16 ms·

Daniel Stenberg (curl) has been denied entry to the US for 870 days

337 points by tehwebguy 6y ago

konbaji 6y ago
I am a strong supporter of the current administration's restrictions on immigration. The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. Moreover, we need less "white immigrants" to come here in order to maintain diversity.
- Havoc 6y ago
  >I am a strong supporter of the current administration's restrictions on immigration. He's visiting a conference not immigrating.
  - dylan604 6y ago
    Just get a projector and let him present via webcast. Not sure I'd want to risk coming to the US if the authorities might detain me for something I did as a teenager. (not saying this individual did that, but example.)
    - nine_zeros 6y ago
      Sorry he won't webcast. Americans can buy tickets and go to his country if they wish to be among smart peers.
    - Havoc 6y ago
      It's not the same thing. Better to move the conference to a country more conducive to international collab then.
  - OldHand2018 6y ago
    > He's visiting a conference not immigrating. Crazy thought: perhaps the visa folks are thinking that he already missed the conference and they have stacks of other work to do.
- snazz 6y ago
  > The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. I fundamentally disagree with you, but I’m interested in hearing your viewpoint. Would you be willing to expand on what you mean by this statement? Are you referring primarily to jobs and government assistance?
  - vageli 6y ago
    > > The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. > I fundamentally disagree with you, but I’m interested in hearing your viewpoint. Is there any country with unfettered immigration?
    - petschge 6y ago
      Svalbard might fit the bill. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_policy_of_Svalbard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_policy_of_Svalbard
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      Depends on your timespan. In the modern era only failed states that can’t actually secure their own borders have unfettered immigration; but it’s pretty rare for people to want to go into such countries. Scroll back a few centuries, and what we’d consider to be “open borders” was much more the norm. Then again, a few centuries before that and the vast majority of residents in Europe couldn’t legally leave the land that they were on, forget the concept of immigration. Leaving town could make you an outlaw, let alone your country.
      - sushid 6y ago
        That's still true in some places today.
    - CamTin 6y ago
      The United States before 1924 for one. Passports and travel documents didn't really exist at all until Napoleonic-ish times and weren't widespread until about WWI. I personally feel that defining "citizen" in any other way than "people who are currently living here" is a form of apartheid and antithetical to our constitution.
- nathansoz 6y ago
  This is just... wrong? We want smart people here in the US. We should poach them and entice them to come here by all reasonable measures. Plus, people aren't having kids like they used to. So you need to replace population somehow. See also: Japan.
  - ralph84 6y ago
    Why do you need to replace population? Is Japan really that bad of a place? And Japan's population has been in the 120-130 million range for the last 35 years, so it's not like there's been a huge swing either way.
    - nathansoz 6y ago
      Japan has had issues with finding workers to support their elderly population. No, it isn't a bad place. But yes, there are issues to solve that come with an aging population and a shrinking population.
      - ralph84 6y ago
        And yet Japan has the second-longest life expectancy in the world. The "we need open borders or we'll end up like Japan" argument just doesn't seem very strong when Japan does well in most quality-of-life metrics.
      - justaguy88 6y ago
        I'm sure if they raise the wages they'll suddenly find enough people locally
  - monkeycantype 6y ago
    'we want smart people' I agree with this sentiment, but feel in both the US and here in Australia it is used to deflect examination of the specifics of how immigration is being used. I think in our eagerness to oppose xenophobic ideologies, we are currently failing to articulate the problems with immigration programs. I fear in Australia we are creeping towards a regressed, more limited form of democracy. Foreign workers who come here not as free agents, but within the constraints of a specific work contract are an ever increasing fraction of the population - a fraction that skews heavily towards non-professional working class - and have no access to political representation. This leaves them vulnerable to exploitation, and that exploitation is used as an economic lever against the entire population. I believe bringing people to work in our economies without a clear fast path to full citizenship is eroding citizenship for all.
lacker 6y ago
I’m sad to hear it. A lot of people are denied entry to the US for their entire lifetimes; I am sad for all of them.
- setpatchaddress 6y ago
  It's getting to the point where one must ask why someone wealthy enough to fly internationally would want the hassle of entering the US. It's been bad since 9/11, but it's insane now. I can't imagine the TSA is treating people better than they did pre-Trump. Maybe things will be better next year.
  - sokoloff 6y ago
    TSA has nothing to do with people entering the US.[0] CBP is the border police. [0] - except for perhaps a few airports where you pre-clear and are treated as a domestic flight (Dublin, Toronto, maybe others)
    - dhosek 6y ago
      Regardless, the whole mechanism is pretty awful and has only gotten worse since 20 Jan 2017.
    - techsupporter 6y ago
      (FWIW, CBP also does border security at preclearance airports. Local airport staff handle security checks, including the TSA-style bag checks before entering the preclearance area.)
    - gpm 6y ago
      On a flight from Toronto to the US... I don't think I interact with the TSA at all? I interact with Canadian security in Canada. I interact with US border control in Canada. I walk out the front door in the states without interacting with security at all. I could be wrong about the agencies that some of the people I interact with work for though.
      - 6y ago
Angeo34 6y ago
Could just as well go to Saudi Arabia no difference there. What do you even want in the US anyway beside getting shot
dwheeler 6y ago
This is absurd. I'm a US citizen, so I'll contact my Congressman to have his staff look into it. I don't have any special power, any US citizen can contact their congressman, but maybe that will kick-start something.
- joshjhargreaves 6y ago
  spoiler: it won't.
  - D2187645 6y ago
    canned letter in 3 2 1
  - Brendinooo 6y ago
    I had a friend who worked in constituent services for a US Senator, and...yeah, if you can get someone's attention in that setting, they can make stuff happen that otherwise would have fallen through the cracks. Been awhile since I heard stories, but one came to mind was someone getting the right visa for his bride in time for the wedding. Another one had to do with getting some kind of medal for a soldier. Not sure if doing things on someone else's behalf can be as effective, but it almost certainly won't hurt to ask.
    - refurb 6y ago
      Oh when it comes to immigration issues for the family of US citizens, yes, calling your Congressman can definitely move things along. But a foreigner whose visa is denied? Not sure why the Congressman would bother unless it somehow impacted the US.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - dwheeler 6y ago
        They have an incentive to do it because the congressman is my representative, and I am a voter who is a complaining. I live near DC, so I guess I assume others know more about the US system than is common knowledge. My apologies. Please let me explain. Of course the congressman will not actually read the letter. That's not the point. The point is that every congressman has a mechanism for accepting requests from constituents, routing them to the correct agency, and tracking them to make sure they are resolved. You fill in a web form, prove that you are a constituent, and then the information gets routed to their staff. My daughter was did this job a few years ago, there are small armies that do it. It's just part of the US system. There's absolutely no guarantee that this will be resolved the way I want, but this is the standard US mechanism for dealing with stuck bureaucracies. Other US citizens could do the same. It might be a good idea, because with multiple complaints, then the US state department would get the clue that this is important and needs to get worked on.
kyleee 6y ago
A while back I read an article about a conspiracy theory that a man named Brian lunduke was promoting, IIRC something about a connection between Mozilla donations and antifa. We'll probably never know since these agencies are tight lipped. Can't seem to find the article unfortunately. Thanks BTW to Mr. Stenberg for curl
PablumPicasso 6y ago
Hey, I reject curl requests to my website all the time, maybe the USA just has overly strict user agent checking?
bfuclusion 6y ago
$5 says this is stuck in some bureaucratic sinkhole somewhere. Barring a _good_ reason, I'd much rather have Daniel's brain here in the US than anywhere else.
- q3k 6y ago
  > I'd much rather have Daniel's brain here in the US than anywhere else. This sentence strikes me as very odd, and I can't quite put my finger on as to why. Like - why? Why does it matter? Is this some sort of competition? Is this like poaching talent into your company? Do you feel pride from sharing a territory with someone important?
  - kortilla 6y ago
    The network effects of intelligent people in your country are positive. On average, you want their voting behavior, their parenting skills, their risk assessments, their economic and tax contributions, and their cultural contributions.
    - q3k 6y ago
      It's the 'than anywhere else' part that I have an issue with. If that's the way you see it, you're doing this at the explicit detriment of everyone outside your country. There's ways to grow that 'intelligence pool' locally, without having to see the rest of the world as just a pool of immigration candidates. Not to mention, just because someone travels to the US doesn't mean they want to actually immigrate there...
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - ashtonkem 6y ago
        From an economic perspective, having a specific person in your economy is zero sum; either they’re in your country or they’re not in your country.
mdifrgechd 6y ago
The headline is odd, this has been going on for 870 days, as documented on his site. It looks like the last update is from 2019. The headline reads like he cant come in for the next 870 days.
- vageli 6y ago
  > The headline is odd, this has been going on for 870 days, as documented on his site. It looks like the last update is from 2019. The headline reads like he cant come in for the next 870 days. Maybe adding "for the last 870 days" would clarify it a bit.
  - H8crilA 6y ago
    Or s/for/since/
- pwinnski 6y ago
  It has now been 871 days, and "This page was edited with new content on: September 4, 2020." Looks like posting here has prompted an update.
anonymouse2019 6y ago
could try a G-639 FOIA
- non-entity 6y ago
  From what I've heard, you might be waiting for that 870 days later as well.
peterburkimsher 6y ago
Sorry to say it's a similar story across the entire English-speaking world. There's a whole group discussing the situation in New Zealand, and there have been protests. I'm not particularly involved in the activism, but I am in the queue (since Feb 2019) and watching the group to know when the decision about my life's future is likely to be taken. https://www.facebook.com/groups/297880251255491 https://www.facebook.com/groups/297880251255491
bigtones 6y ago
One of the most common reason to be denied an ESTA of a Visa to the United States is because of a criminal conviction or a criminal charge in your home country. I'm not saying this is the case here, but that is one of the most common reasons. Then again, it might be just because he's a "hacker".
- Havoc 6y ago
  Given that his ESTA application previously succeeded a criminal charge seems unlikely here.
  - tmn007 6y ago
    Most countries don't give the USA carte blanche access to their citizens criminal history unless it is in their interests to declare (I base this on observations of people who have past criminal convictions yet still get ESTA approvals and travel to the USA). However, the USA may have become aware of something that they previously were not aware of.
- viraptor 6y ago
  > Then again, it might be just because he's a "hacker". Given the number of non-US people successfully traveling to BlackHat and other explicitly "hacking" conferences... This is not the most likely explanation.
- jrochkind1 6y ago
  Would that normally result in a fairly quick rejection though, instead of a couple years with no response?
Havoc 6y ago
The delay is truly bizarre. If whatever black box they're using found something wrong presumably it would just get denied. Between this type of stuff and TSA shenanigans the USA has definitely dropped on my places to visit (again) list.
svnpenn 6y ago
If you know Daniel, you know that this is one of the stupidest things the US government could possibly do regarding immigration. Daniel is literally one of the most brilliant computer programmers alive today. He created cURL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CURL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CURL A program so ubiquitous that it comes preinstalled on every mainstream OS, even Windows. It has bindings for Rust, D, PHP and God knows how many other languages. It would be the equivalent of blocking a Senator, or say, Fleetwood Mac. I guess people just don't give a shit about programmers.
- throw_m239339 6y ago
  The irony is that whoever designed the US immigration information system are probably using CURL somewhere in their stack, thus Daniel's code.
  - tehwebguy 6y ago
    That’s the headline he needs I think, “Homeland Security relies on his software every day, so why won’t they let him into the country?”
- ilaksh 6y ago
  To me it's just another explicit example of how the current government structure is obsolete. And I know people will say that it's just the current government is a bad apple. But why do they have the ability to screw things so fundamentally here anyway? And if people think they are going to supposedly get a "good" government next time, I can pretty much guarantee if you like the next government you will hate the one after it. Because it swings between extremes.
- pmiller2 6y ago
  Speaking of "blocking... Fleetwood Mac," a number of hip hop and rap artists have been denied entry to Canada due to their criminal records. For instance: > Entry to Canada may be a challenge to those with a record of criminal conviction, including celebrities looking to perform in Canada. Many rappers, including DMX, The Game, Lil Wayne, Coolio and 50 Cent, have been denied entry to Canada and unable to attend their scheduled performances. [0] Of course, one can be denied entry to many countries with a felony record, but a conviction need not be a felony in the home country for Canada to use it as reason for denial. If the offense would be considered an "indictable offense" (the rough equivalent of a felony) in Canada, then they will deny. Among other things, IIRC, DUI is considered an indictable offense, which causes issues for a number of celebrities. --- [0]: https://www.duicanadaentry.com/news/rappers-with-criminal-inadmissibility/ https://www.duicanadaentry.com/news/rappers-with-criminal-in...
MattyMc 6y ago
Canada is benefiting substantially from the recent US immigration policies. My Ai team at Microsoft Canada was stacked with talent, all immigrants, and most expressed to me that they would have “normally gone to the US.” I don’t have to remind this community of the laundry list of tech giants started by immigrants. However, if anyone outside the US is reading this we’d love to have you in Canada. Come here, please.
- codetrotter 6y ago
  I’ve been thinking about going to Canada for a long while, and this might sound silly but I was wondering, do people on HN who have immigrated to Canada arrange a lot ahead of time like doing interviews with companies via teleconferencing? Or do you go there to meet people in person first and to investigate opportunities? Or something else? And when you did go, did you get a job at the company you thought you were going to work for, or did you have to interview with other companies instead? Furthermore, has anyone here had the misfortune of trying to immigrate but ending up not finding work and having to cancel their immigration plans? If so, what were your experiences like and what would you do different this time?
  - 3np 6y ago
    I’ve seen all of the above. Not specifically with Canada, but otherwise. A lot depends on your personal situation and priorities. Do you like to go there now, knowing nothing and no one and have a bit of an adventure finding a home and a job? Or do you have dependents and want the safety off having sorted out all the essentials? Some people start from a hostel with a laptop in a backpack. Some people buy a house and sign an employment contract before the move. Have a way to support yourself before you go. Either comfortably on savings or through remote work freelancing. That way you have way less risk of either having to cancel because of financials or get exploited by a bad employer.
- konbaji 6y ago
  If this trend continues US will likely see this as an act of aggression by Canada. They can't just "take all the talent". Canada should be careful or US will push for annexation.
jacobwilliamroy 6y ago
The U.S. has a brain drain problem. This is what I was trying to explain to all my friends who jumped ship after the 2016 presidential election. The only way to save the U.S. is for all the good people to stay but "noooooooooooooooo", all the smart people wanted to run off to canada or germany or whatever. Please come back. It's getting really bad.
- foolfoolz 6y ago
  your bubble does not represent reality. the u. s. is and has been the destination for brain drain for decades. and our decades long green card application list shows it’s not going anywhere
  - jacobwilliamroy 6y ago
    Maybe your bubble doesn't represent reality.
  - taneq 6y ago
    Ten years ago the U.S. was the default destination to go and get rich as a tech worker. Now, I don't think I know anyone who wouldn't have serious misgivings about moving there.
  - deisner 6y ago
    Anecdotal, but: I work in an engineering department at a major U.S. university. Non-citizen grad students (i.e. grad students) I personally know -- and their friends at other universities -- upon graduation decided to seek (and obtained) employment abroad (Netherlands, Canada are the two countries I know of) rather than stay in the U.S. Before Trump they wouldn't have considered this. I doubt our handling of the covid-19 crisis has helped, either. My wife is German and in frequent contact with her family in Germany. They look at us with pity. I feel like my country has really lost its shine. Maybe permanently (hopefully not).
  - nine_zeros 6y ago
    Things have changed. Young budding engineers, researchers, medical professionals and others are actively choosing not to come any longer. This has rippling effects. Once this cohort settles into their lives in whatever country, they will be less inclined to come to the US. It's not too hard to imagine. Serious people with kids and families will never come to a place where they are harassed or their lives can be uprooted by a bureaucratic process abruptly. Things were different until a few years ago and all the immigrants and tech companies you see today are the rewards of seeds down earlier.
stonogo 6y ago
Why are all the comments here about immigration? Daniel Stenberg is trying to visit, not move to the United States. Having said that, I'm not sure why this is being posted here today, since there haven't been any updates since his two-years-in blog post some months back.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ExcavateGrandMa 6y ago
minds shifting :Ð
phendrenad2 6y ago
The man responsible for the infamous hacker tool "curl"? Yeah right, he can just stay where he is. </satire>
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Mandatum 6y ago
Australia pays very well and has pretty reasonable overlap hours with much of Asia if you've got family or friends that you want to catch up with virtually. Probably 90% of my colleagues and customers aren't from Australia (including me!) so it's pretty welcoming in of Australia (there's obviously still issues here, but no worse than you'd experience in other Western countries) Please, we need more talent..
- raihansaputra 6y ago
  But Australia is not making it easy too. I studied and graduated UQ (but only for a year, so no work for me), and a number of my friends did too and continued to work in Australia. But it's not easy. Most job openings prefer PR/citizens. My friends who got a job can only stay for maximum 2/3 years, with uncertainty related to the point and visa grant system. If there's a way for me to work in Australia or even get into the work visa stream without spending AUD100k+ on a 2 yr masters + living costs, I'd definitely consider it.
  - Mandatum 6y ago
    If you're already qualified, it's been slow but easy for my friends to get sponsored. Yes, it ties you to your employer - but the transfer process between employers is relatively simple since the recent visa changes, but does just seem to take forever (even pre-COVID). My suggestion when applying to large orgs is to not mention your visa status. It's quite often HR policy not to ask about it until an offer is made, then you've got a lot more leverage. But yes, getting that initial sponsor is a royal pain in the butt.
zxcvbn4038 6y ago
I had a co-worker whose wife was applying for US citizenship. In the middle of processing her paperwork the immigration department decided they needed to paint the office. The story goes - and I believe her lawyer told her this - the immigrations employees went home one day and the painters came in and covered all of the desks with plastic. They then took the next two years to paint the facility. At the end of two years the tarps came off and the workers returned - with all of their paperwork from two years prior exactly where it had been left. Sounds crazy but is somehow believable. I had a similar experience last time I was at the New York DMV where I handed an agent my papers, he looked at them for a bit then got up and left without saying a word, he went and had lunch for an hour, then came back as-if nothing had happened. I had twenty plus people standing behind me in the same queue. The other queues around us kept moving, we all stood there for an hour while the guy ate.
salah93 6y ago
"did you travel to any arab countries"
stjohnswarts 6y ago
Please forgive us Daniel, perhaps this national nightmare will be over Jan 21 2021
- vaxman 6y ago
  Yeah, 78 days of tech layoffs due to the public equity market crashing will drive demand for cheap foreign labor, just as in January 2001. How I miss having an Indian show up offering every imaginable skill set for $7/hr. How ironic that the catalyst for that crash was the gov’t finally acting on “old” Microsoft and 20 years later, they have a technocratic Indian CEO that came of age in all of that.
  - vaxman 6y ago
    Clarifying, market crashed in April 2000 and October 2000, then the shock in September 2001 before the freeze that lasted until 2006. (I implied Oct ‘99 or Nov ‘00, but same difference.)
BrandoElFollito 6y ago
While I appreciate the US as a tourist, the psychopatic, hosile employees at the border made me change my mind a few times and go spend my euros elsewhere. Russia was the only other country so openly unfriendly in letting me in. Seriously, that should be fixed,the US have great places to visit.

337 points by tehwebguy 6y ago

I am a strong supporter of the current administration's restrictions on immigration. The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. Moreover, we need less "white immigrants" to come here in order to maintain diversity.

Havoc 6y ago
>I am a strong supporter of the current administration's restrictions on immigration. He's visiting a conference not immigrating.
- dylan604 6y ago
  Just get a projector and let him present via webcast. Not sure I'd want to risk coming to the US if the authorities might detain me for something I did as a teenager. (not saying this individual did that, but example.)
  - nine_zeros 6y ago
    Sorry he won't webcast. Americans can buy tickets and go to his country if they wish to be among smart peers.
  - Havoc 6y ago
    It's not the same thing. Better to move the conference to a country more conducive to international collab then.
- OldHand2018 6y ago
  > He's visiting a conference not immigrating. Crazy thought: perhaps the visa folks are thinking that he already missed the conference and they have stacks of other work to do.
snazz 6y ago
> The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. I fundamentally disagree with you, but I’m interested in hearing your viewpoint. Would you be willing to expand on what you mean by this statement? Are you referring primarily to jobs and government assistance?
- vageli 6y ago
  > > The resources in the US are simply too scarce to support unfettered immigration. > I fundamentally disagree with you, but I’m interested in hearing your viewpoint. Is there any country with unfettered immigration?
  - petschge 6y ago
    Svalbard might fit the bill. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_policy_of_Svalbard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_policy_of_Svalbard
  - ashtonkem 6y ago
    Depends on your timespan. In the modern era only failed states that can’t actually secure their own borders have unfettered immigration; but it’s pretty rare for people to want to go into such countries. Scroll back a few centuries, and what we’d consider to be “open borders” was much more the norm. Then again, a few centuries before that and the vast majority of residents in Europe couldn’t legally leave the land that they were on, forget the concept of immigration. Leaving town could make you an outlaw, let alone your country.
    - sushid 6y ago
      That's still true in some places today.
  - CamTin 6y ago
    The United States before 1924 for one. Passports and travel documents didn't really exist at all until Napoleonic-ish times and weren't widespread until about WWI. I personally feel that defining "citizen" in any other way than "people who are currently living here" is a form of apartheid and antithetical to our constitution.
nathansoz 6y ago
This is just... wrong? We want smart people here in the US. We should poach them and entice them to come here by all reasonable measures. Plus, people aren't having kids like they used to. So you need to replace population somehow. See also: Japan.
- ralph84 6y ago
  Why do you need to replace population? Is Japan really that bad of a place? And Japan's population has been in the 120-130 million range for the last 35 years, so it's not like there's been a huge swing either way.
  - nathansoz 6y ago
    Japan has had issues with finding workers to support their elderly population. No, it isn't a bad place. But yes, there are issues to solve that come with an aging population and a shrinking population.
    - ralph84 6y ago
      And yet Japan has the second-longest life expectancy in the world. The "we need open borders or we'll end up like Japan" argument just doesn't seem very strong when Japan does well in most quality-of-life metrics.
    - justaguy88 6y ago
      I'm sure if they raise the wages they'll suddenly find enough people locally
- monkeycantype 6y ago
  'we want smart people' I agree with this sentiment, but feel in both the US and here in Australia it is used to deflect examination of the specifics of how immigration is being used. I think in our eagerness to oppose xenophobic ideologies, we are currently failing to articulate the problems with immigration programs. I fear in Australia we are creeping towards a regressed, more limited form of democracy. Foreign workers who come here not as free agents, but within the constraints of a specific work contract are an ever increasing fraction of the population - a fraction that skews heavily towards non-professional working class - and have no access to political representation. This leaves them vulnerable to exploitation, and that exploitation is used as an economic lever against the entire population. I believe bringing people to work in our economies without a clear fast path to full citizenship is eroding citizenship for all.

lacker 6y ago

I’m sad to hear it. A lot of people are denied entry to the US for their entire lifetimes; I am sad for all of them.

setpatchaddress 6y ago
It's getting to the point where one must ask why someone wealthy enough to fly internationally would want the hassle of entering the US. It's been bad since 9/11, but it's insane now. I can't imagine the TSA is treating people better than they did pre-Trump. Maybe things will be better next year.
- sokoloff 6y ago
  TSA has nothing to do with people entering the US.[0] CBP is the border police. [0] - except for perhaps a few airports where you pre-clear and are treated as a domestic flight (Dublin, Toronto, maybe others)
  - dhosek 6y ago
    Regardless, the whole mechanism is pretty awful and has only gotten worse since 20 Jan 2017.
  - techsupporter 6y ago
    (FWIW, CBP also does border security at preclearance airports. Local airport staff handle security checks, including the TSA-style bag checks before entering the preclearance area.)
  - gpm 6y ago
    On a flight from Toronto to the US... I don't think I interact with the TSA at all? I interact with Canadian security in Canada. I interact with US border control in Canada. I walk out the front door in the states without interacting with security at all. I could be wrong about the agencies that some of the people I interact with work for though.
    - 6y ago

Angeo34 6y ago

Could just as well go to Saudi Arabia no difference there. What do you even want in the US anyway beside getting shot

dwheeler 6y ago

This is absurd. I'm a US citizen, so I'll contact my Congressman to have his staff look into it. I don't have any special power, any US citizen can contact their congressman, but maybe that will kick-start something.

joshjhargreaves 6y ago
spoiler: it won't.
- D2187645 6y ago
  canned letter in 3 2 1
- Brendinooo 6y ago
  I had a friend who worked in constituent services for a US Senator, and...yeah, if you can get someone's attention in that setting, they can make stuff happen that otherwise would have fallen through the cracks. Been awhile since I heard stories, but one came to mind was someone getting the right visa for his bride in time for the wedding. Another one had to do with getting some kind of medal for a soldier. Not sure if doing things on someone else's behalf can be as effective, but it almost certainly won't hurt to ask.
  - refurb 6y ago
    Oh when it comes to immigration issues for the family of US citizens, yes, calling your Congressman can definitely move things along. But a foreigner whose visa is denied? Not sure why the Congressman would bother unless it somehow impacted the US.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - dwheeler 6y ago
      They have an incentive to do it because the congressman is my representative, and I am a voter who is a complaining. I live near DC, so I guess I assume others know more about the US system than is common knowledge. My apologies. Please let me explain. Of course the congressman will not actually read the letter. That's not the point. The point is that every congressman has a mechanism for accepting requests from constituents, routing them to the correct agency, and tracking them to make sure they are resolved. You fill in a web form, prove that you are a constituent, and then the information gets routed to their staff. My daughter was did this job a few years ago, there are small armies that do it. It's just part of the US system. There's absolutely no guarantee that this will be resolved the way I want, but this is the standard US mechanism for dealing with stuck bureaucracies. Other US citizens could do the same. It might be a good idea, because with multiple complaints, then the US state department would get the clue that this is important and needs to get worked on.

kyleee 6y ago

A while back I read an article about a conspiracy theory that a man named Brian lunduke was promoting, IIRC something about a connection between Mozilla donations and antifa. We'll probably never know since these agencies are tight lipped. Can't seem to find the article unfortunately. Thanks BTW to Mr. Stenberg for curl

PablumPicasso 6y ago

Hey, I reject curl requests to my website all the time, maybe the USA just has overly strict user agent checking?

bfuclusion 6y ago

$5 says this is stuck in some bureaucratic sinkhole somewhere. Barring a _good_ reason, I'd much rather have Daniel's brain here in the US than anywhere else.

q3k 6y ago
> I'd much rather have Daniel's brain here in the US than anywhere else. This sentence strikes me as very odd, and I can't quite put my finger on as to why. Like - why? Why does it matter? Is this some sort of competition? Is this like poaching talent into your company? Do you feel pride from sharing a territory with someone important?
- kortilla 6y ago
  The network effects of intelligent people in your country are positive. On average, you want their voting behavior, their parenting skills, their risk assessments, their economic and tax contributions, and their cultural contributions.
  - q3k 6y ago
    It's the 'than anywhere else' part that I have an issue with. If that's the way you see it, you're doing this at the explicit detriment of everyone outside your country. There's ways to grow that 'intelligence pool' locally, without having to see the rest of the world as just a pool of immigration candidates. Not to mention, just because someone travels to the US doesn't mean they want to actually immigrate there...
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - ashtonkem 6y ago
      From an economic perspective, having a specific person in your economy is zero sum; either they’re in your country or they’re not in your country.

mdifrgechd 6y ago

The headline is odd, this has been going on for 870 days, as documented on his site. It looks like the last update is from 2019. The headline reads like he cant come in for the next 870 days.

vageli 6y ago
> The headline is odd, this has been going on for 870 days, as documented on his site. It looks like the last update is from 2019. The headline reads like he cant come in for the next 870 days. Maybe adding "for the last 870 days" would clarify it a bit.
- H8crilA 6y ago
  Or s/for/since/
pwinnski 6y ago
It has now been 871 days, and "This page was edited with new content on: September 4, 2020." Looks like posting here has prompted an update.

anonymouse2019 6y ago

could try a G-639 FOIA

non-entity 6y ago
From what I've heard, you might be waiting for that 870 days later as well.

peterburkimsher 6y ago

Sorry to say it's a similar story across the entire English-speaking world. There's a whole group discussing the situation in New Zealand, and there have been protests. I'm not particularly involved in the activism, but I am in the queue (since Feb 2019) and watching the group to know when the decision about my life's future is likely to be taken. https://www.facebook.com/groups/297880251255491 https://www.facebook.com/groups/297880251255491

bigtones 6y ago

One of the most common reason to be denied an ESTA of a Visa to the United States is because of a criminal conviction or a criminal charge in your home country. I'm not saying this is the case here, but that is one of the most common reasons. Then again, it might be just because he's a "hacker".

Havoc 6y ago
Given that his ESTA application previously succeeded a criminal charge seems unlikely here.
- tmn007 6y ago
  Most countries don't give the USA carte blanche access to their citizens criminal history unless it is in their interests to declare (I base this on observations of people who have past criminal convictions yet still get ESTA approvals and travel to the USA). However, the USA may have become aware of something that they previously were not aware of.
viraptor 6y ago
> Then again, it might be just because he's a "hacker". Given the number of non-US people successfully traveling to BlackHat and other explicitly "hacking" conferences... This is not the most likely explanation.
jrochkind1 6y ago
Would that normally result in a fairly quick rejection though, instead of a couple years with no response?

Havoc 6y ago

The delay is truly bizarre. If whatever black box they're using found something wrong presumably it would just get denied. Between this type of stuff and TSA shenanigans the USA has definitely dropped on my places to visit (again) list.

svnpenn 6y ago

If you know Daniel, you know that this is one of the stupidest things the US government could possibly do regarding immigration. Daniel is literally one of the most brilliant computer programmers alive today. He created cURL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CURL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CURL A program so ubiquitous that it comes preinstalled on every mainstream OS, even Windows. It has bindings for Rust, D, PHP and God knows how many other languages. It would be the equivalent of blocking a Senator, or say, Fleetwood Mac. I guess people just don't give a shit about programmers.

throw_m239339 6y ago
The irony is that whoever designed the US immigration information system are probably using CURL somewhere in their stack, thus Daniel's code.
- tehwebguy 6y ago
  That’s the headline he needs I think, “Homeland Security relies on his software every day, so why won’t they let him into the country?”
ilaksh 6y ago
To me it's just another explicit example of how the current government structure is obsolete. And I know people will say that it's just the current government is a bad apple. But why do they have the ability to screw things so fundamentally here anyway? And if people think they are going to supposedly get a "good" government next time, I can pretty much guarantee if you like the next government you will hate the one after it. Because it swings between extremes.
pmiller2 6y ago
Speaking of "blocking... Fleetwood Mac," a number of hip hop and rap artists have been denied entry to Canada due to their criminal records. For instance: > Entry to Canada may be a challenge to those with a record of criminal conviction, including celebrities looking to perform in Canada. Many rappers, including DMX, The Game, Lil Wayne, Coolio and 50 Cent, have been denied entry to Canada and unable to attend their scheduled performances. [0] Of course, one can be denied entry to many countries with a felony record, but a conviction need not be a felony in the home country for Canada to use it as reason for denial. If the offense would be considered an "indictable offense" (the rough equivalent of a felony) in Canada, then they will deny. Among other things, IIRC, DUI is considered an indictable offense, which causes issues for a number of celebrities. --- [0]: https://www.duicanadaentry.com/news/rappers-with-criminal-inadmissibility/ https://www.duicanadaentry.com/news/rappers-with-criminal-in...

MattyMc 6y ago

Canada is benefiting substantially from the recent US immigration policies. My Ai team at Microsoft Canada was stacked with talent, all immigrants, and most expressed to me that they would have “normally gone to the US.” I don’t have to remind this community of the laundry list of tech giants started by immigrants. However, if anyone outside the US is reading this we’d love to have you in Canada. Come here, please.

codetrotter 6y ago
I’ve been thinking about going to Canada for a long while, and this might sound silly but I was wondering, do people on HN who have immigrated to Canada arrange a lot ahead of time like doing interviews with companies via teleconferencing? Or do you go there to meet people in person first and to investigate opportunities? Or something else? And when you did go, did you get a job at the company you thought you were going to work for, or did you have to interview with other companies instead? Furthermore, has anyone here had the misfortune of trying to immigrate but ending up not finding work and having to cancel their immigration plans? If so, what were your experiences like and what would you do different this time?
- 3np 6y ago
  I’ve seen all of the above. Not specifically with Canada, but otherwise. A lot depends on your personal situation and priorities. Do you like to go there now, knowing nothing and no one and have a bit of an adventure finding a home and a job? Or do you have dependents and want the safety off having sorted out all the essentials? Some people start from a hostel with a laptop in a backpack. Some people buy a house and sign an employment contract before the move. Have a way to support yourself before you go. Either comfortably on savings or through remote work freelancing. That way you have way less risk of either having to cancel because of financials or get exploited by a bad employer.
konbaji 6y ago
If this trend continues US will likely see this as an act of aggression by Canada. They can't just "take all the talent". Canada should be careful or US will push for annexation.

jacobwilliamroy 6y ago

The U.S. has a brain drain problem. This is what I was trying to explain to all my friends who jumped ship after the 2016 presidential election. The only way to save the U.S. is for all the good people to stay but "noooooooooooooooo", all the smart people wanted to run off to canada or germany or whatever. Please come back. It's getting really bad.

foolfoolz 6y ago
your bubble does not represent reality. the u. s. is and has been the destination for brain drain for decades. and our decades long green card application list shows it’s not going anywhere
- jacobwilliamroy 6y ago
  Maybe your bubble doesn't represent reality.
- taneq 6y ago
  Ten years ago the U.S. was the default destination to go and get rich as a tech worker. Now, I don't think I know anyone who wouldn't have serious misgivings about moving there.
- deisner 6y ago
  Anecdotal, but: I work in an engineering department at a major U.S. university. Non-citizen grad students (i.e. grad students) I personally know -- and their friends at other universities -- upon graduation decided to seek (and obtained) employment abroad (Netherlands, Canada are the two countries I know of) rather than stay in the U.S. Before Trump they wouldn't have considered this. I doubt our handling of the covid-19 crisis has helped, either. My wife is German and in frequent contact with her family in Germany. They look at us with pity. I feel like my country has really lost its shine. Maybe permanently (hopefully not).
- nine_zeros 6y ago
  Things have changed. Young budding engineers, researchers, medical professionals and others are actively choosing not to come any longer. This has rippling effects. Once this cohort settles into their lives in whatever country, they will be less inclined to come to the US. It's not too hard to imagine. Serious people with kids and families will never come to a place where they are harassed or their lives can be uprooted by a bureaucratic process abruptly. Things were different until a few years ago and all the immigrants and tech companies you see today are the rewards of seeds down earlier.

stonogo 6y ago

Why are all the comments here about immigration? Daniel Stenberg is trying to visit, not move to the United States. Having said that, I'm not sure why this is being posted here today, since there haven't been any updates since his two-years-in blog post some months back.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ExcavateGrandMa 6y ago

minds shifting :Ð

phendrenad2 6y ago

The man responsible for the infamous hacker tool "curl"? Yeah right, he can just stay where he is. </satire>

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Mandatum 6y ago

Australia pays very well and has pretty reasonable overlap hours with much of Asia if you've got family or friends that you want to catch up with virtually. Probably 90% of my colleagues and customers aren't from Australia (including me!) so it's pretty welcoming in of Australia (there's obviously still issues here, but no worse than you'd experience in other Western countries) Please, we need more talent..

raihansaputra 6y ago
But Australia is not making it easy too. I studied and graduated UQ (but only for a year, so no work for me), and a number of my friends did too and continued to work in Australia. But it's not easy. Most job openings prefer PR/citizens. My friends who got a job can only stay for maximum 2/3 years, with uncertainty related to the point and visa grant system. If there's a way for me to work in Australia or even get into the work visa stream without spending AUD100k+ on a 2 yr masters + living costs, I'd definitely consider it.
- Mandatum 6y ago
  If you're already qualified, it's been slow but easy for my friends to get sponsored. Yes, it ties you to your employer - but the transfer process between employers is relatively simple since the recent visa changes, but does just seem to take forever (even pre-COVID). My suggestion when applying to large orgs is to not mention your visa status. It's quite often HR policy not to ask about it until an offer is made, then you've got a lot more leverage. But yes, getting that initial sponsor is a royal pain in the butt.

zxcvbn4038 6y ago

I had a co-worker whose wife was applying for US citizenship. In the middle of processing her paperwork the immigration department decided they needed to paint the office. The story goes - and I believe her lawyer told her this - the immigrations employees went home one day and the painters came in and covered all of the desks with plastic. They then took the next two years to paint the facility. At the end of two years the tarps came off and the workers returned - with all of their paperwork from two years prior exactly where it had been left. Sounds crazy but is somehow believable. I had a similar experience last time I was at the New York DMV where I handed an agent my papers, he looked at them for a bit then got up and left without saying a word, he went and had lunch for an hour, then came back as-if nothing had happened. I had twenty plus people standing behind me in the same queue. The other queues around us kept moving, we all stood there for an hour while the guy ate.

salah93 6y ago

"did you travel to any arab countries"

stjohnswarts 6y ago

Please forgive us Daniel, perhaps this national nightmare will be over Jan 21 2021

vaxman 6y ago
Yeah, 78 days of tech layoffs due to the public equity market crashing will drive demand for cheap foreign labor, just as in January 2001. How I miss having an Indian show up offering every imaginable skill set for $7/hr. How ironic that the catalyst for that crash was the gov’t finally acting on “old” Microsoft and 20 years later, they have a technocratic Indian CEO that came of age in all of that.
- vaxman 6y ago
  Clarifying, market crashed in April 2000 and October 2000, then the shock in September 2001 before the freeze that lasted until 2006. (I implied Oct ‘99 or Nov ‘00, but same difference.)

BrandoElFollito 6y ago

While I appreciate the US as a tourist, the psychopatic, hosile employees at the border made me change my mind a few times and go spend my euros elsewhere. Russia was the only other country so openly unfriendly in letting me in. Seriously, that should be fixed,the US have great places to visit.