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I really don't see a lot of accountability in any of his statements. It just seems like "well this thing went wrong, somehow, and its nobodies fault and hey not

I really don't see a lot of accountability in any of his statements. It just seems like "well this thing went wrong, somehow, and its nobodies fault and hey nothing was lost". I find that to be absolutely abhorrant. Think about if you're one of their junior developers - you'd probably be blaming yourself for whatever bug that happened to get in. That the CEO wouldn't take any responsibility is a complete lack of leadership. To those devs, jr or otherwise - every step that was supposed to protect against a failure in the app seems to have failed here, and you should not feel bad. Mistakes happen and should be expected, but the damage that they are allowed to wreck is the blame of poor management, not you.

alpb 7y ago
Every single executive in this little software company used to work at Clinton's 2016 campaign [1] so they have political connections. Not to mention, political parties aren't transparently run in many cases like we've seen in 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. Most likely, these people are feeding off of their political connections and harvesting donation money from not just the party, but also the candidates [2]. This is also why I'm no longer donating to a political party directly, or a candidate who would in turn would do the same. It seems like the only independent candidate running under democratic party is keeping his campaign money in-house. [1] https://www.crn.com/slide-shows/applications-os/who-is-shadow-inc-the-company-behind-the-iowa-caucus-voting-app-/2 https://www.crn.com/slide-shows/applications-os/who-is-shado... [2] https://twitter.com/BustinTrudeau/status/1224697566182498306 https://twitter.com/BustinTrudeau/status/1224697566182498306
- 6nf 7y ago
  These developers also developed Buttigieg's campaign software and Buttigieg donated to help develop the caucus app.
  - otachack 7y ago
    No COI to see here, folks. Why isn't the DNC harder on crap like this?
    - thedance 7y ago
      The national party does not operate state elections and caucuses.
    - commandar 7y ago
      >Why isn't the DNC harder on crap like this? Well, for starters, because the DNC doesn't run the Iowa caucus.
      - munk-a 7y ago
        The DNC doesn't directly run the caucus, but the DNC (or maybe, more precisely, the democratic party) chooses to accept the results of the Iowa caucus and subsidizes (or entirely funds) the running of the caucus. Additionally, the Iowa dem caucus (and primaries) aren't a governmental thing, the political parties aren't government organizations - they're private organizations that are just _all about the government and politics_ as such the Iowa caucus is really weirdly in a grey zone where there is even less necessary oversight than the administration of the general election in Iowa will have - but sort of more oversight since the DNC could just reject the results outright... Buuuut things like the voting rights act have forced some regulations into primary operation - it's all quite confusing... The TL;DR though is that the DNC doesn't technically run the Iowa caucus but is more than capable of making the Iowa dem caucus committee feel a whole lot of pain and hold them accountable.
    - AndrewBissell 7y ago
      The DNC is composed of Clinton loyalists who want to stop Bernie Sanders from winning the nomination. John freaking Podesta was named to the Rules Committee for the national convention in Milwaukee.
    - munk-a 7y ago
      This is a political response but I think it's important to highlight that the DNC seems quite enthused about Buttigieg, lowering the likelihood that they'll pursue anything about a connection between his campaign and Shadow when compared to more fringe candidates like Warren, Steyer, Yang or Sanders.
  - erulabs 7y ago
    I believe that that is false: https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/feb/04/what-we-know-about-shadow-acronym-and-iowa-caucuse/ https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/feb/04/what-we-know-... It looks like multiple campaigns (including the one the most to lose and the one with most to gain from a confusing Iowa) paid Shadow for services - Buttigieg’s campaign was not an investor, and does not appear to have anything to do with the development of the app. Do you have any sources for your claim? > Some claims, such as that the Iowa caucus app was funded by Buttigieg, mischaracterize what we know. > Buttigieg’s campaign wasn’t involved in the app’s development.
    - 6nf 7y ago
      > Buttigieg’s campaign was not an investor, and does not appear to have anything to do with the development of the app. Do you have any sources for your claim? This was not my claim at all
      - sokoloff 7y ago
        When you said "and Buttigieg donated to help develop the caucus app" was that anything to do with the development of the app or not?
        6nf 7y ago
        It was not an investment and Buttigieg did not commission the app but they did help to pay for it by donating money to the Iowa dem group that was had the app developed last year
xmzx 7y ago
"We need more time testing this app, sir" - Dev "No" - Manager "But it could..." - Dev "I don't care." - Manager "Okay :(" - Dev
- alexeiz 7y ago
  We'll test in production.
maxlybbert 7y ago
I doubt anyone will publish a good post mortem. I agree somebody is responsible for such a high profile failure, but I’m sure that the wrong person will be chosen as the scapegoat. The app itself doesn’t sound like it needed to be that complex, and by all accounts, it wasn’t. But it feels like the company believed that the secret to a successful rollout was to ask the developer beforehand “are you sure there won’t be any problems?” Every time I’ve been involved in releasing a web service, the step before “tell the world that the software is live” has been “make one or more complete end-to-end requests to make sure everything is running correctly.” The company clearly skipped that step: they announced the project was live without first making a single end-to-end request. We know that because the problems people reported and the problems that the company has described would have made it impossible for any upload to succeed.

alpb 7y ago

Every single executive in this little software company used to work at Clinton's 2016 campaign [1] so they have political connections. Not to mention, political parties aren't transparently run in many cases like we've seen in 2016 Democratic National Committee email leak. Most likely, these people are feeding off of their political connections and harvesting donation money from not just the party, but also the candidates [2]. This is also why I'm no longer donating to a political party directly, or a candidate who would in turn would do the same. It seems like the only independent candidate running under democratic party is keeping his campaign money in-house. [1] https://www.crn.com/slide-shows/applications-os/who-is-shadow-inc-the-company-behind-the-iowa-caucus-voting-app-/2 https://www.crn.com/slide-shows/applications-os/who-is-shado... [2] https://twitter.com/BustinTrudeau/status/1224697566182498306 https://twitter.com/BustinTrudeau/status/1224697566182498306

6nf 7y ago
These developers also developed Buttigieg's campaign software and Buttigieg donated to help develop the caucus app.
- otachack 7y ago
  No COI to see here, folks. Why isn't the DNC harder on crap like this?
  - thedance 7y ago
    The national party does not operate state elections and caucuses.
  - commandar 7y ago
    >Why isn't the DNC harder on crap like this? Well, for starters, because the DNC doesn't run the Iowa caucus.
    - munk-a 7y ago
      The DNC doesn't directly run the caucus, but the DNC (or maybe, more precisely, the democratic party) chooses to accept the results of the Iowa caucus and subsidizes (or entirely funds) the running of the caucus. Additionally, the Iowa dem caucus (and primaries) aren't a governmental thing, the political parties aren't government organizations - they're private organizations that are just _all about the government and politics_ as such the Iowa caucus is really weirdly in a grey zone where there is even less necessary oversight than the administration of the general election in Iowa will have - but sort of more oversight since the DNC could just reject the results outright... Buuuut things like the voting rights act have forced some regulations into primary operation - it's all quite confusing... The TL;DR though is that the DNC doesn't technically run the Iowa caucus but is more than capable of making the Iowa dem caucus committee feel a whole lot of pain and hold them accountable.
  - AndrewBissell 7y ago
    The DNC is composed of Clinton loyalists who want to stop Bernie Sanders from winning the nomination. John freaking Podesta was named to the Rules Committee for the national convention in Milwaukee.
  - munk-a 7y ago
    This is a political response but I think it's important to highlight that the DNC seems quite enthused about Buttigieg, lowering the likelihood that they'll pursue anything about a connection between his campaign and Shadow when compared to more fringe candidates like Warren, Steyer, Yang or Sanders.
- erulabs 7y ago
  I believe that that is false: https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/feb/04/what-we-know-about-shadow-acronym-and-iowa-caucuse/ https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/feb/04/what-we-know-... It looks like multiple campaigns (including the one the most to lose and the one with most to gain from a confusing Iowa) paid Shadow for services - Buttigieg’s campaign was not an investor, and does not appear to have anything to do with the development of the app. Do you have any sources for your claim? > Some claims, such as that the Iowa caucus app was funded by Buttigieg, mischaracterize what we know. > Buttigieg’s campaign wasn’t involved in the app’s development.
  - 6nf 7y ago
    > Buttigieg’s campaign was not an investor, and does not appear to have anything to do with the development of the app. Do you have any sources for your claim? This was not my claim at all
    - sokoloff 7y ago
      When you said "and Buttigieg donated to help develop the caucus app" was that anything to do with the development of the app or not?
      - 6nf 7y ago
        It was not an investment and Buttigieg did not commission the app but they did help to pay for it by donating money to the Iowa dem group that was had the app developed last year

xmzx 7y ago

"We need more time testing this app, sir" - Dev "No" - Manager "But it could..." - Dev "I don't care." - Manager "Okay :(" - Dev

alexeiz 7y ago
We'll test in production.

maxlybbert 7y ago

I doubt anyone will publish a good post mortem. I agree somebody is responsible for such a high profile failure, but I’m sure that the wrong person will be chosen as the scapegoat. The app itself doesn’t sound like it needed to be that complex, and by all accounts, it wasn’t. But it feels like the company believed that the secret to a successful rollout was to ask the developer beforehand “are you sure there won’t be any problems?” Every time I’ve been involved in releasing a web service, the step before “tell the world that the software is live” has been “make one or more complete end-to-end requests to make sure everything is running correctly.” The company clearly skipped that step: they announced the project was live without first making a single end-to-end request. We know that because the problems people reported and the problems that the company has described would have made it impossible for any upload to succeed.