Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit | 0xy's commentslogin

Why was it trivial for FB to scale WhatsApp from 450,000,000 users at acquisition to over 3,300,000,000 now?

Seems like an insane achievement to scale a messaging service to half of the world.


8x scaling over a time period where the available size and performance of single-image systems increased by more than 8x seems… if not trivial, at least not an “insane achievement.”

Scaling a product like that is an incredible engineering achievement, but I am speaking specifically about product development. What other products has Facebook innovated internally, worked through the product-market fit, and scaled itself? Again, my point is that they have a ton of resources and a huge existing user base, but the only successes they seem to have are purchasing companies that are ramping. They deploy engineers and connect to the existing user base, but they aren't innovative in product design.

facebook itself is a myspace or nexopia clone

the targetting pixel and like button are the most obvious innovations?

facebook is a tool for building products on, rather than a product in and of itself.


“Scaling” as in “making sure the infrastructure can handle much higher load”, or as in “making sure the product remains genuinely useful to people, so that the user numbers go up and not down”? For both, it didn’t happen by itself, but it’s far from rocket science. A sane team of 15-20 people can do it.

Was it just because WhatsApp was already generally well designed when they purchased it?

I think that might be common enough these days through sound horizontal scaling principals and especially services that scale for you, but Whatsapp launched in 2009, pretty much the turning point for the tech that enables "web scale".

At that time AWS was just rolling out ELB and RDS, people were still fulfilling their (and most) roles on EC2 servers or even more likely dedicated servers / VPS that took day(s) to commission and might have even been setup by hand, there was no Docker, GitHub was new and Actions, Jenkins etc were years away, and there were very few PaaS- or IaaS-type offerings IIRC just a very nascent Heroku and Google App Engine.


WhatsApp was built on Erlang, though, which was built to scale in the 80s.

ejabberd right?

Scaling a product from 0 to 450 MM is a humongous achievement.

Going from 450 to 3300 seems rather small in terms of technical achievement. If you can serve 450 you can serve 3300 MM frankly.


There's a massive spike in mortality for those who retire from work versus those who keep working. In fact, working just a single year after you're 65 is associated with 11% lower risk of death for healthy people and 9% for unhealthy.

Working is objectively good for your health. Stopping work is associated with an extremely large increase in mortality risk, for both healthy and unhealthy people.

Any alternatives must weigh the resulting death it will cause.


How are we sure about the direction of cause and effect here? I'd expect more healthier people to self-select the working cohort, all else being equal.

In practice it doesn't really work that way. It isn't like "I am ill bodied, I ought to retire." It is more like "I am ill bodied, but I can't afford to retire, so I must work in some capacity." People who retire early are probably far more likely to be wealthier, and that is correlated with healthspan.

It's hard to prove or falsify this statement.

> Early retirement is increasingly a preserve of the wealthy. Back in 2002–03, the fraction of those who were retired aged 55–64 was fairly similar across the wealth distribution: 20% in the poorest fifth compared to 28% for the wealthiest fifth. In contrast, by 2018–19, only 7% of the poorest fifth were retired, while for the wealthiest fifth it was still 24%.

https://ifs.org.uk/news/early-retirement-increasingly-concen...


Right, but the original post was about working past retirement age, not retiring early. It's unlikely the last two US presidents have been working in their 70s and 80s because they can't afford retirement. I'm not aware of anyone working past 80 that haven't been a professor, CEO, politician, etc.

Regardless it's a confounder, statement otherwise now being that affluence predicts mortality.


Yeah this seems like an obvious confounder.

Yeah no shit people who are forced to retire because of health reasons are going to die earlier than the ones who aren't.

The study controlled for that. Unhealthy people who continue working have lower mortality than those who stop working.

Did any of that signal come from people who hadn't spent the last 40 or 50 years working, in a society constructed around working?

If I had a study that showed increased mortality in people who had owned a parrot for 50 years in the year after that parrot died, you wouldn't cite it as evidence of the basic human need for a parrot.


The Biden era EPA covered up the East Palestine disaster by backdating policy changes to make the spill look less bad for the administration, didn't they? That's what an EPA whistleblower alleged.

How did these EPA regulations help prevent the East Palestine disaster?

Didn't an EPA whistleblower credibly accuse the fully regulated EPA of a coverup including backdated policies in that incident?

Sounds like a better system, coverups, corruption and incompetence.


What bribery?


Clarence and Alito have received gifts that would raise serious scrutiny if they were a “regular” government employee. Here’s a link to the series of articles covering this over the last few years.

https://www.propublica.org/series/supreme-court-scotus



Clarence Thomas accepted multiple bribes from Harlan Crow

What about Charlie Kirk's conduct was not civil? Did he advocate or perpetuate violence?


Source?

He called for the military to use "lethal force" against migrants at the southern border. He also repeatedly demanded "Nuremberg-style trials" for medical providers who offer gender-affirming care.

Also there's this: https://www.imdb.com/news/ni63814717/


Well, being that gender "care" has been pretty much debunked, that seems fine.

Debunked in what sense?

In the sense that it doesn't work? Well it definitely works, gender affirming care like TRT helps men all the time. Breast implants help women after breast cancer related mastectomies. Vaginoplasty also commonly helps traumatic rape victims, too.

Or, do you mean debunked as in debunked in helping people with gender dysphoria? Because that's wrong too, we know that gender affirming care leads to less suicide in that population.


Even the ACLU had to admit your last line is false (U.S. v. Skrmetti). After multiple rounds of obfuscation.

This is a misunderstanding.

Because suicide is so rare and the number of people receiving gender affirming care is so low it is nearly impossible to get population sizes to demonstrate a statistically significant reduction in suicide.

We can instead show a statistically significant reduction in depression, anxiety, and suicidal thinking. In every other medical context this is used as a strong shorthand for "reduces suicides." It is completely reasonable here as well.


Well, you said it directly reduces suicides. Now you are saying it doesn't. Which is it?

At some point you need to understand this is why 95% of the population disagrees with your side.

Good luck! I will stop responding here because you seem ill-equipped to form a substantive argument.


The research community is happy to use "reduces suicides" as shorthand for "reduces depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation in statistically significant amounts." It is only in this one context that people insist that this is somehow misleading and therefore actually gender affirming care is evil.

But okay. Imagine that in this circumstance it really is the case that gender affirming care doesn't reduce suicide rates (rather than this just being difficult to collect data about). It merely reduces depression and anxiety and suicidal ideation in people. Oh no. That still sounds good to me.


He's not me, but from our understanding it reduces suicide as he explained.

Also, you pulled the 95% number directly out of your asshole. Most people don't give a shit if someone gets hormones prescribed by a doctor. You care for reasons that are unclear and you have failed to explain. I'm guessing because they're stupid reasons, and you know it, and you don't want to embarrass yourself so you figure you can just not say anything and hope nobody notices.

It is so incredibly rich to be talking about a "substantitive argument" when you haven't even brought AN argument. You just said "uh it don't work" and "durr people don't like this" and then refused to elaborate further.

Yes, you should stop responding because obviously you are far out of your depth and liable to humiliate yourself.


Thanks for proving my point.

Having “some gun deaths every single year” was a cost worth paying. The alternative, under gun control laws preventing school shootings, is not “rational”.

People who says that, never think it will happen to them. I wonder if his widow thinks that was a price worth paying?

Didn't he call for the death penalty for Joe Biden?

This is complete nonsense. All other countries, including the UK, Australia and most of Europe has immigration systems that are just as stringent if not more so.

Notably, and very relevant, the UK recently made it substantially harder for UK citizens to bring over spouses to the point that even teachers don't meet the income thresholds necessary to qualify.

Australia is more expensive AND takes longer than the United States for the equivalent spousal visa.


Sorry, which part of my personal experiences was nonsense? Immigration is hard, and yes, I'm aware of challenges in the UK as I moved my spouse over there in 2014. Do you have an experience with immigration that you can speak to?

Your implication is that the US has an outsized level of difficulty in immigration. This is nonsense. The UK, Australia and Europe are harder.

Notably, the exact same UK visa you used has been made substantially harder to get since you applied.

I am very familiar with the US, UK and Australian immigration systems. The US is the easiest, cheapest and fastest of those 3.


I think you're responding to a comparison I didn't make. My point wasn't that the US is uniquely difficult compared with the UK or Australia. My point was that legal immigration is difficult, stressful and often misunderstood, including for people who are clearly trying to contribute and follow the rules. I'm aware the UK system has become much harder since I used it, and I'm not disputing that. But "other countries are harder" doesn’t make my experience nonsense.

Your experience wasn't nonsense. Your expectations are nonsense. If you think immigrating to another country should be straightforward and easy, then it's your expectations that are wrong. I also immigrated to the US and it was just as tough, even though I came well before Trump and from Canada.

It should be straightforward and easy to make the application. That doesn't mean that it has to be especially likely that it is approved. There is no reason for it to be so byzantine in any country.

Is the goal here to be the same as others or to be better than others? The US immigration system is far from great at the best of times, but it's becoming worse over time.

Did you just pick other generally racist countries with unfriendly immigration policies to prove that all other countries have such systems?

It's a two tier system where the best outcome appears to be to simply break the law completely and illegally.

It's not an ideal outcome it's a very non-enviable multi-decade process working menial jobs and being at risk of something benign like a traffic stop escalating to imprisonment at any time. This fantasy that illegals are living in luxury is how they boiled the frog on people who "did it the right way." They want to get rid of everyone.

To support your position the official DHS Twitter account tweeted a picture of an island paradise with the caption America after 100 million deportations. There are only an estimated 12M undocumented immigrants a 37M legal immigrants including 23M naturized citizens.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/07/22/what-we-k...

100M is closer to the Total number of nonwhites including citizens than the number of immigrants legal or illegal.


however, though, how about those people that are illegals just... dont?

There's too much demand for their labor. You'd have to go after the businesses that hire them in a way that would hurt certain constituents. TPTB have given themselves the Sisyphean task of rounding up enough of them to appease a nativist base that's been riled up with conspiracies about people invading them, but not so many that it would make economic number go down.

This is to close the common loophole where people would fly into the US on an ESTA, B-2 or another temporary visa "without immigration intent" (fraud) and then marry a US Citizen and adjust status.

On visa forums this method is commonly discussed. By entering on an ESTA/B-2 with the intent to marry a US Citizen, they're committing immigration fraud, inherently. You would be denied entry at the border if you admitted to your plans.

The correct way to do this is to file a K-1 visa outside the United States, or marry outside then file a IR-1/CR-1.


Maybe it does close that loophole, but the effects are much, much broader and more harmful: https://www.cato.org/blog/dhs-quits-granting-green-cards-alm...

This article is intentionally misleading.

Department of Homeland Security is no longer processing Green Cards via AOS. That included UCSIS.

However the STATE DEPARTMENT is still processing it via Consular Processing.

The article makes it sounds like the US is no longer offering Green Cards which is false.


The article you linked is patently incorrect. It claims "Now, every legal immigrant must leave the country—that is, self-deport—even if they are qualified for a green card and even if leaving would disqualify them.". This is false according to USCIS' memo.

It very specifically lays out common exceptions to this, including for legal immigrants on dual intent visas and those whose only pathway to permanent residency is via adjustment of status.

It also wildly misinterprets the news to claim that the K-1 visa has been effectively ended, even though the memo specifically excludes it.

https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/memos/PM-...


No the memo specifically says:

> However, maintaining lawful status in a dual intent nonimmigrant category is not sufficient, on its own, to warrant a favorable exercise of discretion.

Which basically means that, applying AOS while being in dual-intent category is not favorable and you will have to prove extraordinary circumstance for a simple i-485 AOS on H1B. Lacking the extraordinary circumstance, your application may be denied.

What this basically means for millions of people on H1B (especially from countries like India is), they have to go for consular processing. And given the lack of appointments in India and delays they are facing - you could be stuck for months to years and no company is going to wait for you while you go through the process. So leaving would definitely disqualify them.


Why should H1Bs be exempt from consular processing when nobody else is? K and IR/CR categories MUST do consular processing, which takes 3 years in some cases.

H1Bs should jump the queue why? You're arguing that the family of US Citizens should be considered behind temporary immigrant workers with no family ties to the United States, and you should be exempt from the requirements they face.


You are moving the goal posts. You said this memo does not apply to dual intent visa holders and I proved it does. I am not saying if an exception should be made ffor H1B visa holders or not.

I am just pointing out this affects all employment visa types.for countries with long delays in counselor processing this effectively kills any chance of getting Green card because no employer will wait that long.



No, this also affects anyone under employment based immigration petitions unrelated to marrying a US citizen.

Only if they do not maintain lawful status, which is what the law says anyway. In fact, it specifically mentions this: "USCIS acknowledges exceptions including nonimmigrant categories with dual intent and immigrant categories where only adjustment of status provides a pathway to permanent resident status"

https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/memos/PM-...


Footnote 20 on page 4:

Footnote 20: However, maintaining lawful status in a dual intent nonimmigrant category is not sufficient, on its own, to warrant a favorable exercise of discretion


Where in the memo does it say "only if they do not maintain lawful status"? there are plenty of people adjusting under employment based petitions who have non-immigrant visas (eg O-1) which are not dual intent.

O-1 is a dual intent visa, as is L-1, as is H-1B, so I have no idea what you're talking about?

No, the O-1 is not officially dual intent: https://www.wegreened.com/o1-visa


Do you know why many sources state that it is not dual intent or that it is "quasi dual intent"?

"The noncitizen may legitimately come to the United States for a temporary period as an O-1 or O-3 dependent nonimmigrant and depart voluntarily at the end of their authorized stay and, at the same time, lawfully seek to become an LPR of the United States."

Seems extremely clear to me.


Given our population problems, I can't think of a single rational reason why we'd want to stop this from happening.

Our population problems, in that we need immigration to avoid population decline? Our total fertility rate is 1.6.

Exactly that. And really, it's still not going to be enough.

Which is, notably, well under replacement.

It is absolutely NOT specific to the very limited situation you are describing, which is already a big red flag when processing applications.

"USCIS acknowledges exceptions including nonimmigrant categories with dual intent and immigrant categories where only adjustment of status provides a pathway to permanent resident status"

https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/memos/PM-...


The literal next line after your quote is:

> While aliens who were inspected and admitted or paroled may request adjustment of status, as a general matter the discretionary approval of such a request is extraordinary given Congress’s intent that aliens should depart once the purpose for which they sought parole or nonimmigrant admission from DHS has been accomplished.


Slight correction here. It is fraud if you intend to stay after getting married. Nobody cares if you get married on a tourist visa and leave the country after.

Holy shit why is this comment buried?! This is exactly the purpose.

Anthropic is paying real cash, how is it fake revenue?

Fake __AI__ revenue. Maybe Hetzner should build Colossus4, rent it out and book it as AI revenue instead of hardware rental revenue and get a P/E of 100.

Anthropic this quarter will have revenue of $10.9B, up from $4.8B last quarter[0]. They're paying SpaceX $1.25B per month for compute[1] - which is more than what SpaceX earn on space. SpaceX spent about $30-40B in capex on Colossus 1 & 2.

This is all real revenue, real spend, real usage.

Hetzner just aren't at this scale. Not even close. If they wanted to get into this business - first, they're late. Second, it's at a scale of ~10x of their total lifetime datacenter buildout. Third, they'd need to change their business to being one that is debt fronted.

xAI have proven out that being able to deploy compute is a very viable business (and difficult to pull off)

At some point AI cynicism clashes with reality, it must be exhausting maintaining it.

[0] https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/mind-blowing-growth-is-about-to-...

[1] https://www.wired.com/story/spacex-ipo-anthropic-compute-fin...


Anthropic’s revenue is computed different from OpenAI. As I recall, they inflate it by including money that they end up just paying forward to some of the companies they depend on. OpenAI doesn’t count that component. And none of these companies - including SpaceX - have trustworthy accounting.

Thank you. It’s arguably even more tiring to hunt it down on HN, and often thankless.

"I'm an investor, the founder of new alchemy, co-founder Lamina1, former CEO of coinlab.com, Chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation, Ethereum security researcher, holder of patent 9298806, general nerd. Currently working at Capital6, my private equity fund."

You poor misunderstood Bitcoin booster! Now you have to deal with AI critics! How about getting a real job?


all of that is fake. The bitcoin foundation was sold for SEO purposes after a string of scandals.

Jesus Christ, the Hetzner example is obviously an example of booking revenue as AI revenue (where investors assume it is generated by Grok subscriptions) vs. hardware rental revenue, which traditionally not valued as highly.

Nowhere does the hypothetical state that Hetzner, an example for hardware rental, has the funding or the capabilities to execute the sarcastic example.

But ok, now hardware rentals have a P/E of 100 or more.


Investors aren’t dumb. These numbers are being reported and the fact that the data centers are being rented out is publicly disclosed everywhere. Investors know full well that the revenue is from the data center rental. No (non-retail) investor is going to see the jump in revenue and think “I better buy up because grok must be kicking ass!”

And yes, if hetzner built a massive AI hyper scale datacenter and rented it out for billions, with the expectation that they would keep building more, they would also see massive PE ratios because it’s expected that their revenue would be going up.


I think you're low at 100. TSLA has 370 PE, and SpaceX is targeting 250+.

If Hetzner could build that, they would.

No Cuban would ever say that, given Cuban Americans overwhelmingly support military invention in Cuba (79%), probably because most of them were fleeing extreme civil liberty crackdowns, persecution or violence.


Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: