Some context is needed. That specific email was a scam email sent to the investment team and Sean (partner @ 500) jokingly replied to it playing along with the scammer.
The immediate quote below the email images is:
"(In fact, the vast majority of pitches I’ve seen probably fall under this category and these only take a few seconds to read and archive, so this is how you get to see 20k pitches!)"
So the majority of pitches you see are spam pitches? As a former grad student in chemistry/biophysics, I would see no reason to read that pitch as a spam. In fact, at first I thought it was quite liberating that 500startups would entertain non-traditional startups trying to tackle real-life hard problems in the physical science industries instead of another startup in the food delivery or cleaning services space, and then the response from your partner was, shall we say, discouraging. You might want to edit your post since it doesn't paint 500startups in a good light.
I love it when founders will only take what they need and not automatically adjust their salaries to each other even when their life circumstances are different.
I'm Israeli too - I applaud and support the Gazan startup economy. I know this is the only hope to build a solid bridge between the Israeli and Gazan community.
Moving across continents to work for a company which you're not sure it'll work well with them is a too big risk to take to be honest.
I'm a founder of a startup and I would only move someone across the continents after working with him for a while. For example I would fly him over for a month to work for us to see if there's a fit (without asking him to leave everything yet), covering his expenses, flights and anything other expense he would incur.
I understand if the startup is paying for relocating you but you're still taking a big risk, there's always the chance that you would be let go if you're not a good fit.
How other are mitigating this risk? Is working remotely for a couple of weeks/months with occasional flying viable and moving only after you spent some time with the company viable for others here?
That is why I said I wasn't interested in moving to my current company unless I had some sort of guarantee about being able to find a new job, since it would be horrible if I got dropped a month later.
They said I would be able to stick around for a few months until I found another job, which they would be sure I would be able to find very quickly in SV. Now I've been working with them for 3 years.
The details were actually written down, so it wasn't an informal contract, but it's been 3 years.
Also remote trial work should be an option for these kinds of workers. Making your company remote worker compatible will force many best practices from the start at your company.
That's a legit question and I don't know the answer. However how is it different from hiring someone and letting him go after a month if you think he's not a good fit? The mention of a month of bootcamp or "orientation" is mainly to set expectations.
You should always hire the best candidate which you think will work out but that month allow you to set the right phase, this is a month where you both give the best to make that relationship work - orientation, pairing, documentation, short meetings to discuss potential roadblocks or issues.
All startups usually do this - I just consider it's a good practice to say it out loud that there's a period where we both find out if we want to keep working together.
Depends on where you are. Developers are in demand in major US tech hubs (read: SFBay, NYC, Seattle, Austin), they are not nearly as hotly fought over everywhere else, particularly in Europe and Asia.
It's important to remember that the "companies prostrating themselves at your front door offering you bonuses and perks and lavishing dining you" is an American Tech Hub phenomenon. While I doubt UK coders are doing badly, I doubt they are as in-demand as they would be in SF or NYC.
I went to Waterloo and still have friends there - the job market may be pretty good for Canada, but it's a far, far cry from what you'd see in an American tech hub.
Trying out at a company for a month isn't really that bad when the demand is so intense you can literally line up 3-4 competing offers in under a week if things don't work out. There is sadly no place in Canada where the demand is that high.
Hi Adam! Yes, we are rolling out city-by-city in order of number of listings. Mountain View has around 400 active listings, so we should be there in the next month or so! We use a ton of data to derive our prices, rather than creating a generic pricing algorithm without data, so it's just a matter of getting that together and testing in each market.
I think you should indicate earlier that you don't support cities before users go through the process of creating an account only to find out they can't use your service. I understand you want to maximize users and figure out where the demand is the highest, but I think you should at least give users the option to continue creating an account if their city is not currently supported.
I always wondered why there's a no photography rule. Is it because of copyright or because it's a sacred site? (Although the mere fact that we're watching a 360 photo on the site means that it's probably copyright).
Copyright was a good chunk of the reason, but there is a much better one: lots of flashing from cameras will fade the pigments just like sunlight fades outdoor advertising.
There's a better one still IMO. It's a place of worship, you're supposed to look at the images and ponder your relationship with, and position before, the Almighty Creator. If you're messing around with your camera, or others are, then you're invariably far to distracted to meditate on higher things.
So, one is only allowed to ponder your relationship before the Almighty Creator while one is in the Sistine Chapel? Or am I not supposed to be distracted by the beautiful works of art?
While I appreciate the need to respect others who may want some peace and quite while worshiping, this is total hogwash. One can ponder one's relationship with their creator ANYWHERE, not just in some small made up room.
Except of course that that particular room was made for exactly that purpose.
As a total atheist I would still very much want to make room for the people who are using that place for its original purpose as opposed to me, who just comes to appreciate the work of the man that spent an appreciable part of his life creating one of our most important works of art. Even though they could do what they're doing anywhere and I could do (until I saw this link) what I'm doing only there.
That's a terrible reason, it's a tourist attraction, not a place of worship;even if it still were many don't care about your superstitions and don't need or want your superstitions imposed upon them. We don't all walk around with delusions of a creator in our minds.
Your contention is that the Sistine Chapel¹ is not a place dedicated by Christians to the glorification of God? Like it's not, say, a chapel? And they don't have art work depicting the lives of important people in the Christian faith, or imagery that Christians might use as part of their worship.
When the Sistine Chapel choir sings the Miserere, say, to assembled members of the Roman Catholic church, you don't think that maybe, just maybe that means that the people who own the building consider it to be - perhaps - just a tiny bit of a building for religious devotion ... now what's that word, oh yeah, perhaps they consider it to be a chapel.
Would you go to a Mosque, perhaps the Great Mosque in Istanbul, and say "people shouldn't be imposing their religion on me, like, just because I came to a mosque".
"Why should I respect your beliefs as a Christian when I choose to visit a Christian chapel" is that really your considered opinion?
TBH if it weren't for your long standing on this site I'd have dismissed your comment as an obvious troll.
Now if I go picking apart your need to hide from God, your desire to run from the truth, your imposition of your beliefs on others in an affront to the truth ... I'm guessing you're going to consider that this isn't really the appropriate forum for such a conversation, that I'm being crass and troll-like, no? Perhaps you'll start by telling me you're only interested in the truth despite your "not a place of worship" claim being the most obvious of falsehoods and putting the lie to such a notion ...
> Your contention is that the Sistine Chapel¹ is not a place dedicated by Christians to the glorification of God? Like it's not, say, a chapel?
They don't use it as one, at least most of the time. There are too many people passing through for it to be a place of worship or reflection. Once you start selling entry to tourists you lose the right to demand they do something other than tourism, IMO.
If they really wanted to keep it as a place of worship they'd close it to the unbaptized and allow free entry (as is done with the Kaaba IIRC). Of course, that would be much less profitable.
Just on a point of fact, you can worship/reflect/meditate anywhere, of course. It's like being at a pop concert in some ways, the imagery was commissioned with a purpose - which at least in part was to aid worship of God - if everyone is waving cameras around that inhibits that purpose in a way which is easily remedied. Cutting back to the thread start I was offering a reason to prohibit photography in the Sistine Chapel that I felt was better than some others, that's all.
Second point: The Kaaba, in Mecca is only accessible to Muslims. There are Umrah/Hajj costs to pay to get anywhere near the Kaaba.
Funny - I just got back from Rome 2 days ago and was in the Vatican - imagine the surprise when I saw this on top of of Hacker News.
The experience of being in the sistine chapel is nice but a bit spoiled by the fact that there are hundreds of tourists in the chapel as well and Italian guards are pushing you to move and be in the center (Often yelling at tourist who aren't moving fast enough and throwing out of the chapel anyone trying to take a picture).
I was there last week but we did the evening tour (8pm). Not very crowded at all - I had time to sit on the benches and stand as long as I liked in the centre.
Someone tried to make it clear to everyone that it is the second attempt. At least we're dealing with someone who wants to be honest about the fact he attempted to repost it twice.
