skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Showing all the territories, as they expand and contract, would be much more information. Also, the smooth growth of empires just isn't the way it happens. The quick snaps of change would be both more accurate and dramatic.

The time constant is an interesting aspect. If it were tunable, you might get bored in the past and overwhelmed as time progressed to modernity.

Globally, it would be interesting to see colonization through the end of the cold war.

Another interesting map might be a heat map of home prices over an area like NYC's 5 boroughs. Lots of people treat gentrification like some kind of war, so using a similar visualization would be appropriate.

Another map that would be interesting, even over the same time period and region, is total or per capita wealth within an empire. The best visualization would involve the area of the territory shrinking or growing like these scaled cartograms:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/countycart3070l...

update: Normalizing wealth per capita by the number of slaves would be an interesting measure ancient productivity
If it's your company blog, it's a good idea not to host it on your servers, because if your site goes down you'd lose communication with customers.
Clearsilver
Here's an idea: Watch TED on the internet like the rest of us and give the $6000 to the worthy cause of your choice. Then you would be DOING the message while the others are TALKING about it.
Mine is self-hosted using wordpress.It works, but I am always tempted to write my own just because I want more control over the app. The templates that use widgets are nice and wordpress has a lot of nice plugins, but it just isn't the same. I used blogger a couple years ago and didn't like it much. That being said I would have to agree with andr that if it was not a personal blog and my startups blog I would host it elsewhere. You want someplace where you have some sort of communication with your users about what is going on in the event of the site going down. Oh I also have a tumblr account but don't really use it for blogging. I just wanted to check out the features. For the most part it is pretty cool and I could see where a really nice microblogging solution could be built off of something similar.
Could the same thing be said for people?
At the core of snowflakes, bacteria
Hey do you have links for the especially good ones saved somewhere?
What is your idea worth?
Sounds like they pretty much agree that the figure is wrong in the comments.
It's all about the execution!
I just spent 2 hours learning about whole empires that I had never heard of.
Joys of a great american education.
I've always just gone here

http://www.ted.com/index.php
I couldn't agree more. I often find that I'm less tired and more productive after working out. But obviously this won't help much if you haven't slept in 2 days or are physically exhausted.
What an excellent idea. One problem: what records do you suggest we use that shows the breakdown by empire of the total and per capita ownership of slaves?
Follow ons for your blog post:

How much did you earn in poker in wage terms, i.e. $/h?

How would you rank your mathematical ability compared to most you played with?

Is it possible to quantify the level you can play at based on your standardized math scores?

Did your group try to maximize the potential payoff:mathematical ability ratio in your poker game crowds?

Is this something that can be done to a useful extent?

Finally, if success is so mathematically based, why did you say in an earlier comment that it is so hard to create good poker AI?
Poll: Do we need a downvote button or is that insane ?
Is editing by pg and others enough or should the community be allowed to downvote in order to control the front page?
We need a downvote button.
Things are fine the way they are.
I went from using self hosted wordpress to using wordpress.com

I didn't like having to always worry if my VPS was up, remembering to always upgrade to the latest version, etc. Using a hosted solution means giving up some control but for now it has worked out just fine.
How about databases. Oracle, MySql, Microsoft Sql, PostgreSQL
Innovation comes cheap, says Google engineer Kevin Marks
Will the same map in a few years include the American empire? Afganistan, Iraq, (maybe) Iran...
The populations are roughly known. In the roman empire, I think the numbers were something around 1:2:2 for citizens, regulars, and slaves. It's also difficult to measure wealth. Should we use gold?

Rate of technological advancement would probably be the best measure.

There are a fair number of records from ancient times, with huge holes.
Mine is self hosted without any blogging software. I have written my own PHP based engine for this.

The reason? Here it is!

Originating works from scratch always thrill me. It evidently demands a lot of patience and hardwork. But the sense of elation and the thrill that follow are priceless!

I even boast of this on a page, "100% Original" on my website. [http://www.adarshr.com/pages/original]
"Joys of a great american education."

I learned about all of those listed in a public high school AP European History class.

The generalizations about American education are a bit broad. It's fair to say it is extremely unevenly distributed. It's also fair to say the US has the best university system in the world. Just look at where people try to go to study.
get those 12 and under users off the site unless they have parental consent.
A third possibility: while a downarrow on stories would solve some problems, it would introduce others.
While a downarrow on stories would solve some problems, it would introduce others.
My personal weblog is on blogs.mit.edu, just because I think that's cool. I don't have a company blog, but if I ever were to, I would almost certainly host it myself, to make it as integrated as possible.
I ask because I have no first hand knowledge about Europe. I was told that among the Europeans, the Germans are most similar to Japanese. I can't think of an English equivalent now, but both people are said to "follow the book strictly."

There are many things to ask; I just wondered if you had a general impression about the comparison. You said they share quite a few traits -- for example?
I agree. Despite the guidelines, I can see this potentially being used to spread rumors, gossip, lie, or just stuff that's plain unflattering on people. I doubt many people will be actively monitoring their Biographicon profile and this content could go undetected for a while, causing the subjects real harm.
Added. This makes some sense. I often find that on reddit some stories that are actually interesting get downvoted to oblivion for no apparent reason and yet at a later time are up voted to the front page with a similar headline. I'm sure there are other cases where it would bring up other problems.
Random thought: have a 'bozo article' button. If enough people click it, the names of the upvoters are revealed.
Go right ahead and learn C in four hours - I think it would still be pretty difficult to use, because I doubt that you could cover enough pointer and memory management intricacy in four hours.
Some people are little more than karma bots (or maybe they are bots) - skim all the top articles from the major sites and reintroduce them randomly at semi-regular intervals (proportional to ranking at reintroduction).

I would say this goes for major news organizations too.

- EDIT -

Aha, it isn't a bot!
"Who would most likely want to buy you?"
I agree, I learned all about these in school.

I also learned about a fair number of them from church...
Because you, dear sir, have less karma in your post.
No one's going to conquer Afghanistan - certainly not the U.S.
I've gone back to lurking having been rather swiftly shouted down by a group of identikit hivemiders determined to prove the negative cliches of programmers as petty, rude and emotionally retarded.

Edit: ooooh, click your little down arrows, that'll show me... lol
And thus the fluff invades...
Its good this way, with more lurkers than posters. Why? Because very often lurkers don't have anything good to say, and those who have nothing good to say ought not to say anything.

Unfortunately, there are those who don't abide by that, and thus we get those ugly trolls.
That is an interesting question. I wonder if there is even a way to know if the space has merely local maximums.
This place, if you haven't noticed, is nothing like Digg, Reddit or Slashdot. This is for serious people. That's his point.
I use WordPress software, but the blog itself is on my own server and domain.
Also, how about a 'some bozo downvoted this comment' button? If enough people click it, the b-identity is revealed, lol.
EDIT: Added. Can be a catch-all for other Java frameworks not utilizing JSP.
Mine's self-hosted. My personal internet endeavors are small-scale enough that I have been able to host my own domain services on my own machines for years. I ALMOST tried to write my own system for running my blog, but in the end I went with Wordpress, which seems to allow enough homebrew (no pun intended[1]) HTML and the like in my posts to do what I want. Plus, I have just enough of a grasp of PHP that I think I can set up my own custom extensions when the time comes and I feel the need.

[1] As a computer-nerd turned microbiologist, one of the topics I expect to pop up on my blog regularly is homebrewing, from a somewhat nerdier than usual perspective.
There are some similarities between Finland and Japan that I've noticed or heard of.

Both countries have a relatively high suicide-rate.

Both societies frown upon someone who changes jobs frequently, and being unemployed is considered shameful and terrible in general.

The way we travel in public transports seems to be the same too. Everyone just sits there in silence :)

On a happier note, our languages often sound surprisingly similar.

- For example there are words in the Finnish language that happen to sound like words in the Japanese language.

The meanings are different of course, but at least to me, saying the word "sato" sounds exactly the same in both languages. In Finnish it means "crop" (as in what you reap), and in Japanese it means "village".

There are probably quite a few others like that.

I've been told that Finns most resemble the people in Hokkaido, the northmost area in Japan where the climate is supposedly like (southern?) Finland.

Germany? Maybe they're as methodological in Japan?

I studied German for about 5 years at school (voluntarily even), but nowadays I can probably make it through more sentences in Japanese without breaking any.

As far as I remember, we didn't hear much about their culture..

They had a fun way of wishing good luck though: "Hals- und Beinbruch!", which means something like "Neck- and leg-fractures!", as in "Break a leg!" :)

Well, you guys do belong in the same family of languages after all..

In Finland we just settle for saying "Onnea!" as in "Luck!".
That's like being happy about an endorsement from Louis Farrakhan. I denounce and reject Zed's endorsement.
Question: Why is this on hacker news?
When Greg Mcadoo of Sequoia spoke at YC last week he said that Sequoia looked for startups founded by people solving problems they themselves faced.
Honestly, not really loving this poll feature in general.

What does a down vote mean? "Do not want"? I'd personally be tempted to down-vote polls.
News.YC in my understanding is not a forum or a discussion group, it is a way to quickly find new interesting links. Sure, commenting on the articles is great, but polls and the like are not news, and not usually new or interesting (imho). I think sites like Reddit, Digg, News.YC get watered down when they start adding "features" like this.
Consistent drinking of water seems to help as well.
If only there was a room with infinite seating...

Oh wait. There is. It's called "the internet", and TED is there.
There shouldn't be a "negative vote", but there should be a way to retract your vote.
I personally just dig that they've got some great talks that are up with Creative Commons licenses. I appreciate the conference even if only for the fact that I think they've got some important ideas that are being preserved in an open format.
I agree that the ads at the beginning of the TED videos are annoying, but overall I don't think TED is particularly heavily marketed. And I think it is hard to complain when they are distributing free videos of pretty much all the conference talks.
It'll probably get better once people get over the novelty of it. I hope.
Various other web-frameworks?

Out of those three, only JSP is like a basic building-block for web stuff.

It might be better to name only "Java", which would then cover everything related.
I'm 38 now and can't pull the long hours I used to. I discovered that yoga really helps - much of the stress I'd been experiencing has faded away and I have more energy, feel more alive and have a better posture (even whilst seating) from doing it. It took time though - it took about 3 months before I really 'got it'. Hope this helps anyone out there who's 'getting on' like me and who wants a low-impact way of exercising
Teach Yourself Accent Reduction
Currently looking for ANGEL CAPITAL

http://loseyouraccent.googlepages.com/

email me at: loseyouraccent@gmail.com
A minor nitpick: the northwest of the Iberian peninsula, the Romanic-Swabian kingdom of Gallaecia, was never conquered by the Caliphate.
I find this bit very interesting:

"you can install applications both on your profile page and on your user page"

This represents a key insight into something that I've found lacking at Facebook. There's stuff that you want the world (or at least your friends) to know about, and there's stuff that matters or is appropriate only to you.

LiveJournal understood this deeply. At times it doesn't feel like Facebook does.
Will RealNetworks Buy Scrabulous?
Reminds me of the sci-fi book "The Children Star" by Joan Slonczewski.

She describes a world whose only civilization is an intelligent species of bacteria. Among other feats, they control the weather.
Only 200% more to go!
Rediscovering garlic soup. It's hard to believe someone doesn't know that exercising a bit, or simply changing to a totally unrelated activity, results in one feeling rested and energized.
the David Deutsch one is very good. also the Aubrey de Grey one.
I'm fed up with the titles and theme music at the beginning of TED videos. They're almost violently smug. The orchestral crescendo tries to give you a heart attack, like it was the return of Jesus Christ, and then it cuts to some wonk giving a PowerPoint presentation.
Herbal tea should go down as well.
Many web services use servlets directly -- no JSP or other 'framework'.

Other web startups may use Java for internal roles other than 'serving pages'.

Still others may have an applet or desktop-Java component to their overall service.
Users would ask for pie charts. ;)
Somebody posted it?
Mine is hosted in blogger but under my own domain. I lose a lot of control over it, but I save a lot of headaches: no backups, no updates, no security problems, is hosted in a good reliable network... And all for free. I don't mind having the top blogger bar.

The only thing is that I'm using disqus for the comments, way better than the blogger implementation!
I think the diamond merchants in NYC is a different situation since it is a tight-knit community of people that rarely lets insiders in. Most people have known each other and each others families for years, so its easier to hold them accountable.
Poker is a much more diverse group.
"The focus of Hacker News is going to be anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes a lot more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."

http://ycombinator.com/hackernews.html
The lazy person's intro to something almost like yoga:

http://www.mkprojects.com/pf_TibetanRites.htm
Perhaps you can write a bot like this. And then sell your karma-drunken account to a PR company.

(Obviously this would not work on our enlightened side - but only with the unwashed masses of social news.)
It's too bad people are so hyped up about elitism. I know I'm not the brightest bulb in the basket, and I don't want that fact bringing down others' potential. What's next, people complaining about academic discrimination against lesser intelligence?
You're right. I didn't mean to imply everyone who uses Java was a drone, but there is a class of Java users who are heavily dependent on frameworks and couldn't code anything from scratch.

I myself have written in Java for one of the companies on your list.
Tcl and C the tools of choice for the discriminating hacker!

git and gitk are made in Tcl and C, and git is nowadays considered to be the new linux, so thats my proof

and why is VBScript up there!
Great app. Simple, probably not that much behind it, but conveys a lot of data directly into the user's reptilian brain. Makes me wonder how I could incorporate a technique like this into my own apps.

Oh, and the content was interesting, too.
How do you setup an ESOP for a startup?
When assembling a team in the infant stages, how do you setup an ESOP in lieu of compensation given that there is no way to value the company?
Yeah youre probably right. I just wanted to separately measure JSF and GWT, but there's so many other frameworks its probably better to simply group them under "Java".
>So, right tool for the job... it's surprising to me that 'Drupal developers can write their own ticket' because it's actually very easy to use and code to.

Props to you! I've been doing quite a bit of Drupal development over the past year and I haven't met that many people who would say it was very easy. Not to put down drupal, I love it, but easy... eh. Worth the effort, thats my take on it...
Java (Any other usage of Java, such as applets, backend, JAX-WS/JAX-RPC web services, etc)
There are many web frameworks in java that don't use JSPs. Wicket is a good one.
>why is VBScript up there!

If you're going to build in PHP, vbscript/ASP would be the MS equivalent. Interesting to note though that nobody is using the granddaddy of inline web scripting anymore...

IMO, if MS would have open-sourced ASP when PHP started to come out, they would have that market.
I thought that might be a bit outside this domain since they are not used to serve or generate web pages. But still useful to know, if someone else wants to make a separate poll..
These reports are written so that someone with almost no knowledge of investing can comprehend them, which is rare in a corporate America that is knee-deep in bullshit.
Agreed.

Additionally, I hate the rhetoric of Full Disclosure suggesting that somehow, now that you've explicitly mentioned why you are in no good position to write an article, your biases are no longer affecting you.

The guy just wants to whine and to point blame at a good thing.
Feature Development and Traffic Growth at Justin.tv
I'd vote it up, sounds like a useful thing. But then I'm just a fool like that.
A little greasemonkey and it'd probably be equivalent to what I said. Hmm...
justin.tv is the best :)
The quant-fund of the social news world.
how to make feature requests (some video)
How do you ignore feature requests when someone puts so much effort into them?
Ask your non-hacker friends what irks them about work... develop from there...(yes, it will take a while... but you were bored anyway)
I love the justin.tvs, its awesome.
I'm using it because it's what our founder started with. I joined knowing this because it's higher-level than most languages in use, and we've got smart people and no bureaucracy. That doesn't mean I don't hate Ruby, but I do hate it a lot less than Java.

In fact, I can't think of any case where a project I worked on used a language that I thought was the best abstraction for the problem space. It was what the founder thought would work well, or what the company policy required (I wish I was kidding), or what had bindings to The Library we needed, or had a compiler on the desired platform, or whatever.

When I was job-hunting last, I found zero Lisp jobs in Seattle, and wasn't ready to start my own yet (and really don't want to move to Boston). Next time, I will be, and I'll probably use Lisp exclusively.

Maybe it's time for a "I wish we were using ..." follow-up survey.
git itself doesn't link against Tcl afaik. Still, though, it's a cool language that doesn't get enough love.
[SF] Justin.tv: Hackers Wanted
This one sets off my "not hacker news" alarm. Too political.
Looks like they are hiring: http://news.ycombinator.com/jobs
Man, based on the overall negative response this comment generated, perhaps I need to go back and reread the posting. I'm not above thinking that I'm never incorrect <-- that's a triple negative, for those that are counting.
One of Pollan's articles which describes this in detail:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/22/magazine/22wwlnlede.t.html
Nope, I just reread it. It's as bad as I recall.
>But everybody will just laugh at you and scoff, "Pssst - what would you know about that? You don't even work in that field! You're not credible!"

Which would put you in pretty good company.
Angel financing - Due diligence
A downarrow doesn't have to work in the exact opposite way as the uparrow. In the trivial case the downarrow would do nothing, and then site wouldn't change at all, except cosmetically. In the more generalized case you would:

-weight it versus upvotes

-weight it based on user history

-weight it based on user's propensity to downvote

-weight it based on the number of distinct "user clusters" it offends

(If one group always votes for butter-side up stories, and another always votes for butter-side down stories, and a story annoys both of them, chances improve that the story is worth voting down.)

Another interesting metric might be contentiousness. If a topic generates an outlying number of downvotes from trustworthy users, and an insignificant number of upvotes (or many upvotes from unpopular users), its participants can be labeled as positive or negative forces. Someone who posts articles that generate a lot of downvoting in the comments might not be picking the best topics. There's probably a nice linear algebra way to generalize this in the same vein as PageRank.

A closed-source, nearly-null downarrow would at least give pessimistic users the feeling that their voice was being heard. (Heuristics is one area where it makes sense to keep things closed-source. Changes should be explained, but not necessarily in exacting detail.)
Has anyone seen whether the print version includes photos?
nice post Mike. think having a regular release day is a great idea. well done.
Yes we are. Feel free to contact me (bill@justin.tv) if you are interested, or if you have any questions.
1) I was relatively lazy because I didn't enjoy the game, but with really hard work I think I could have done 7 figures a year, or at least close.
2) Most top players are probably around where I am in math. A few are far beyond though.
3) I don't think so. A large part of poker is reining in your emotions.
4) No
5) I doubt it.
6) Like I said, math and reading ability are two sides of the same coin. Computers can't read people for shit, especially when there's more than 1 opponent. Even the worst human can do a better job of it than the best computer.So even though a computer is clearly superior at math, it will always have to put me on such a wide range of holdings that it won't help much. They can do a good job at heads up limit hold'em, but the more players you add to the table, the worse the AI becomes.
The verdict is in: The Pownce API kicks Twitter's ass
Sounds like Agile to me.
i don't think it'll be particularly harmful. i think in the long term the wiki's reputation as a reliable source information may suffer. when something is well known not to be reliable, it doesn't have much of a way of inflicting harm.
well, there is no way that people who don't know you can monitor your profile and filter out the fiction from the truth, so a single unified "inner circle" is unlikely to be of much use