Category: Q & A

It's a non-issue. On your resumé, and during the interview process, it will just say "MA in CS, Stanford University". Assuming you ever need to "produce your papers", that will be handled by HR, who will not consider the online origin of your degree, so long as it's from the same Stanford they already know and love, to be an issue.

Pretty much your only concern pre-hire is to encounter someone who is very familiar with Stanford, or an alumn themselves… And so long as you're honest about why you don't remember Professor X, Library Y, or Froyo Shop Z, you probably won't be discriminated against because of it…

Still, if you do have opportunities, even post-grad, to become involved with Stanford programs/departments/events/etc, then that will help immensely for the "intangible" that employers do seek out of top-tier grads: the ability to network and recruit more top tier grads into the company.

Would top companies consider a Stanford master's degree in computer science earned online to be less valid than one earned in-person?

Perhaps Andrew Mason has some background in phone phreaking?

In the midwest, as I recall, it used to be that dialing "575" + the last 4 digits or full phone number (can't remember which) and then hanging up would send a "ringback" to your phone that would prove the line was working… If you wanted to prank your friend, you could just tell them a cute girl from school said she was gonna call him, and then do the 575 trick every so often (when you go to the bathroom, etc), and watch him leap for the phone, only to find clean dialtone when he picked up.

Either that, or he plans to move to New Mexico after the IPO (they recently added the 575 area code somewhere out there).

He could also be referring to "5×5" – meaning perfect signal strength and clarity, and of course the "perfect number 7"… Could it be some kind of reference to perfectionist traits of the Groupon CEO?

Finally, the most likely option is simply that he's a fan of "Seventeen" magazine.

Andrew Mason (CEO of Groupon)'s salary is $575 per year. What is the significance of the "575"?

I have a friend that swears up and down no matter what site you use or where you find movies online, it’s illegal to watch them. She believes that if you can watch it online, and for free, that it must be pirated and is illegal. Is this true? And if it is, why are these sites allowed to operate?

Let me just start by saying: there are some people you will never convince, ever.

When I worked for Harvard Business School, I was part of a team of IT contractors working to upgrade all of the faculty and staff computers from a variety of older machines (both Mac and PC) to an all-Windows Dell-sourced infrastructure (what can I say, the Dean of HBS at the time was a little nutty in the head about platform homogeneity being a panacea).

Part of these upgrades involved backing up their old machine data, just in case “something happened”, but also to help speed up migrations – we would copy the data from the old machine, then load everything in place on the new machines remotely, then do a “clean up” copy of whatever had changed/been created in the meantime.

In those days (mid 90s), our choices to do this effectively, in bulk, were limited: We could burn the data to CDs at around $2 a disc, or we could copy the data to Iomega Jaz cartridges… For $60/cart. That’s not counting the external burners – CD drives were a little more expensive, but call it $50 premium.

Obviously, if we went the CD route, we’d save money, space, and could keep a permanent archival backup of every job – with the Jaz drives, we thought, we’d need to eventually re-use cartridges after a “safe period”, because how could they possibly afford the $10K required JUST to run these backups. Well, you know, they wound up just buying Jaz carts for everyone, at a total cost of something like $15K more than just going with CDs. Jaz carts and drives proved over time to be significantly less reliable, media couldn’t be used in any drive like CDs could, etc.

Why did the “World’s #1 Business School” make such a silly move? Because, simply put, they worried that if the 5 IT contractors doing the work got hold of portable CD burners, that every compact disc on Earth would suddenly become vulnerable to piracy by these same workers… So, not only did they have completely unfounded fears over the use of CD-Rs, but they completely distrusted the very workers tasked with preserving the integrity of some pretty big name professors and their staff. It still makes me crazy to think about it.

What does all this have to do with movies, and illegal streaming/downloads? Well, nothing. Or EVERYTHING. Simply put, I think your friend has made up her mind, and won’t budge until a more significant percentage of her daily reality reflects the truth – that there are legal movie streaming (and download) sites, that even paid movie sites like YouTube’s commercial offering sometimes do promotional free offers, and that sometimes you can “pay” for a movie by watching commercials, or even performing specific actions (I believe it’s possible to rack up Facebook Points to watch movies there simply by clicking on offers, for example).

So, my advice is simple: do make sure that the free sites you view movies on are legitimate, but also don’t put any effort into trying to convince people who disbelieve you even when you show them proof. It’s a waste of both your time, and hey – you could be enjoying another movie instead of arguing about it! At most, you can hope that someday, they’ll wise up, and learn from their past follies[*].

[* If anyone has evidence that HBS has made such improvements in their Information Technology policies, I’d love to hear it. 😉 ]

Is it illegal to watch movies online for free?

Mark Zuckerberg, is that you?

Seriously, though, all that's required to eliminate frustration about the unreality of movies is a little thing we call "suspension of disbelief"… We all have it to some degree, because if we couldn't suspend disbelief, we also couldn't take things on faith – so, basically, everyone would have to learn that they couldn't fly by actually jumping off cliffs… In evolutionary terms, that would be a bad thing.

Still, this quality varies from person to person, and it's not strictly linked to things like how creative we are, or how imaginative. Based on the question, though, I'm assuming the querent has a comparatively high "suspension threshold", or perhaps watches too many movies that map closely to their own life experiences (thus making it easier to spot the "unrealistic" bits – I know a few cops who just can't watch police dramas for this reason).

In the latter case, the reason for the frustration is much clearer: you're drawing a conclusion that the filmmaker (or even the other enrapt audience members) "just don't get you"… I've been there, it sucks. Still, complaining about it doesn't really fix things, and harping on it when you discuss the movie with people later just makes them stop inviting you out.

A good strategy to employ, that may help reduce your frustration level, is to stop focusing on how the movie isn't like the real world, and instead think about what would happen if things really did work like they do in the movies! Think about it: you're a fighter pilot, and you're seeing those F-22s doing some just plain impossible maneuvers. Well, what if they were possible? What would change about your missions, or your job in general? What other technological advances are suggested/inferred, and how cool would they be to have in your day to day?

Talking about that in the diner after the movie is something that doesn't piss off your friends, but instead helps them see how unrealistic the movie was, in the context of seeing how cool/difficult/impressive being a pilot in the real world is.

Remember – a lot of the tech we see today comes from inspired scientists and engineers who cribbed the concepts from science fiction! "What if" is a powerful tool in the mental toolbox, so make use of it whenever those "frustrating moments" arise, and maybe see things in a new light, or even learn something about yourself!

Why is it so frustrating to watch an unrealistic scene in a movie?

Even if it was on a double-digital old school analog broadcast channel (okay, break out your time machines, I know), I couldn't help but sit down for The Final Countdown, pretty much every time[*].
(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/iIsSQc)

Krull has no innocence of pleasure about it, though with a healthy dose of fast forward, it is thoroughly enjoyable. 😉

(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/iGlj58)

And, to really blow the doors off, The Return of Captain Invincible is soooo soooo bad, and sooooooooo sooooooooo good, especially once it turns into a musical. Plus, who could be a more convincing invincible superhero than Alan Arkin?

(Image courtesy of http://amzn.to/j3fAB6)

[* My wife is Japanese, and even she enjoyed it… And then perversely lent it out to all her Japanese/American-coupled friends. Sick, sick woman. ]

What are the best "guilty pleasure" movies?