physcab

26 ms·

271.
by physcab 14y ago
Officially adding "beautiful" to the words and phrases that make me shudder: - beautiful - ninja - rockstar - web 2.0 - social-mobile-local - ajaxified - "I have an idea for an iphone app" - gamification - hyper-local
272.
by physcab 15y ago
Interesting. Excuse me for my ignorance here (I haven't fully looked at your product), but how do you push app updates? Is it like Heroku/git? Or do I have to "submit" it to you? Can you schedule when the update goes live?
273.
by physcab 15y ago
Are you on Facebook? Because the kind of information that you can gather about someone from a UDID pales in comparison to the kinds of information Facebook has about you. Privacy on the web was dead a long time ago...
274.
by physcab 15y ago
This is neat looking, but I'm not sure how actionable it is. Of course there is going to be a drop-off of users as they drill down. That happens in almost every funnel situation. Also, this doesn't seem to account for other factors that
275.
by physcab 15y ago
I used to build a detector for explosives in academia that is now being marketed to the TSA. To get funding for these projects, its pretty standard to rip another technology apart, point out all of its flaws, then argue why yours is better.
276.
by physcab 15y ago
That would be an almost funny turn of events. My neighbor is a recruiter at Square and I'm 100% positive that they try to recruit exclusively out of Apple's hardware teams. These are the people that are looking for their next win and alrea
277.
by physcab 15y ago
Finding a job is almost just as difficult as hiring, even if the person is credentialed and the company has many open positions. If you don't know exactly what you are looking for or what you may be good at, theres a good chance you might
278.
by physcab 15y ago
I understand. But who is to say that these big spenders are actually addicts? Is the probability of this type of user being an addict greater than the probability of being plainly rich? Targeting is your word, not mine. We cohort users by s
279.
by physcab 15y ago
Right, which is why I said this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3556270 You and I also know that this isn't a problem inherent to just casual mobile games. It's a chronic problem to the gaming industry as a whole, and its not going t
280.
by physcab 15y ago
I believe that people can make judgement calls about what do to with their free time. I don't think what I do (which is to perform analysis) is any different than what the same analysts at Blizzard do when they make Starcraft or World of W
281.
by physcab 15y ago
Even if they did, I'm not so sure it would be that big of a deal (to most users anyways). I mean, Facebook has all of that data and more, and they definitely sell it to 3rd parties. Hell, you can learn anything you want about a person using
282.
by physcab 15y ago
Well, analysts aren't exactly new. Do a search for business analyst and you'll see lots of jobs posted at hundreds of companies. The difference is that mobile game companies deal with extraordinary amounts of data so they actually need peo
283.
by physcab 15y ago
As I said in another comment, I think this industry is still in its infancy and getting a lot of its mechanics worked out. I don't honestly believe we make a game targeted to addicts, otherwise I could not work there in good conscience. But
284.
by physcab 15y ago
See my comment here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3556270 Would you feel the same way if we changed the business model from virtual currency to a fixed-cost one?
285.
by physcab 15y ago
I think learning statistics definitely helps. Simple things like averages, stdev, probability, etc will help you. Also a healthy knowledge of SQL goes a long way. But more importantly, its learning how to be a detective. For example, I'm no
286.
by physcab 15y ago
That is a good point. And actually I didn't know we used the same terms! I'm obviously aware of what goes on in the industry and its similarities to gambling are something I think about a lot. But as an analyst, I feel like I have a lot of
287.
by physcab 15y ago
> You do realize that the whole point of these games is socially engineering people into parting with as much money as possible, right? Isn't this the point of any business? > If you don't want to make games for addicts perhaps you
288.
by physcab 15y ago
I'm curious why you consider it creepy. Note that we don't see any identifiable information and all of the metrics I report are all used to improve gameplay and help monetize the product.
289.
by physcab 15y ago
They do. But sometimes these bugs are less obvious and hard to spot without data. In this particular case, it was an animation bug that occurred during a tutorial of a game, whereby the animation caused the game to crash, but only on a sub
290.
by physcab 15y ago
One of my greatest worries going through Engineering school was working on a product that would inadvertently harm people. I once wanted to work at a Lithium Ion battery start-up because I wanted to help create an energy source free of geo-
291.
by physcab 15y ago
I'm an analyst for a gaming company too, so let me offer my perspective. I consider myself to be an ethical, non-creepy person, and I disagree with what this person says. Yes, gaming companies are extremely data-driven and they measure eve
292.
by physcab 15y ago
> the idea that you can't bond, have fun, and have crazy nights without it is all bullshit Right, and I realize that. You're making the same point the OP did. But I'm saying you can bond, have fun, and have crazy nights with alcohol an
293.
by physcab 15y ago
I get the point of the post. But come on, we're adults. Drinking is a choice. For some people, if having a drink makes them more social and they enjoy it, more power to them. If people choose to be sober and it works for them in their socia
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Tips For Launching Successful Mobile Apps(thedatascientist.com)
4 points by physcab 15y ago|0 comments
295.
How Turntable.fm Will Save the Music Industry(thedatascientist.com)
2 points by physcab 15y ago|0 comments
296.
How Turntable Will Save The Music Industry(thedatascientist.com)
1 points by physcab 15y ago|0 comments
297.
How Turntable Will Save The Music Industry(thedatascientist.com)
1 points by physcab 15y ago|0 comments
298.
by physcab 15y ago
Launching an app in the App Store is hard. And the App Store is an incredibly stressful environment because essentially you only get 2 weeks to settle into a rank that will be the basis of your success. If you fuck it up, you're pretty much
299.
by physcab 15y ago
Miscommunications happen. Its a fact of life and its even moreso when you're dealing with a complex legal matter. I'm offering up my time as an unpaid ex-employee to help someone out who seems to be having difficulty. The offer stands to
300.
by physcab 15y ago
Like I said above, feel free to ping me and I'll help connect you with the right people.

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