That's because you all share your email addresses directly in your posts. I put my email address in my profile, and anyone genuinely interested is just one click away from getting my address from there or from my website which i also link to. Aside from a handful of exceptions I get no spam whatsoever, despite posting for years and not obscuring my address at all. And what I do get is most likely hand-written.
Of course we do. but it's not happening. Not yet anyways. Or not at scale. It's like the joke with the bear. I don't need to outrun the bear, I only need to outrun you.
But I didn't post this to gloat, just to point out that spammers are lazy. Of course if everyone moves their email into the profile then this will change, but even if everyone reading this thread does it, most others won't, so I trust that this will still work for some time.
It is happening, within the last two months, by multiple recruiting startup services scraping/monitoring HN, and matching that up somehow with email addresses, in an automated way.
I live in Africa, and this video explains what I have been wondering about ever since I first encountered washboard roads. They are a daily annoyance for those who live away from the cities along major unpaved roads.
Like this Ask HN: Recommend employers with positive social impact [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31518945], I am looking for similar work, but I am open to work on any interesting project. I am a European software developer who has lived and worked on four continents. Now it's time to move on and so I am in the process to relocate to Africa.
I have more than a decade of experience running a company, doing software development, support and training and mentoring adults and students, as well as working on educational projects, and I am willing to take on a mixture of roles as needed to support a project.
I value good teamwork over fancy tech, and I don't shy away from working on legacy code. I am primarily motivated by solving problems, so let me help you solve your problems.
I am open to work for a company anywhere as long as the work can be done fully remote from Africa.
While I could find a job elsewhere I believe that the experience living in an area where my work is going to have an impact gives me a better understanding of the needs of the location I am serving. Whether it is through direct contact with clients and users or just by being part of a local community and learning about the reality of living there.
In addition, I want to use some of my income to hire local interns and junior developers and train them in order to pass on my experience. I also sponsor children that otherwise can't afford to go to school (see my website). If you want to support this, I would love to work with you. Also if you are interested in hiring African developers yourself. I can help you build up a team for you.
But you are proving the point of the parent comment:
well I guess I have no choice but to keep all my money for myself and donate nothing
You can't donate without trust. By your reckoning any trust at all is to much trust. So you are saying: Never trust anyone. And you are not wrong.
I am actually following that advice. In general, I never donate money, but, I do donate my time. That is, I rather work less, and earn less money in order to have time to volunteer. That applies double now that I live in Africa. I do support some children that can't afford to go to school. But I know all these children in person. I see how they actually live, and in most cases, I give the money directly to the schools the children go to, because I could not even trust the children or the parents. In most cases that lack of trust was unnecessary, but in at least one case it turned out to be warranted. That child is not getting help from me anymore.
Now, once I started to ask people to help me supporting the children here, it became clear that anyone helping me has no way of verifying how the money is used. They have to trust me. And not only do they have to trust that the money goes to the children's school expenses but also that these children actually need the money. It is to easy to build up a narrative on how poor everyone here is. and unfortunately the whole charity industry (or however you want to call that) is built on those narratives.
That's one reason why I came here. To find out what is the actual reality. What is the truth. And, ultimately, what is really the best way to help. I don't know the answer yet.
My interim conclusion so far is to invest, buy, bring money into the local economy, ever which way. Most of it will not go to the neediest. But, actually, I believe only helping the neediest is not going to move the needle anyways. Sending money to the neediest will allow them to buy food, but sending money to the government will allow it to build infrastructure which will also benefit the neediest because it may give them access to clean water, electricity, internet, streets, which for example make it easier for those children to go to school.
People talk about the trickle-down effect, and how it does not work. But that's not what I mean here. At least not directly. The trickle-down effect assumes that giving money to the rich automatically leads to actions that benefit the poor. That's obviously not the case. What I mean is to actively invest into things that benefit everyone, including the poor, and give money to those who are building those things. That in turn is also easier to verify than any charity that helps individuals which you can not track.
That's my theory for now. Over time I hope I will learn more get a better understanding. I am unfortunately not in the position to make any investments myself, to test if my guess here is true. But I will keep observing and and learning, and I'll share what I learn in the comments here.
A local director of a gold mine here in Tanzania told me that all the profits of the mine go to the owners in China. I don't know how much profit they are making, but if Tanzania as a country does not benefit from the mines then the deal is better than it should be.
The average citizen does not have the income to even afford stuff like that. Anyone who is able buy a laptop like that is wealthy by local standards. And in particular anyone importing stuff from outside. And that wealth is being taxed. If they didn't do that then there wouldn't be may people left to tax at all.
Sure, Django here is the exception, but not taxing imports would generally not benefit people like him, but the actually wealthy people who can otherwise afford the tax.
> Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi have adopted a three-tiered duty structure for imports from outside the East Africa Customs Union under the terms of the Protocol on the Establishment of the East Africa Customs Union, which became fully operational in January 2010. Most finished products are subject to a 25% duty, while intermediate products face a 10% levy. Raw materials (excluding foodstuffs) and capital goods may still enter duty free. Imported goods are charged a value added tax (VAT) of 18% and a 15% withholding tax, which is not reclaimable. Combined, these taxes effectively charge a 33% tax on all foreign goods and services. Imports are also charged a 1.5% infrastructure tax to finance railway infrastructure development. [0]
"Effectively charge a 33% tax on all foreign goods and services." Not just Macbooks. I don't know if this is the final definitive tally of the tariffs but I believe almost everything has a high tariff, so people effectively pay 33% more for the same goods plus shipping. Fair, can't really get rid of shipping, but a 33% or even a 15% penalty on tools means people get worse tools. Computers, mobile phones, cars, motorcycle helmets, medicines (if imported perhaps?), hammers, fans, showers, whatever tool you might use that is a finished good coming from another country, you pay 15-33% or whatever more, so you get a lower quality product for the money you have. I just would prefer my people get the best deal on the best tools (that we as a country don't think we need to make for security reasons) so people can improve faster. Less smog, better roads, fewer things that break...would be quite nice at all levels.
Yes, but it has nothing to do with tax in this case, but bribe. I guess you could say it's still a good thing because if it wasn't for the bribe you simply have no option of getting your goods. But maybe if the bribe didn't exist the network wasn't down for so long in the first place
The lowest price for a working second hand laptop in Uganda is about half a million ugandan shillings, which is about USD130. That gets you a 10 year old second hand model with minimum specs. If you want anything decent, expect to pay at least double. The difficulty of importing and the import taxes are at least part of the reason. In hindsight, sending the money would have saved a lot of trouble, but it would not have gotten him a better laptop than the one he received.
But otherwise you are right. Not only is it not economical, a lot of stuff that is sent to Africa is junk, and that's exactly the reason why Uganda generally does not allow importing of second hand products. On the other hand, i believe second hand imports are the only way to make laptops available at that price range. I don't know how that works though. Maybe they make exceptions for importers that they verify are not importing junk?
Thank you for the answer - I think one the biggest trap is to bring more problem than solution. I am afraid that a some laptops or smartphone that I gave a second life will have almost no value on the second hand market.
I will keep offering them locally on market place or charity shops
Like this Ask HN: Recommend employers with positive social impact [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31518945], I am looking for similar work, but I am open to work on any interesting project. I am a European software developer who has lived and worked on four continents. Now it's time to move on and so I am in the process to relocate to Africa.
I have more than a decade of experience running a company, doing software development, support and training and mentoring adults and students, as well as working on educational projects, and I am willing to take on a mixture of roles as needed to support a project.
I value good teamwork over fancy tech, and I don't shy away from working on legacy code. I am primarily motivated by solving problems, so let me help you solve your problems.
I am open to work for a company anywhere as long as the work can be done fully remote from Africa.
While I could find a job elsewhere I believe that the experience living in an area where my work is going to have an impact gives me a better understanding of the needs of the location I am serving. Whether it is through direct contact with clients and users or just by being part of a local community and learning about the reality of living there.
In addition, I want to use some of my income to hire local interns and junior developers and train them in order to pass on my experience. I also sponsor children that otherwise can't afford to go to school (see my website). If you want to support this, I would love to work with you. Also if you are interested in hiring African developers yourself. I can help you build up a team for you.
The problem is not that corruption prevents capitalism from working. The problem is that capitalism doesn't prevent corruption. Corruption is enabled because of capitalism, and any measures to curb corruption will also interfere with capitalism.
I spoke to a local director of a mineral mine in Tanzania. He told me that all of the profits of the mine go to the chinese owners who invested into the mine. That's capitalism at work. The corruption here is (if any) that local officials who brokered the deal allowed this deal to go through without making sure that at least some of the profits remain in the country. It is not even clear that corruption is the cause here. It may well be that the investors simply demanded that much and the locals thought that that would be the best they could get.
In my opinion most of the profits from mining should remain in the country. Those minerals are Tanzanias wealth, that they should use to build up their own country. But capitalism demands that investors make as much profit as possible, disregarding side benefits. So no, capitalism is not the answer.
It's more complicated than that. Here in East Africa women are allowed to work and run businesses. In fact, most of my friends here who run a business are female. The majority of them run small shops selling food, one sells phones and accessories and another works in such a shop that is also female owned. A number of these are also single mothers because their husbands left them, mostly because they were unable to provide for their families. It is not just about the right of women to earn an income, but also about men being under pressure by their peers to be good providers, and being unable to do so. Some women told me they are not even interested in getting married any more. They just want to have some kids and then manage on their own.
Either way, only education can change things. Both men and women (boys and girls) need to be educated about better ways and how to cooperate to provide for their families together.
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