
I'm About as Good as Dead: The End of Xah Lee - craftsman
http://ergoemacs.org/misc/xah_as_good_as_dead.html
======
andywood
I am willing to 'out' myself as a human being who has struggled with serious
mental illness my whole life, if there's a chance it could help this person. I
have also had a long and prosperous career, including 5 years as a senior
engineer and lead at Microsoft. These two things are very nearly orthogonal.
I.e. my medical history has very little to do with my employment history.

But being compassionate does not require you to analyze this person's merits.
The only thing to 'analyze' is that he begged you for help.

Also, please remember the hackers, family, and friends we have lost to
suicide. People say "I wish we'd known. Maybe we could have helped." Well, you
know; and there is a chance you could help.

[http://www.paypal.com](http://www.paypal.com)

~~~
JasonFruit
As a person who has struggled with the same, I disagree. Compassion and "help"
from strangers would have helped me very little — might even have harmed me.
The compassion of my family and friends, their encouragement, honesty, and
support, helped me beyond measure. I don't think strangers on the internet can
fill that rôle.

~~~
brudgers
Every person's story is unique. Xah's is here:

[http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/xah.html](http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/xah.html)

There doesn't seem to have been a deep bench for his support team for a very
long time, if ever.

When I went to school in Gainesville, there was a saying: No matter how weird
you are, there are a bunch of people who are weirder. The internet is that at
scale. Thirty years ago, Xah would probably not have known people who he could
identify with or that anyone identifies with him. The internet gets some
people out of their isolation. It lets them talk about things that they find
interesting or that matter.

I don't talk programming languages with the locals. The appropriate topics are
children, church, and Auburn football - which runs from National Signing Day
in February to the BCS in January.

------
throwaway283719
He could start by rewriting his resume. This in particular stands out -

    
    
      Accomplishment highlights:
        * Autodidact. High school dropout. No degree.
    

To almost any employer, that is not an accomplishment, much less a highlight!
If you're a high school dropout who is very accomplished since then, just
silently drop any mention of your education from your resume. Everyone will
assume that you left it off because it's irrelevant given all your experience
since then.

If the first paragraph of your resume calls attention to the fact that you
didn't even graduate high school, it sets a bad tone for the rest. Many people
will throw your resume away without reading further.

~~~
jgrahamc
Sad.

A couple of months ago at the Go London User Group a young guy came up to me
and told me he didn't have a degree, was totally self taught, and wanted to
know if it was even worth him applying to CloudFlare.

I told him to apply.

He started last Monday.

I can only speak for CloudFlare, but educational background is _a component_
of a candidate. But it's only _a component_, it's not everything. We're
interested in what people know and what they can do. I honestly look more at
people's personalities, employment history and Github than what college degree
they have.

~~~
madaxe_again
Ditto. I actually actively _don 't_ look at peoples qualifications when it
comes to hiring, as I fervently believe that the ability to get a degree does
not correlate to, well, anything in real life, other than what your tolerance
to debt is, or how rich your parents are, or how compliant you are. None of
those are really endearing qualities in a potential employee.

It usually comes out conversationally months down the line, and we therefore
are mathematicians, school & college drop-outs, physicists, chemists,
geographers, and marine biologists - and all developers.

In no small part this stance comes from my own experiences when I first set
out into the world as a naïf graduate, thinking that a masters (Desmond -
didn't let my degree get in the way of my education) in Physics from
[redacted] was somehow valuable. Turns out that a first in urban forestry
management counts for more with most employers, because HR witches don't
actually understand the skills they're supposed to be assessing, and therefore
just get told "throw everything that's not a 1st in the bin". Which is a
despicable waste of talent, and why I therefore do not give two hoots what you
studied or where, if at all.

~~~
throwaway283719
You say you believe that your ability to get a degree doesn't correlate to
anything other than your tolerance to debt or how rich your parents are.

But you clearly believe that your 2:2 in Physics (for Americans, a 3.0 GPA) is
worth more than someone else's 1 in Urban Forestry Management (for Americans,
a 3.7 GPA) so presumably you think that there is _some_ variation in
difficulty among degrees, and presumably you believe that smarter people will
be able to get better degrees?

~~~
madaxe_again
_But you clearly believe that your 2:2_

Nope, I _believed_ that. I now realise it's total bunkum, as while one degree
may be more challenging than another, from a hiring manager's perspective it's
the GPA/class that counts, and little else, and value is in the eye of the
beholder.

------
Beanis
I interviewed/phone screened Xah Lee about 2 years ago.

I'd never heard of him, so I skimmed over his resume and checked out his site
an hour or two before the call. I remember when I was looking at his site I
was seeing various articles around math and programming, and then articles
about things like "2 girls 1 cup". The breadth of articles completely threw me
off. He seemed to have this unfocused interest in EVERYTHING. After looking
over everything I could I had no idea how we'd be able to use him, but I was
really interested in talking with him.

I went into the call expecting a lot of tangents about various topics he was
passionate about and thinking I'd constantly have to refocus the conversation.
Instead the conversation was pretty boring and not really going anywhere. He
had breadth, but the depth was not there. At least not for the things I
brought up. I couldn't understand how someone who seemed to be interested in
everything could have no real interest in anything.

For the last couple of minutes we talked about his site, and how he
maintains/updates it. He finally seemed to light up, and we hit on something
he was really interested in talking about. The basics of the site looked like
it was just a couple of scripts, a lot of static text files and some emacs.
The setup might have been impressive in the mid-to-early 90's, but it wasn't
relevant to anything we would have wanted/needed.

The call lasted maybe 20 minutes, and then we wrapped it up. Every topic,
other than talking about his site, was a dead-end. My internal feedback at the
end was: "No! Maybe... if we were trying to hire encyclopedia writers".

I think his main problem with interviews is that his real-life personality
doesn't even come close to his online personality. If I would have gone in
expecting the standard slightly-awkward developer interview, things might have
gone better. I still would have said no, but it would have been a weaker no.

~~~
jpwgarrison
>"...internal feedback..."

Not so internal anymore! Don't get me wrong, I read your comment with
interest, but then was struck with how we are talking about him as if he _was_
dead. Apparently he likes his life to be public but actual job interviews
somehow strike me as private.

~~~
Beanis
You're right. I was thinking about it for a while and have seen his name show
up other times where I've thought about commenting and haven't. Normally I
wouldn't say anything, and it would have stayed personal and private. I
hovered over the submit buttton for a few minutes and then even after I
submitted I was hovering over the delete link for a few minutes.

I wanted to give some perspective on what "not interviewing well" means in
this case. It seemed as if a lot of comments were assuming age discrimination
and issues with mental illness among other things. I wouldn't doubt that is
the case sometimes, but from my experience that wasn't the case. There were
other issues. I'm sure most people who interview him run into the same issues.

I think his biggest interviewing problem is that he can't live up to the
expectations others will expect from a one-man encyclopedia.

------
mercer
Cases like this, when the talented person in question is a geek who "doesn't
interview well," always frustrate me.

Most of my professional success is a result of social skills and a lot of
experience with wildly different social environments and cultures. While I do
work hard at being actually _good_ at what I do (because that's just more
fun!), I could get pretty far as a cruddy developer.

And that just feels unfair, and frustrating. I do understand that social
skills matter when you work for a company, in a team, but it often feels like
they're _way_ too important (evidence: incompetent people at top positions in
companies who primarily excel at manipulation or are extremely socially
skilled).

Of course, there's a difference between a geek who just lacks social skills,
and a geek who is just not a nice person and _also_ lacks social skills to
hide this (or lacks social skills _because_ of this). I've met my share of
those.

But even then, it's hard to (fully) blame the person in question. I've met my
fair share of arrogant, abrasive, unsympathetic, or misogynistic geeks who
seem to have mostly become that as a reaction to having been bullied or
ostracized. Often, it's self-defense or just inability, and quite frankly the
main reason I didn't turn out that way was because I was in the right place at
the right time, and I had wonderful peers who dragged me out of my isolation.

It just sucks. And I wish I could fix that. I can't imagine how frustrating it
must be to _know_ that you are competent, or even well above average, and
still not get the jobs that downright incompetent people seem to have no
trouble getting.

(I don't mean to justify 'bad' behavior, by the way, but to a degree
understanding where it comes from allows me to still sympathize with, say, a
racist.)

~~~
overgard
I get what you're saying, but I also tend to think: if they're so smart, why
not learn some social skills? It's not like being socially awkward has to be
an innate thing; they're called social _skills_ for a reason, you can learn
them. Many people were once socially awkward, and then fixed it.

It's not particularly fair, but social awkwardness does tend to send a signal
about what people value. And what a socially awkward person clearly does not
particularly value is time spent with other people. I'm not saying everyone
needs to be a gregarious extrovert (I'm certainly not), but if I were looking
to hire someone, I'd be a bit concerned if it was obvious that they had no
real interest in anything that isn't directly within their bubble. It's not
just "are they skilled" it's, are they actually going to fit in the company?

~~~
kylec
Social skills are very hard to learn. The best way to learn something is to
get a result, positive or negative, for a given input. When interacting
socially, results can be difficult to observe, especially when you don't know
what to look for, and often can be time delayed. It's also virtually
impossible to test a specific behavior in isolation, which makes it difficult
to detect what specific thing might cause you to be perceived negatively. Most
people start off on a strong footing socially, making it easier to try new
things to see if they get a positive reaction, but for someone that doesn't
have such a strong footing it can be confusing and frustrating when people
don't want to talk to you or spend time with you, and you don't know why.

~~~
chillingeffect
This is the reason behind manners. They may be bullshit, but they're a
conservative basis from which to begin.

For example, manners say, "don't swear at people in conversation." We all know
it can be okay to swear at people in conversation, but Xah Lee hasn't learned
_when_ to swear at people.

Xah Lee, stop swearing at people for now and stick to your technical guns.
Once you get on some stronger footing, experiment with venting.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Never thought about manners as a "conservative basis" before. Thanks for that
thought!

------
peterwwillis
He needs to find a social services office that can help him get organized and
take care of his personal responsibilities. It's completely his fault that
he's in this mess, but he probably has some kind of personal/mental health
problem that requires assistance.

The one thing nobody should do is simply send him money or give him a job,
since there's nothing on this page that indicates he won't go back to exactly
the same thing he's been doing for the past 10 years.

(Also, 1600 rent? what the fucking fuck? dude needs to go sleep in a shelter
and use that money to get a thrift store interview suit and pay off his bills)

~~~
pkfrank
The only comment in this thread to point out the $1600 rent. Unless I'm
misreading or it's (heavily) back-logged, living on $3/day/food but paying
$50/day/rent just seems insane.

~~~
leoc
True, but moving is not easy if you're depressed and disorganised, especially
if you can't scrape up the money for moving expenses (one more way in which
it's expensive to be poor).

------
terhechte
Xah, if you're reading this: Based on the comments on your page it is not
clear whether you can or can't accept money via Paypal. Your Emacs resources
have always been very helpful to me. I'd be willing to send you some money. Do
you happen to have a Bitcoin address that I could send something to?

~~~
IanKelling
I just spoke to Xah on the phone. He does want people to donate to his paypal
address. He can transfer it to someone to cash it out if needed. He will be
making further updates on his site, probably later today to be clear about
that. He will be looking into bitcoin also. So feel free to donate, I think at
least his contributions to emacs documentation make it worthwhile.

~~~
zymhan
Can't he get a Paypal debit card for free, so that he can spend the money
directly from the account?

~~~
rando289
Yes, he can. Some people don't know about that yet.

------
brudgers
Writing is thinking and one person's philosophical pondering can be another's
trolling, e.g. this post.

Sure trolling is sometimes just being an asshat. But it's also a way of
creating diversity. An attempt to deprogram members of a cargo cult. It can be
fighting group think and ideological tribalism. I've come to think about
trolling as often being an expression of a desire to write - it's very essence
is writing something that didn't need to be written and doing so in a way
that's tailored to one's audience. Just as sarcasm can be a low form of wit,
trolling can be a low form of literature.

If everyone who trolled the Usenet or a mailing list or an online forum was
condemned for it, who would be left and would anyone want to read what they
had to say.

Xah Lee is a person whose particular genius doesn't fit well into a
prefabricated category. But his website expresses a genuine desire to help
others by sharing what he knows - and what he knows, he knows really well.
There but for the grace of god, go I.

~~~
Bahamut
You can do every one of these things without trolling. If trolling is used for
such a purpose, it often has the effect of fostering groupthink - you often
see it in places like 4chan.

Trolling when used for these purposes is often used as a substitute for well-
reasoned/articulate point, and has the irresponsible effect of causing grief
when it could be pre-empted by simple actions. To not take those actions is
often an indication of callousness.

Note: I claim no knowledge on Xah's case, and am not commenting on it.

~~~
brudgers
I apologize for not being more articulate. I'm not suggesting that there are
not better forms of writing than trolling or that trolling is something to
encourage. My point is psychological: a meaningful fraction of trolling
behavior is driven by a desire to write. Writing something to which you
respond at length gives me an opportunity to write a counter response. It
gives me the opportunity to analyize your arguments and rebut them.

In other words, it provides an opportunity to write just as presenting a
reasoned and rational argument does...only on most of the internet even more
so. Trolling is the primary form of entertainment on much of the internet.
Outrageous flame wars sell popcorn to the peanut gallery. Some people enjoy
watching opponents practice their craft in combat.

That's not to say that that impulse to write can't be channeled to a more
productive tone and more constructive ends. But the urge to write is what
makes for great writing...or at least its possibility.

Writing like an asshat just happens to be a path of least resistance. Sarcasm
and meanness provide easy material. They prompt a reaction and getting
feedback is how a writer can improve their craft and flaming and trolling are
crafts - just somewhat destructive ones. All that trolling manifests itself in
the quality of much of the material on Xah Lee's site. He's been writing for
more than two decades.

------
thegeomaster
I don't think anyone should judge him based on the small amount of information
available. I understand that his situation is mostly his fault, but there may
be other things at play. Why be so fast to condemn someone when an unfortunate
sequence of events could've put some of us into a similar situation? I'm not
defending Xah Lee's irresponsibility nor I am defending people who condemn
him, I just want to say that we are all imperfect, after all, and these kinds
of things can and do happen because of that fact.

~~~
15thandwhatever
he still hasn't learned his lesson. he's actively asking people to send money
to him in a way that skirts the lien the irs has filed against him.

if the irs notices this and gets pissed, it absolutely puts his 'helpers' in
harm's way. by continuing to not file taxes, the probability of irs aggression
only increases with each passing day.

i'm all for giving people a 2nd chance, but he still hasn't realized that it's
his fault, and only his fault.

~~~
cmiles74
He feels confident that he doesn't owe the IRS taxes since he has never earned
sufficient money to file (less thank $1,000). It turns out, according to the
present rules, that he is incorrect: self employed and earning more than $400
a year requires filing income tax.[1]

It does not appear that he is purposely evading taxes. I agree that it is his
fault that the IRS is pursuing him, on the other hand it seems pointless for
the IRS to pursue someone with so little material wealth.

[1]: [http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Do-You-Need-to-File-a-
Federal...](http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Do-You-Need-to-File-a-Federal-
Income-Tax-Return%3F)

~~~
DanBC
He says that he has earnt less than $1000 per year. Later on he says his
monthly rent is $1300 per month.

I'm not sure how to resolve that.

~~~
cmiles74
That's a good point, I took it to mean that he's been slowly draining savings
and his 401k.

~~~
calbear81
Distributions from his 401K would count as income and he would receive a 1099
to file and report.

What doesn't make sense to me is that if he's as poor as he claims, he may
actually qualify for a lot of assistance in the form of earned income tax
credit, food stamps, section 8 housing eligibility, etc.

I'm not qualified to judge his past behavior or what not but by looking at his
bank statement, he doesn't seem to be spending his money wisely. I live a few
blocks from him so I recognize those places. Rotten Robbies is a gas station
which usually means overpriced groceries and sundries.

If he has the ability to work, he could invest the rest of his money into
renting a car and then driving for Uber or Lyft. Uber is guaranteeing $40+ per
hour for 6 months which is a hell of a lot more than you make as a dishwasher.
The only consideration is if he can keep a 4.9+ rating out of 5.0 which seems
like a stretch from someone who may be having problems.

------
louhike
At the bottom of the page:

"if you can help, paypal to xah@xahlee.org

buy my tutorial:

Buy Xah Emacs Tutorial
([http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/buy_xah_emacs_tutorial.html](http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/buy_xah_emacs_tutorial.html))

Xah's JavaScript Tutorial
([http://xahlee.info/js/js.html](http://xahlee.info/js/js.html))

Xah's {Python, Perl, Ruby} Tutorial or buy my entire xahlee.info site content
for $50. see ∑ Xah Code ([http://xahlee.info/perl-
python/index.html](http://xahlee.info/perl-python/index.html))

〔☛ Xah Lee's Resume〕

or, send paypal to this my previous effort to something similar to a
kickstart.
[https://pledgie.com/campaigns/19973](https://pledgie.com/campaigns/19973)

i won't actually be able to draw money from paypal, due to bank/IRS problem.
So

better, send your check to:

Huynh Kang at huynh.kang facebook
([https://www.facebook.com/huynh.kang](https://www.facebook.com/huynh.kang))
or huynh-kang linkedin ([http://www.linkedin.com/pub/huynh-
kang/24/8b/535](http://www.linkedin.com/pub/huynh-kang/24/8b/535)) professor
Richard Palais, home page at University of California Irvine
[http://vmm.math.uci.edu/](http://vmm.math.uci.edu/), Wikipedia Richard
Palais, richard-palais on linkedin"

------
partisan
I can empathize and I feel bad for anyone in what feels like a helpless and
hopeless situation. I sometimes feel like I am there as well despite having
"enough" money for a rainy season or two.

Some people need to hit rock bottom to even begin to understand that there is
light at the end of the tunnel. Manual labor, however humiliating and
seemingly beneath him, may give him the proper motivation he seems to be
lacking.

~~~
DanielStraight
I think this explains the vastly different reactions to the author's post. His
mental state, I can easily empathize with. So if I focus on that, my reply
will be very positive. But at the same time, he is calling the every day
experience of something like 1/3 of Americans "as good as dead", which is
frankly insulting to those who do it their whole lives and even support
families doing it.

Having to do manual labor for minimum wage is not as good as dead, it is an
obstacle. And it is an obstacle that many people have overcome.

I wish the author nothing but the best, but his ability to improve his
situation is going to depend on his ability to change his attitude regarding
work and what he needs to live. I hope he does. I hope he finds something or
someone that will push him in the right direction. But that's what he needs,
not a monetary handout. Working as a dish washer isn't going to kill him. It
hasn't killed the thousands of other people doing it, some of whom are even
happy about their lives and hopeful about the future.

~~~
vezzy-fnord
I don't think you read the whole thing.

Among minimum wage labor, he also mentioned impending homelessness, lack of
private transportation (which, at least in the USA, is a huge impediment) and
a total of $23 in life savings, which is pretty bad, even for a lot of people
in rough situations.

I don't know if he's "as good as dead", but he's in a hard place, certainly.
More than you're giving him credit for.

~~~
DanielStraight
I did read the whole thing, several times.

His situation sucks, I'm not denying that. But why would his likelihood of
homelessness be any greater than anyone else working minimum wage? Can he not
do what everyone else with a shitty job does and get a shitty apartment with a
bunch of roommates for a few hundred a month? Can he not get food stamps like
everyone else with minimal income?

I'm not trying to criticize his current feeling of hopelessness. I'm just
saying that his situation _isn 't_, in fact, hopeless and that the only way
it's ever going to get any better is if he realizes that it isn't hopeless and
starts working his ass off to make it better.

And I'm not criticizing him for not having already come to that realization
either. It's hard. It takes times. It probably takes help from others who have
been there. But it is the only way forward.

It's wrong to be unsympathetic to his plight, but I think it's just as wrong
to withhold the truth that many other people have faced the same situation and
gotten through it by persistently working their asses off until things got
better. He can do this. Anyone reading this in a similar situation, you can do
this. It will suck. There's no point in being coy about that. But if you do
what it takes to keep working, and work and save smartly, you can get through
it. Don't give up hope.

------
seansoutpost
Xah,It really sounds like you need a bitcoin address. Coinbase.com (YC S12) is
a great place to start. Once you have some coins, you will find no shortage of
people in the bay area willing to buy them off of you.

I would even be willing to run a btc fundraiser on your behalf. I don't have a
lot of rep on here, but it's pretty solid in the bitcoin space. Google Jason
King Bitcoin or Sean's Outpost

Best of luck, man. Stay strong.

~~~
SandB0x
> Xah,It really sounds like you need a bitcoin address.

Only on Hacker News.

This guy needs professional support for his mental health issues, food to eat
and help in finding a steady job.

------
deadghost
I've come across his blog multiple times when I started with emacs and he
seems like a cool guy(anyone that can spoon raw oatmeal into his mouth like
it's the greatest thing ever is cool by my book).

It's great he's asking for help instead of showing up on the front page as
another dead hacker.

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
Totally OT, but when I was a kid, raw oatmeal and brown sugar was one of my
favorite treats.I hated it cooked. Even now, I still like raw oats right off
the stalk, though it's a lot of work for such small reward.

------
danso
Almost sent the OP money through PayPal, but I saw this at the bottom of the
post:

> _i won 't actually be able to draw money from paypal, due to bank/IRS
> problem._

Which is confusing because in a few lines above, this is written:

> _if you can help, paypal to xah@xahlee.org_

Can someone who knows the OP provide more context to all of this?

~~~
DennisP
Sounds like a case for bitcoin.

~~~
dkersten
How's he going to buy his noodles with bitcoin?

~~~
nawitus
[http://fukuronoodlebar.com/bitcoin/](http://fukuronoodlebar.com/bitcoin/)

~~~
jnettome
$80

------
userbinator
Did he just post a screenshot of his bank account _with the session key
visible in the URL_!?

(I know it's probably not too significant and there are other checks in place,
but I found it rather ironic when the text right above it happens to be "I try
to be VERY VERY careful".)

~~~
madaxe_again
Actually, it's even better. He was browsing pr0n when taking that screenshot.
Google those imgur filenames in the downloads bar.... _facepalm_

~~~
gebe
I don't think that bothers him. He has discussed his views and tastes
regarding pornography (with explicit examples) before on his site. He also has
a travellog from Las Vegas that includes a visit to a prostitute. He's quite a
character and his site includes posts about everything from math and tech to
the stuff I mentioned above.

~~~
userbinator
That it doesn't bother him is not the problem; that it may bother his
potential employers is.

When looking at his site from the point of view of someone who could be
interested in hiring him, it certainly leaves a strong impression - but
unfortunately, not a positive one.

------
rafekett
Xah needs to seek help for his mental illness. Look at his posts on
comp.lang.emacs for evidence. He's been spending all these years on $3 a day
trying to figure out a more "ergonomic" keyboard for emacs, but many of his
suggestions are really just based on what he wants and are less ergonomic than
standard emacs.

EDIT: comp.lang.emacs doesn't exist, it's been many years. gnu.emacs.BLAH

~~~
chaired
Some find this type of labeling helpful. Some find it unhelpful. At any rate,
we should probably tread carefully.

People with mental illness need jobs as much as, if not more than, those who
pass for normal. I know. I have suffered from serious mental issues for 18
years. In that same time, I have enjoyed a long, exciting, and storied career;
and I know that my employers have been grateful.

~~~
rafekett
My intention wasn't to label anyone. Xah has been a disruptive and
counterproductive presence in the emacs community, but I think it's because he
needs help he's not getting. He spent his time in poverty fighting flame wars
on usenet -- he needs to get his priorities straight. I buy he's a smart guy
who can get a lot done, but he's not employable in his current state, and I
don't think the right solution is to give him money so he can continue to live
like he does.

~~~
DanBC
"Diagnosing" people when you're not a doctor and when your only contact with
that person is written stuff on the Internet is stigmatising.

It keeps people with mental illness out of work (because employers illegally
consider that person to be a riskier hire) and it does little to help the
person being discussed who might just be an asshole rather than being someone
with a diagnosable MH illness.

------
muyuu
What in the f __*.

I've been following this guy since a bit before Orkut/Tribe days when he had
full hair (~2003?). He's been very inspirational. At first I thought he was a
bit of a jerk and a troll (not the right place or time to elaborate on this,
but well this was long ago so it doesn't matter) but when I saw him take on
his education in his 30s I was quite impressed with what he achieved.

I think this guy is top drawer and seems hard working. I have no idea what
happened to him, although I do guess his peculiar character has a lot to do
with it.

~~~
mercer
It could perhaps be the effects of isolation (which, as recent submissions and
discussions here make evident, can have a huge effect on a person).

I've had periods in my life where I withdrew from others, and every time I
recovered, I was amazed by how much this withdrawal warped everything about
me, and by how easy it was for me to forget simple social behavior. It was
almost like I was a completely different person.

~~~
andywood
Yes. Isolation can be very damaging, and he seems to be aware of this. And for
some people, sometimes, it really can be something that 'just happens' as
relationships wax and wane, and not a conscious choice.

------
kayyyl
If you really think you can code, Fiverr
([http://www.fiverr.com/](http://www.fiverr.com/)) is the place you have to
go. There're many little jobs for you. Do 5 per day, let's do it now mate.

------
saalweachter
Reading the blog/comments I don't think a development job is what he
needs/wants. I think what he really needs is a patron.

So why not Patreon?

Some people find value in the content he creates, and his needs are modest. It
is not implausible that enough people are willing to chip in to keep him
going, and Patreon provides a way to do that.

------
cognivore
Is there context here I'm missing? The screen shot with the legal fee leads me
to believe so, but I can't sort it.

~~~
akuchling
Lee is a noted Internet crank, very sure he's completely brilliant and
everyone else is a moron. I remember his flaming about the quality of the
Python documentation, e.g. [https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-
list/2005-April/310...](https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-
list/2005-April/310515.html)

~~~
bluefinity
Yeah, I have a feeling he might have burned a few bridges.

[https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-
list/2005-April/355...](https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-
list/2005-April/355413.html)

~~~
raverbashing
After reading his original post (of unnecessary expletives and excessive
nitpicking) can't say I feel sorry for him

~~~
CatMtKing
[http://xahlee.info/perl-
python/xlali_skami_cukta.html](http://xahlee.info/perl-
python/xlali_skami_cukta.html)

Well, I think his criticisms are pretty well-founded. He just doesn't say it
in a way you would enjoy.

~~~
raverbashing
True, in this text there's a lot of things I agree, however, for example

> If you are accustomed to Perl's semantics, the search operation is what
> you're looking for.

> Its mentioning of Perl is irrelevant, since the majority reading that page
> will not have expertise with Perl regex.

Are you sure? I assume a lot of python users (and the docs he's critiquing are
not the latest, and may have some "old stuff") used Perl first. Perl users
would be familiar with Regexes, so this is a useful piece of info

Or, praising an example as good for a Python tutorial that uses the format def
okaydokey(self): return "okaydokey" which is not recommended by PEP-8

------
ThinkBeat
Standing as the precipice about to lose your home, your possession and things
you have tried to hold on to is an extremely traumatic affair.

Its very hard for someone honest and hard working in our world to admit to
having problems and asking for help from the general population.

He has done good things, and he is a fellow human, who needs help. Leave it at
that.

Who cares if he has upset some people on usenet. You think its some kinda
karma? Wut? Troll the net, lose your house?

If there are trolls on the net that should be taken care of it is assholes to
humiliate and denigrate a man in his hour of need, when he is down and
humiliated. That takes a lot more of an asshole than having spirited
discussions regarding technical topics on usenet.

------
cenazoic
Sacha Chua recently did one of her "Emacs Chats" with Xah Lee:

[http://sachachua.com/blog/category/podcast/emacs-chat-
podcas...](http://sachachua.com/blog/category/podcast/emacs-chat-
podcast/#post-27224)

------
chaired
1 ) Perhaps this could be the start of Xah Lee learning some social skills. If
so, good on him. He'll go a lot further with them.

2 ) Surely someone in this community can offer him a job writing
documentation, at the least? Think of it as charity if you must, but he will
probably deliver good value, and he would probably be happy to work cheap, if
you're into that sort of thing.

3 ) I will donate $, since that's what I can do from where I am.

------
garretraziel
This is mostly unfortunate. As an Emacs user, I have read a lot of his
tutorials and they are very good, I will consider buying one of them (but I
don't understand; does or doesn't he accept money through paypal?).

On the side note, he should really edit that bank account screenshot. These
downloaded images really looks like they were downloaded from imgur. And if
you type those filenames into imgur...

------
moistgorilla
Props for asking for help.

------
BadassFractal
The problem with someone like Xah is that you don't quite know what you're
getting yourself into.

Why has he not worked for a decade, and what reassurances are there that he
will be able to be productive? There's no chain of trust that would prove that
you're not hiring some kind of a ticking timebomb. There's no proof that he's
up to speed with any tech since the 90s. There's no proof that he'd not be
potentially very quirky and difficult to work with in a team environment. It's
a very difficult position to be hired from, and it mostly has to do with the
fact that he "let himself go" for a long time.

If you have the option between hiring someone good and "someone potentially
good, but also very unpredictable, high-risk and likely to be a long-term
project", you'd go with the former every single time, it's a no-brainer.

------
auganov
Wow, that's pretty shocking. As an emacs user I'd often stumble upon his
articles. Even bought an emacs autohotkey-mode from him. It's so strange to
see a person you thought was this amazing genius that surely did well for
himself struggle like that. Hope you take care of your problems Xah.

------
clutterjoe
Initially I typed some snark into this textarea, but thought better before I
clicked submit.

It's troubling to see a human in pain and even more so to derive joy or a
false sense of righteousness from it.

I'm not sure the help he wants is the help he needs, but I hope he finds his
way out of that dark place.

------
Globz
From the python mailing list:

Xah Lee wrote:

> What does a programer who wants to use regex gets out from this piece of
> motherf __king irrevalent drivel?

> Any resume that ever crosses my desk that includes 'Xah Lee' anywhere in the
> name will be automatically trashed.

-rbt at athop1.ath.vt.edu

------
killnine
[http://www.sendameal.com](http://www.sendameal.com)

------
fantomass
If you look at Xah's website with the eyes of business owner it could be a
problem that that it handles a lot of exotic stuff, that is almost never a
subject in a small to medium IT companies, but is written and fostered with
great passion and care.

So there might be concerns if he would fit in to company with all its mundane
day to day problems.

I think I would be helpful if he could do an internship or some sort of a
program, where he can prove his capabilities to do \- "boring" stuff \- follow
orders of his boss \- working teams

Once this is approved, he might had better chances.

------
nkozyra
I don't know that this is necessarily a good idea when the IRS has a lock on
your account(s), either:

>> better, send your check to: [snip]

------
pawelkomarnicki
WTF? "why i didn't seek job all these years? well, i can only say i
procrastinate and is ok living on a dime."

~~~
chaostheory
my question is, if he's "procrastinating" why didn't he just rent a room
instead of a whole apartment? Better yet why not move back to his parent's
place? When I was single, I never rented an apartment on my own. I always had
a roomate(s).

------
octopus
Best thing someone can do for this guy is to help him fill his taxes
declaration retroactively and create a fund for him to write an Emacs book for
e.g. Seems quite competent writing about Emacs, so it should be right on his
alley.

Maybe someone from Apress, Pragmatic or Packt Publishing can contact him about
an Emacs book.

------
logfromblammo
Sounds like the guy needs a friend more than he needs a job.

~~~
sanxiyn
He has friends. Read the post again.

~~~
logfromblammo
I read it again. What you may not realize is that people with many friends and
people with few or none have different meanings for that word.

He may simply be describing the two people that would actually notice if he
vanished from the face of the planet as his friends because that is the
closest thing he has to one.

It's fine to wash dishes if you need money, but if he ever wants a better life
for himself, putting up with the annoyances of people who are not like you is
a skill that must be both learned and practiced. Introverts, especially
extreme loner hermits, have to sacrifice some of their essential spiritual
essence to the vampiric extroverts occasionally, in order to have a better
quality of being left the hell alone the rest of the time.

A guy like this really needs a mediator to introduce him to more outgoing
types, let them have a taste, and then protect him before they scare him back
into the shell. It's very unlikely he could do it alone.

------
graycat
There may be some government and/or privately funded social services in the
area that could help him, e.g., emergency rent money, housing, food,
counseling.

His Web site with 240 K visitors a month, with some ads, should be enough to
help him significantly.

------
driverdan
> why i didn't seek job all these years? well, i can only say i procrastinate
> and is ok living on a dime.

Why would anyone give this guy money? It sounds like his money woes are all
his fault. He's just begging online rather than begging in the street.

~~~
sanxiyn
Well one thing he is doing is soliciting donation for his Emacs Tutorial,
which he provides for free on his website. I don't think that is begging, and
think it is entirely appropriate.

You won't care about that if you didn't read his Emacs Tutorial. But if you
did, consider donating.

------
BryanBigs
I feel for him - he seems to suffering both mentally and physically. But I
have a hard time believing he hasn't legally had to file his taxes for the
past 10 years. At the very least, if he really has only had $1k in income
(which isn't credible - he's showing $700 of income on that bank statement
alone) he would have gotten a few hundo from the EITC - which when you only
make $1k is a big deal. And admitting you didn't file for 10 years isn't going
to help him going forward either. Hate to see someone in pain - but this
really looks self-inflicted.

------
galfarragem
I think the biggest help we can give him is to redesign his website: very few
people (without knowing his struggling situation) would ever pay for the
content. His website content is pure gold but looks like crap..

------
fharper1961
Am I the only one who thinks that the IRS should not be able to make someone
who is mentally fragile homeless, just because he hasn't filed his taxes? It
seems very inhumane to me.

------
methehack
I sent him $10.

------
ww520
It's saddening to see fellow hackers falling on hard time. I'm going to Palo
Alto next week. I'll swing by to Mt View to see what I can help out.

------
yiedyie
I anything this story tells is how much hacker need to adapt to business as
usual. So much for the power to change.

------
chj
I read some of his emacs related posts before, not that pleasant to read, but
can be very helpful.

------
stefap2
"well, i can only say i procrastinate"

No there is my motivation to end the lunch break earlier.

------
geetee
I couldn't help but see what tqOSxqI.jpg is on imgur. NSFW

------
arjn
What about an Indiegogo campaign to help this guy out ?

------
roghummal
Someone get this man some vim, stat.

------
itsameta4
Go. On. Welfare.

Jesus.

------
rando289
Xah's website has been an amazing resource for emacs users, me included. I
really hope someone can help him out a bit.

------
wfjackson
Edit: He seems to have a lot of interest and worked a lot on good
documentation, which is the bane of the typical OSS project. Why doesn't Red
Hat/Google etc. throw some money at him to write docs for underdocumented OSS
stuff? Sounds like win win for all. It's hard to find really smart developers
that are interested in writing documentation.[End edit]

If you don't really know him, his LinkedIn profile shows more details about
his work.

[http://www.linkedin.com/in/xahlee](http://www.linkedin.com/in/xahlee)

Xah Lee's Summary

Full stack web site development. Heavy backend experience + unix sys adimn.
Seek startupish, small team engineers environment.

Accomplishment highlights:

• Autodidact. High school dropout. No degree. • Taught graduate math students
at National Center for Theoretical Sciences, Taiwan. • Invited speaker to
Geometry And Visualization workshop, Tokyo Metropolitan University. • Work
cited in US Patent. • Well-known open source contributor in emacs and LISP
communities. • Expert in: JavaScript, Perl, Python, PHP, Emacs Lisp,
Mathematica, MyLinux, SQL, Second Life Linden Scripting Language. Each with at
least ten thousand lines of code. (working knowledge Java)

Specialties: • Design, code, entire system. Understand language, protocols,
raw. Do not depends on frameworks/libs when unnecessary.

Portforlio:

• Xah's JavaScript Tutorial 〔
[http://xahlee.info/js/js.html](http://xahlee.info/js/js.html) 〕 • Xah's
{Python, Perl, Ruby} Tutorial 〔 [http://xahlee.info/perl-
python/index.html](http://xahlee.info/perl-python/index.html) 〕 • Xah Emacs
Lisp Tutorial 〔
[http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/elisp.html](http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/elisp.html)
〕 • Xah's Java Tutorial 〔 [http://xahlee.info/java-a-
day/java.html](http://xahlee.info/java-a-day/java.html) 〕 • Xah Linux Tutorial
〔
[http://xahlee.info/linux/linux_index.html](http://xahlee.info/linux/linux_index.html)
〕 • Xah's HTML5 Tutorial 〔
[http://xahlee.info/js/index.html](http://xahlee.info/js/index.html) 〕 • Xah's
CSS53 Tutorial 〔
[http://xahlee.info/js/css_index.html](http://xahlee.info/js/css_index.html) 〕
• Programing Language Design 〔
[http://xahlee.info/comp/comp_lang.html](http://xahlee.info/comp/comp_lang.html)
〕

Xah Lee's Experience

Author and Webmaster XahLee.info January 2007 – Present (7 years 5 months) San
Francisco Bay Area

Creator and author of award-winning website
[http://xahlee.info/](http://xahlee.info/) , since 1997.

• 8 thousand visitors per day. 240 thousand visitors per month. • 5 thousand
HTML pages • Frequently cited in academic journals as well as online sites
such as StackOverflow, Hacker News, Reddit, Wikipedia. Also cited by Microsoft
TypeScript publication. (see list of citations below.)

Published more than 50 software. Have a look at

• Xah's JavaScript Tutorial 〔
[http://xahlee.info/js/js.html](http://xahlee.info/js/js.html) 〕 • Xah's
{Python, Perl, Ruby} Tutorial 〔 [http://xahlee.info/perl-
python/index.html](http://xahlee.info/perl-python/index.html) 〕 • Xah Emacs
Lisp Tutorial 〔
[http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/elisp.html](http://ergoemacs.org/emacs/elisp.html)
〕 • Xah's Java Tutorial 〔 [http://xahlee.info/java-a-
day/java.html](http://xahlee.info/java-a-day/java.html) 〕 • Xah Linux Tutorial
〔
[http://xahlee.info/linux/linux_index.html](http://xahlee.info/linux/linux_index.html)
〕 • Programing Language Design 〔
[http://xahlee.info/comp/comp_lang.html](http://xahlee.info/comp/comp_lang.html)
〕 Xah Lee's Projects

Programming Tutorial: Python June 2006 to Present Team Members: Xah Lee

~~~
nkozyra
Is he a particularly noted person? Maybe just in the emacs community? I don't
know who he is and that resume is pretty skimpy.

It seems that his biggest need right now is self-presentation and that's a
pretty tough thing to acquire on short notice.

I'd also say there would likely be way more opportunities for someone of his
skillset outside of the valley, where the skimpy resume probably looks even
skimpier by comparison.

I realize leaving is tough when you don't have a car, but he also won't have a
home soon. Some relocation may be in order. Best of luck to him either way.

~~~
nabla9
He is known as annoying Usenet troll by many. I don't classify him as pure
troll, however. He don't troll for the sake of trolling and he can be helpful.
He is very opinionated and argumentative and don't adjust his thinking very
well.

He might have mood disorder.
[http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/xah.html](http://xahlee.org/PageTwo_dir/Personal_dir/xah.html)

~~~
swah
Like Erik Naggum, which is considered a troll by many, and also a great writer
w/ deep knowledge of programming languagess if can get past the troll part.

~~~
sanxiyn
Also Jon Harrop. There is no doubt he is trolling, but also no doubt he is a
very accomplished programmer. (He may disagree he is trolling, but if audience
thinks you are trolling, you are.)

~~~
freshhawk
"if [the] audience thinks you are trolling, you are"

Really? I thought the entire definition of trolling was based on intent.
Trolling is trying to provoke a reaction from people.

By your definition a significant percentage of the world is trolling the anti-
vax and truther communities for example. And many mentally ill people who
comment online _are_ trolls instead of just being mistaken for them?

This definition seems a lot less useful to me than the intent based one.

~~~
rbanffy
> a significant percentage of the world is trolling the anti-vax and truther
> communities for example

You don't go to an anti-vax or truther community to remind them how crazy they
are. When we consider mental conditions, it may be that some people have
compulsive troll disorder or something to that effect.

~~~
freshhawk
My point about anti-vax or truthers is that they often think people who
disagree with them are trolling them, and under this definition that means
they are. That seems ridiculous to me.

As for mental conditions, that's another definition that seems inconsistent. I
thought trolling was trying to provoke a reaction by being obnoxious or acting
stupid or acting mentally ill. I thought the whole point of trolling was that
you mostly can't tell if you are being trolled or not. Similar to Poe's law.

A definition of trolling that labels anyone who provokes a negative reaction
from a community for any reason, like actually being mentally ill or actually
being very ignorant seems overly broad. You just put weev in the same category
as someone extremely technically illiterate who asks a stupid question on
yahoo answers.

Now you just have a synonym for "annoying" or "irritating".

------
yung_ether
Who would hire a 45 year old programmer? Certainly good as dead. Have fun at
the laundry.

~~~
laichzeit0
45 year old programmers most likely have seen everything come around the block
more than a few times in their careers and realize fads / crap ideas when they
see them. E.g. Yet another build system

I work with a 42 year old and by far he's the person I've learned the most
from even though he "still uses Perl" (I love Perl btw) and I'm trying to
convince him to learn Git and abandon CVS.

~~~
mgkimsal
Exactly, and it's a big reason why _some_ places are reluctant to hire them.
They'll rain on your parade faster than anyone else, and people don't like to
have their parade rained on.

~~~
roghummal
Kinda sucks when someone experienced enough to know bullshit calls bullshit.

------
bestest
I simply can't resist it, but alas, see what will happen to you if you code in
emacs!

On the serious note though, he did admit he enjoys procrastinating. Why would
I help someone who never had and still does not have any motivation?

~~~
seren
If you are procrastinating that much, to the point you are on the verge of
literally dying or starving, there is probably an underlying issue like social
anxiety, depression, etc that is triggering the procrastination reaction as an
avoidance mechanism. I am not sure he is really "enjoying" it, despite what he
said. (I am not a psychologist but I play one on Internet.)

~~~
quotha
Procrastination is the soul rebelling against entrapment. \-- N N Taleb

------
jqm
This kind of case is why I don't think guaranteed income will work. Some
people won't even be able to manage that money. We have to find a way to
insure people have the basics without money (in their hands anyway). The
salvation army type/soup kitchen programs aren't it. No dignity, 5000 other
guys (a significant percentage of which would slit your throat for a rock), an
underlying "join the cult theme".... no, that environment doesn't make things
better. Basic privacy and dignity are needs too. And if someone is going to
become productive they need access to basic tools like a computer also. If
people like Lee could forget about money and work on what they love I think
the world would have more for it. Or else a lot more trolling. IDK...

I think what we are seeing here is similar to heroin addiction or alcoholism.
But this is an internet 24-7/ trolling rush/ porn addiction that makes it hard
to live in the real world. I bet his isn't the only case either. I recommend a
three month cold turkey session in the woods of Canada this summer. No net. Up
at dawn chopping wood. Real face to face interaction most of the day. Fix this
poor fellow right up and give him a new lease on life. I do feel for his
case... in the same way someone who drinks a little more than they should
might feel for homeless drunk passed out on the sidewalk.

~~~
jqm
I don't mind down votes.

At the same time I am curious how someone could feel significantly differently
than the point of view I posted to down vote it. Does someone not believe an
internet addiction is partly to blame for Lee's problems? That this isn't a
disorder or there isn't a treatment? That his basic needs should not be met?
That our social support service system doesn't need a pivot? What exactly is
the argument?

------
phkahler
So you claim to be a decent programmer, but haven't been working a traditional
job in years because why? You claim to be smart but don't know the value of
maintaining a basic financial safety net. It won't be hard to bail you out,
but this should not be happening in the first place. Let it be a lesson to
others. Or is this just a fake?

~~~
nnq
It's obvious the guy needs some help to help him "pull out". Whether it's a
friend, a psychologist, a psychiatrist or a "mystical" experience, he needs
something.

There's no point criticizing him, it's obvious nobody would hire him until he
"pulls himself out of the hole". But if you live near him and have some spare
time / expertise / willingness to help, be a decent human being and help him
get to someone that could help or hire him.

Most of are are not as "autonomous" as we think we are, and in unfavorable
circumstances, we can all fall off the tracks. And get over the "but don't
know the value of maintaining a basic financial safety net"... it's obvious
that he already lost the "social safety net" of friends that could have told
him this and probably a "psychological balance safety net" too, so it's a bit
too late to be any point in telling him this...

~~~
throwaway_122
Realistically, what's the best kind of support he should be seeking right now?

His linkedin profile doesn't say or at least I couldn't see his job profile. I
would imagine it is going to be hard for him to get a job as a coder (with his
reputation and all). Even if he does manage to raise $1600, that only helps
him extend his current situation until next month.

He said he's been living in some sort of isoloation ("platonic hermit monk")
for the past decade. Maybe a job in a different field may help him give a
different perspective from the one he's had for the past decade?

What does one do if they become homeless in the Bay Area?

