with the lowest fees in the free financial markets. (3 basis points for Schwab S&P 500 index).
If your company is small or your benefits person clueless, you may have worse funds available to you than in the taxable brokerage world.
I think there are better things to worry about than a couple basis points. If I'm charged 1% for a basic index fund, sure that's a problem. But given the minute fees for most, the inefficiencies from trading strategies could dwarf the explicit fees - if you really care about every penny, you need to look at the actual tracking error. You may be surprised to find it's substantially larger than the fees.[1]
My attitude in practice is that if I'm getting an employer match, then why complain about fees? It's their problem to minimize them - I'm still doing better than I would on my own. The efficiency is their problem, and because they have an incentive to minimize their costs, there shouldn't be a systemic problem.
Yes, it's happily becoming less common, but it was and is common for all options in a 401k plan to have high fees, and be set up to benefit the company
But the beautiful thing is if you don't like the plan you can opt out (or only invest up to the match) and invest in an IRA instead. Can't do that with a pension.
* LLC with S-Corp designation. This is very tax-advantaged vs. Sole Proprietor.
* Currently, I'm mostly on-site for one client.
* 1-person shop.
* I have an accountant. You want a good, small business
accountant.
* I buy health insurance for my family through the ACA exchange. It's very expensive so make sure you factor it into your rate.
I've had 2 FT gigs that lasted 6 months each since 2004 and regretted it both times. If you can handle having to network and interview frequently you can make more money with more flexibility as a contract developer.
* I use hourly mostly because it is common and is met with the least resistance. Either way, raise your rate at least a little after each gig. Don't get complacent, just keep ratcheting it up.
* I've actually been blessed with a great accountant. He's saved me thousands over the years and sent letters to the IRS on my behalf clearing up a couple issues along the way. I would look for someone who specializes in small, professional service firms that is used and referred by people in your area. If they tell you they don't think you should organize as an LLC, look elsewhere.
* Starting out I used recruiting firms. They have the advantage of an established network and getting you paid every 2-weeks. The disadvantage of course is they take a cut. Their first ask will always be a low-ball hoping they can get a huge margin. Always try to get them to make the first offer and always ask for more. You'd be surprised how much room they have to negotiate up most of the time. As I've made connections over the years I've relied more on my network, but I'll still use an agency to fill the gaps. Also, boutique consulting agencies can be great for sub-contract work. They often need to staff up for a project they just landed, but don't want to take on full-timers and they usually command excellent rates.
> boutique consulting agencies can be great for sub-contract work
I just wanted to second this point. In this way, checks both boxes off: one for getting the advantage of an established network like a recruiting firm; two for getting you the higher rates and not needing a middleman
I've been doing freelance/contract work since 2004. My advice would be to start by doing hourly contract work through agencies/recruiting firms. It's not glamorous, but it initially saves you from having to worry about sales and collecting the money, perhaps the two most stressful parts of freelancing. You'll get a check every two weeks and develop contacts in different organizations. Find an accountant that specializes in professional services and set yourself up as an LLC and do the work with a corp-to-corp arrangement. Once you get comfortable and have some reliable clients you can cut out the middlemen.
Why would you be shocked? There's all sorts of nasty things in these tax proposals for the less than wealthy. They are looking everywhere they can to find offsets to make the tax cuts for the donor class work under the budget rules.
The bill gets rid of AMT, which many HN readers have been hit by, thus helping them. It also increases the standard deduction, which helps lower income people much more than higher income people.
When people talk about this package benefiting the wealthy, they mean very wealthy people. The upper-middle-class would probably take more damage from it than most.
It benefits the lower income groups significantly while giving a kickstart to job growth, at nearly the sole expense of the upper middle class.
I don't like the plan because I pay more under it, but the value of the giveaways to the very rich seem rather small compared to low income benefits. Lowering of the corporate income tax rate and axing the mortgage interest deduction has broad support from economists across the political spectrum too.
"while giving a kickstart to job growth" that's less than supported by evidence right now also at current level of unemployment it doesn't seem like taxes have been the limiting factor.
Our labor force participation rate has continued to drop, giving us a shrinking tax base. The official unemployment stat includes underemployed and part time workers as well, and is not fully reflective of the health of our economy.
"As many observers have pointed out, the official unemployment definition leaves out some significant groups. The underemployed – part-time workers who would prefer to work full-time – are counted among the employed. And discouraged workers – people who’d like a job but have stopped looking because they don’t believe any work is available – aren’t counted as part of the labor force at all."
Agreed. I'm 47 and I get hit up every week for good positions. Today I make more than I ever have. When I was 27 I was working at a Big Corp that laid off a good portion of their 60+ year old COBOL programmers. The devs that couldn't retire were all snapped up by other companies as pretty highly paid contractors. The Valley isn't the whole industry. Ageism is a thing for sure, but I think it's much less prevalent outside of startups and will not keep you from earning a living after 40 or 50 or even 60.
I briefly had a Facebook account years ago before deciding I didn't like it. I deleted/deactivated my account. About 6 months ago I received an email saying that 'someone' had reactivated my account and that if it wasn't me I should log in and visit the help center. My old password still worked and there had been no activity. I strongly suspect this was an attempt by FB to get me back on board.
