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1) Mortgage broker - This lady will charge us 1% (10,000$) to find us a suitable loan. Basically, she will compare about 10 loans and choose the best one. Software systems can do this easily.
2) The buying agent - so far she has not come up with any houses on her own. She finds the same things we find on line. I dont need her to visit open houses. Legally, in SF I need an agent to be present during the inspections. I can use the selling agent for a fee. If I use her to place an offer, there is a bias problem. A buyer agent may be biased towards placing a "strong" offer. The "stronger" the offer, higher the probability that it will go through and higher her share. I have researched the areas enough and am comfortable coming up with a price.
Are there any startups that are disrupting this space? Say mortgage brokers and buying agents rolled into one. Small flat fee for the mortgage broker and flat fees for the buyer agent only for services that I need?
Alternative ideas also appreciated.
I joined my current 300 people company about 2 months ago. We are trying to hire Software engineers and are using Leetcode type problems as a selection mechanism.
The problem with it, is if a candidate is very good at it she will be getting an offer from some of the larger companies who follow a similar process and there is no way we can compete with them on salary.
Additionally, internal Google research has also found poor correlation between such tests and performance at the job.
So question for HR and hiring managers from smaller companies - what alternative approaches do you use to interview employees?
One option is take home tests. I have taken them while job hunting and wasted numerous hours only to get 'we will not be proceeding' emails or even ghosted. Too many hours wasted.
Any good alternatives?
Thanks.
Any one with info on this? Is this a new process?
I am applying for L6.
I have tried some coupon sites and they all have expired coupons.
Now I am getting ready for a move from Fremont, CA to Austin, TX. I have a 1 bedroom apartment. A U-haul truck rental for a one way move is approx 3500$. Looks like there is a large imbalance of available trucks because of people leaving the bay area. For reference, a truck rental from Austin to Fremont is only about 200$ (two hundred).
I have checked pods, full service etc and most are above that amount. Uhaul's U-pod is approx 2000$.
I was wondering if there are any alternatives? Any new companies with a new model in this space?
Currently, the best option seems to be to get rid of almost all our stuff in Fremont and buy new in Austin. Some important stuff can be carried by our car when we drive to Austin. Some additional stuff can be mailed by Greyhound at approx 500$ for 500 lbs.
Any suggestions, recent experiences?
I have a startup that focuses on animations. As part of product market fit, I would like to have example animations that you have created or seen for the promotion of your/others startup.
One of the abilities of my startup ToonClip.com is creating customized animations. eg. Lola receives an animation where 'Lola' is mentioned, Jill receives an animation where 'Jill' is mentioned.
Here is an example that was created for a small newsletter - https://toonclip.com/images/lola.gif
In this example the name Lola would be replaced by the newsletter subscriber's name.
I am looking for newsletters to cooperate with for free. Number of users should be between 100 to 1000. If it has more subscribers then a subset would be ok.
Images in newsletters have a high impact. Animations have a higher impact. Animations where the user's name is mentioned, even higher.
Please respond here if you have or know of a newsletter that would be interested in cooperation. Ask questions also if you have any.
I started an application process for a Senior Software Engineering Manager position in SV. Its an approx 150 employee company lead by elite univ alumnus.
Everything went very well, phone screens, tech screens, behaviorals .... I actually enjoyed the interviewing process and like the company.
Then the job offer came and they made an offer for Engineering Manager Position (no Senior). That has left me completely confused.
Has this happened to other folks? Would this be an honest mistake on their part or are they just crooks? If it was non-senior position I would never have applied. It was very anti-climactic for me :-(
What do you think?
ToonClip (https://toonclip.com) is a Flash like, online animation editor that lets users create and export animations in minutes. Its accessible to people with no prior animation experience. Being an artist and a techie, I have always dabbled with animations via Blender, Maya .... But these are complex beasts with a sharp learning curve. Between the dabbles, the skill faded and I had to relearn. One day I just gave up.
But should it be this way? I was using only the basics of the animation software and producing good results. I wished that the animation software would throw out all the advanced stuff and put only the basic things in an easy to use way for dummies like me. The troubled thought stuck to the cobwebs of my mind like a fly floundering for escape.
And then Flash was offically discontinued. There are numerous threads on HN about its demise. One such thread - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21387967
A recurring theme in the threads was how there was a gap in the market for a browser based, easy to use animation software. I created a thread asking if anyone was willing to cooperate on building such a software.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21396048
I received comments but no offers to coooperate. Giving up, I started by myself. I had the following requirements in mind – should be browser based, WYSIWYG, and no code. I started with HTML5 canvas and realized it was still primitive. For instance, it does not have any mouse detection. Then I explored libraries that I could use – bonsai.js, two.js, raphael.js and fabric.js. After approximately a month of experimentation, I decided on fabric.js as it fit my needs best and had an active community.
And thus ToonClip.com was born. How does it work? Say I want to create an animation where a cowboy tells a dog “Come here.” Dog says “ok” and runs to the cowboy. The editor has a library of assets. The user clicks on the needed images (desert background, cowboy and dog). They are now in the canvas but unarranged. To arrange and resize, the user drags and clicks with the mouse.
The script that controls the action uses everyday English sentences. In this case it could be: Cowboy say “Come here.” Wait for 0.5 seconds. Dog say “Ok.” Dog run to Point P2 in 3 seconds. Cowboy smile.
Optionally, audio can be imported and worked into the animation. Eg script would be: Cowboy say “Come here.” using Audio cowboy1.
The benefit – a dummy like me can create animations in minutes. There is a silly grin when I see my animation come alive. It’s special – like the silly grin of a new mama looking at the just delivered. Because it’s within reach, we want ordinary people to experience this silly grin.
It’s not smooth sailing, of course. For one, ordinary users don’t even know that the creation of animations is within their grasp. I have chatted with friends with an artistic bent. They have visited my website but still don’t realize that its well within their reach. Folks without artistic bent don’t even try. We have to educate – a long, tiring process.
Second, the underlying HTML5 canvas and media technology is still evolving, so we have many technical problems that are not cleanly solved. Case in point: exporting to video formats is only possible in Firefox and Chrome. The first time audio is added, it plays with a good 3 second lag. After an animation is recorded, the audio is no longer audible on Firefox. The video created makes a round trip to the server, just to add a header of the duration, which Chrome can fix very easily but has been marked “Will not fix”.
Ah, the joys of bleeding edge tech. So far, people are using it to create memes, animations for special events such as birthdays, company promotional animations and language learners creating simple English dialogs. One other area where we have interest is from companies that want to create customized animations. For instance, John receives an animation with John mentioned in the animation, Mary with Mary …
This is possible via our bulk animation feature, where an animation is created with variables in the action script and then a program runs to fill those variables with the correct values and creates the gifs or video files.
So that is ToonClip.com – a Flash like web based animation editor. We'd love to hear what you think and answer any questions you might have. Thanks!
Hi,
I am very concerned about this. Is it possible for Trump to somehow take control of nuclear bombs and set them off.
What are the different safe guards that are in place to prevent this?
Hopefully, I am just being paranoid.