skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Do not finance your startup with credit cards. Financing a startup with debt is usually a stupid move, and credit card debt stupidest of all. Credit card debt is a bad idea, period. It is a trap set by evil companies for the desperate and the foolish.

-Dear ol' Mr. Graham himself, from his most recent essay (3rd endnote):

http://paulgraham.com/boss.html
In order to get some feedbacks, maybe you should say something about what you are working on without revealing your product/service.
Congratulations! I've been out of a job now since the end of Summer 2007. No startup, unfortunately, just a few websites and odd jobs (and free rent via parents), but I'm still in school so I can justify it (however that counts).
I agree. Kurzweil makes for a nice fantasy though. I mean, it could happen...

I think we've already hit a lesser singularity and no one noticed except some crazy stoned guy that sent me spam emails: the singularity of information. I can find practically anything I want to with a few keystrokes. I can talk to anyone anywhere in the world with ease. It's pretty cool, even if it doesn't make me a post-human. Maybe human 1.1.
That's a funny method they have.
Do college kids know how to program?
I am a college student in North Jersey, and I have - what I consider to be... - a pretty good idea for a startup. My issue, however, is that I can't find a single kid in the area who knows squat about rails or php.

I don't know very much about either language enough to make a real workable product, and since I am in school, I don't have the money to hire a free lancer, so I'm not really sure what to do. Aside from learning how to program, which I have been doing in every free second I have, and emailing every professor in the CompSci department, which turned up no leads, what options am I left with?
Jey - if we all had kind-of abstract existences on computers, then we wouldn't be able to wonderful things like dancing, sailing, skiing and all that good stuff! We could just imagine ourselves doing that, and wouldn't that be worse? It would be kind of like dreaming a life, instead of living it, and I'd much prefer to live a life!
That actually sounds like fun. Friendly competition indeed :D
Sure, song/playlist suggestion and commentary. Been trying to create something that I, personally, would like to see exist. Have devoted most of my free time since the end of last year.
Or just do what 37 Signals does and write something like SVN.
Web Sites Let Bibliophiles Share Books Virtually
I trash-picked a very nice keyboard drawer in Arlington, MA. Little did I realize the risks I was running.
Great observation and well presented.

Try this if you want to get to the source (even though it will most likely make no sense to you on first blush)

"The desire for guilt produces the fear of love"

or to say the same thing in Ken Kessy's words

"The desire for the mystery is greater than the desire for the answer"

TheD
The professor as an open book
Making Money by Giving Away Jobs
I would love to see more of these coworking facilities open up locally. The closest thing we have to one is geared more towards established businesses to rent office space from. There's an artist in residence program going on in the next county over, and that's about it.

Provided I had the amazing credit and resources, I'd probably create one myself.
Microsoft forges first official link to Eclipse
The latest AI approach to the game of Go
The kind of technology that would allow us to upload our minds to computers would presumably be powerful enough to simulate a body and an environment so convincing that we wouldn't know the difference.
Well that's not too bad... I got loans, 3 mortgages, a stack of bills and a broken xbox 360... But... it could be a lot worse.
I agree, Kurzweil's analyses are just bunk, but they work reasonably well as a subjective "intuition pump". You can't logically claim anything from the "accelerating curves", except that technology does seem to be "accelerating" a lot. So "exponentially accelerating technological development" does not imply that there will be world-changing effects.

To me the whole "singularity" thing comes down to these two beliefs: a) AI is feasible. b) When true AI appears on the scene it will have a profound impact on humanity. If I ignore all the confusing and contradictory definitions of the word "singularity", then my claim is "appearance of AI leads to singularity" as opposed to Kurzweil's "accelerating change observed so far will lead to singularity".
Sounds like you might not be ready to do a startup. Remember, it will consume most of your time.

Keep learning. Put up a prototype of your idea as soon as you can. Being able to wave a prototype at people will help attract talent -- hackers want to work with other good hackers.

Don't worry about losing the idea. There will be other ideas. As you've discovered, the secret is not having the perfect idea... it's having the skills to execute one idea after another.

Finally, don't expect profs in a CompSci department -- or any other academic department, really -- to have the first clue how to find someone who actually ships products for a living. ;) That's not really their job.
I agreed.

As it turns out, I just finished a new chapter today on "Team Building" which talks about how to screen potential candidates and to discourage them from joining unless they actually demonstrate that they have "a fire under the belly". There is no need to give these people perks. They don't join startups for perks.

http://www.lovemytool.com/blog/2008/03/team-building.html
I don't know and it isn't relevant. It's just an example to illustrate that it's possible for there to be outcomes which are positive and desirable yet have no humans on Earth. Whether or not uploading is feasible and desirable is certainly still an open question.

I don't claim to be an expert on this or to have thought about it much, but I think everything should be totally voluntary. Go upload yourself if you want, or go live off the land if you want. Either is fine; do what makes you happy.
Addressing Doubts about REST
Are you living in a computer simulation?
Ask: where to find a part time programming job?
Like many people here, I fantasize about working less and devoting more time to my own projects, and a part time job seems like the best option for me.

The difficulty is actually finding one. From what I've seen, jobs seem to either be full time or contractual; not much middle ground.

Should I interview for a full time position and then surprise them with my intentions after I get accepted?
I like the article and agree with most of it... But what would you rather do?

- Finance through a credit card and own your whole company
- Or finance through an investor(s) and own half of your company.

If you succeed the credit card is a better choice
If you fail the investors path is the better one.

PS: If you take money from anyone, like it or not, he is your boss :)
There was actually formal research done on this topic; IIRC, the results are generally as you said.
If a storm is brewing (aka recession coming into full swing)... I wait it out. I would keep the job, break into the new business idea, build some cash reserves, then jump. But, heck... it's done. Go for it. Warmest regards, Bill.
Good advice! As far as the profs go, I was hoping they might know of a club on campus that was doing something other than C and Java, but it was a bust anyway. :-(

And I have seen other people try my idea in limited form, but they all sucked. Really what this is, is a way for me to help MYSELF out. But I am definitely going to stay at it and make it work one way or another.
Ray Kurzweil has an insatiable curiosity. I talked with him recently, and even at his age, he was trying to learn all he can about cancer biology (which is not even his field) from the top people. If he was even half as intellectually curious as a teen, it doesn't surprise me he found a way to build a computer.
Don't be so stubborn about finding someone who knows php/Rails. Any programmer who knows something like C or Java can learn php or rails really well in a couple days max. Plus, maybe rails isn't the best choice for what you have in mind. Be flexible!
maybe 'kill' is too strong a word. how about being rendered 'irrelevant' instead by some extreme-tech instead ?
Aaron, I live in Cambridge and know several programmers and places to find them. Email me and I might be able to help you out - my email's in my profile.
Aren't all conferences like that?
#1 - Optimize for the CHANCE of success, not the magnitude of it. Don't worry THAT much about the % of ownership. Worry about winning.

#2 - Do worry about control and don't give it up. Plenty of investors don't require you to. "If you take money from anyone, like it or not, he is your boss :)" - that's simply not true. You ARE responsible to him, but you don't have to turn over the keys, nor do you have to turn over 50%.

#3 - Get a co-founder. ;-) Spreads costs, and increases likelihood of success and gives you a nice excuse to have a majority of the board seats.
They went bankrupt. Some details are here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teledesic
indeed. greg-egan's "permutation city" dwells on the nature of reality in such an environment.
PZ Myers gets expelled from intelligent design movie Expelled, but they overlooked his guest...
If you surprise them with your intentions, they just might surprise you with the door.

A better approach, if you can take the time to go through it, might be to work full-time for a year, and prove your worth many times over to the company. At that point, ask if you can move to working part-time. They'd likely rather keep a good programmer on staff part-time than let you go entirely.

In my experience, part-time programming jobs tend to pop up more frequently at research universities than at corporations. It may follow as well that a university would be more flexible in turning a full-time job into a part-time job, if asked.
At least they might give us cool lights in the night-time sky! (see Iridium, similar to Teledesic)
I thought you had friends who were willing to help you out...

Take money from whoever you can - friends, families, and fools. You're not at the investor stage yet where people can eat you alive, and you can just refuse it if they try to. Keep well funded if you can; don't wait until you're out of cash, as investors know you'll be in a bind and will use it against you as much as they possibly can.

Taking money from friends would add motivation (or stress, but you seem like the type who can handle tight situations) and resolve to getting your startup off the ground, so I would recommend you pursue those initial starting funds.

Taking money from someone does make you responsible for that money, but doesn't make him your boss. They're called investors precisely because they give you money and hope to make a return on it - they don't have time to boss you around. Also, if you take money from someone, it means that they believe in your product, which is a great boost to morale especially if you're going in alone.

Finally, there are other ways of raising money besides selling your company - I know convertible debt is one choice, but I'm not familiar with any other low-cost routes (besides YC).
Money isn't the only thing you take from investors. Especially in the early stages, it's not even the most important thing. Their contacts and experience are more important.

If you succeed the credit card is a better choice If you fail the investors path is the better one.

But you're more likely to succeed if you take smart money.
"That's not advice, that's half an advice."

What would you like him to do? Come to your home town, drive you to the airport and escort you to Silicon Valley personally? Raising money is not mysterious or poorly documented. Don't act like it is.
English text link here: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2005...
I plan to go the FFF (friends, families and fools) route in a few months. I have money to last me 4 months and after that it will be credit cards, but I hope to have something solid by then and I will be in a better position to get money.
One of my favorite books.

And note, this company (originally) had nothing to do with hacking or technology. If it works for a manufacturer of heavy equipment, in a unionized shop, how much better can it work in software?
While it's true that if you use debt financing, you're ensuring that you succeed or else, but consider credit card debt: Most credit cards have a high interest rate that compounds each month. By using credit cards (and carrying your debt more than a month or whatever your grace period is), you're increasing your expenses and your burn rate.

It would be better (IMO) to secure a business loan. You'll have a much lower interest rate and a longer time to repay - not to mention the easy regular payment plan.

Still, I prefer equity financing. 10% of a watermelon is more than 100% of a grape.
pg is an enlightened man
Really cool.
I'll just say this.

When i was on the safari, our vehicle got stuck in the mud. There was a pride of lions within 50 meters of our jeep.
We had to get outside and push. One member of our party was the look-out, and at one point yelled "the lion is coming" at which point we all moved as fast as we had ever in our lives.

All the lioness did was get up and start pacing.

While I was at the zoo, there was a 3-year-old boy taunting the Lion in his 15 by 45 foot cage.

See the difference?
Find lowest common denominator to get feedback. It sounds like your friends are perfect.
A business loan? Those that I've seen require hefty personal collateral if not several years of profit backed by tax records. Plus, the minimum amount is usually 25k to 50k. You'll be paying a lot more interest at higher risk than with a credit card.
Here's the link to the paper: http://arxiv.org/abs/0709.0099?loc=interstitialskip

It's just 9 pages long, including an intro and bibliography.
Semco sounds just like Nucor and Gore (of Gore-tex fame). There's probably a few companies like this around.
The First Rule of Programming: It's Always Your Fault
I know of one huge company that does exactly this. Except instead of outsourcing "all functions other than sales and engineering", they outsource nothing but sales and engineering. :)
just post a link to a demo here - i'm sure you'll get valuable comments.
Why Exxon Mobil won't produce more [oil]
Linkin Park, "Hands Held High"

Like they understand you in the back of the jet
When you can't put gas in your tank

These fuckers are laughing their way to the bank and cashing the check
Asking you to have compassion and have some respect
How to make Free Voice Call from Web browser
This is the first ValleyWag article I've read that wasn't a complete waste of time.
I can't tell if this is a parody or not. Is it?
The model is different, but this reminds me of http://www.jaxtr.com
"... hey bootload, thanks for your detailed response. you raise a lot of good points. we've definitely spent a lot of time thinking about these issues. ..."

hey ngrandy, sorry for the delay in getting back to you and thanks for
explaining your setup. It reads like a well considered approach ~ http://flickr.com/photos/bootload/2348875304/
yet another 27 year old programmer hear. i've worked for google for the past 3 years. after saving up a bunch of money and working with a lot of very smart people on two very different projects, I'd have to say I'm happy I chose to work for a company :) That said, there is no substitute for being able to do exactly what you want. I get my kicks in that regard programming on my own (reading SICP, toying with scala, etc). But guess what, at a good company, so does everyone else. My smart co-workers all have interests in and out of work, and just being around them and talking to them day in and day out (while eating really good free food) is a great way to learn a lot and get pointers to places to start learning more on your own. We're not all brain dead code monkeys, believe it or not.

Ultimately though, the money I've saved will afford me the opportunity to strike out on my own. I certainly don't knock small companies, or starting your own. I just think large companies (OK, at least google) can be a great way to start your career before moving on to other stuff.
A large company that doesn't limit freedom
I agree with Paul Graham's recent post on how large companies restrict freedom. His model of how it happens is interesting: as orders flow downwards through the tree, freedom is partitioned at every node. But does it follow that large companies must have this flaw? Only if you assume that management's job is to send orders downwards.

Google has tried to create a culture where management nurtures initiatives from below, to notable success. But this is only for engineers and only some of the time. The carrot they dangle is that you'll get to control 20% of your time at work. One-fifth!

Semco, described in the link, weeds out command-and-control wherever and whenever it crops up in the organization, and replaces it with free choice and shared self-interest.

And have you ever heard of a large company that has no IT policies whatsoever, other than protecting worker email privacy?

http://www.cioinsight.com/c/a/Expert-Voices/Ricardo-Semler-S...
Merely the best we’ve done so far
I'm also a recovering IBMer. It was awful... like 'Programming in a time of Cholera'
I'd say "post it here," but you should think about who (and what) you're aiming for.

Hackers tend to focus on things like algorithms and blocks of text and whether you used a JPEG when you should have used a PNG.

If you're aiming for the mass market, your friends may provide more helpful feedback. They can point out obvious usability problems in seconds... just sit them down in front of your site and have them talk you through it.
Fear not, as one group of criminals falls, another rises. These new ones don't know how to pick a (physical) lock, but they sure as hell are taking in some serious cash via identity theft.
i have in fact decided to do the same thing. Though i decided to quit about a couple weeks ago, i'm taking some more time to sort things out before i actually quit.
Its nice to see you do that.. puts different voices in the back of my head to rest.
Here. Post the link, thats all we need, and get ready for some harsh constructive criticism
The internet has officially come full circle.
The diamond market is proof that women want diamonds.
The one thing I can say about the economy with absolute certainty, at whatever point in the cycle it is... is that there is a recession coming.

There is ALWAYS a recession coming. Go do your thing. Some of the richest and most powerful men in history began with nothing in the depths of the great depression.
That's not entirely true. Workers set their own salaries, subject to the review of their colleagues.

If you think you are awesome, you can give yourself a hefty raise. If your co-workers don't agree though, in a few months you'll be out on the street.

I think it makes sense to share profits equally, since the whole point is that the result was achieved collectively. Salaries can be all over the map.
Gamma ray burst visible to the naked eye
At 7.5 billion light years away, I really wonder what caused it. That's an enormous amount of energy...
Talking beyond friendfeed and plaxo, etc. feedback welcome
Multicellular life is faster, smarter, and more successful than unicellular life.

The corporation is usually way slower, dumber, and typically does not outlast any of its component organisms.

The difference is that the components of the corporation are individually intelligent and self-aware. The corporation's "thoughts" are comparatively slow and stupid. Maybe one day there will be some Borg-like way of making humans act together, which truly makes something smarter and more nimble than any individual. But I don't think you can argue corporations represent the next step in evolution.
if you're serious about getting out check out some of the jobs we have up at http://snaptalent.com/ads.html There are some YC companies on there, but also some other really cool startups.
> whether you used a JPEG when you should have used a PNG.

Attack of the bike shed!:-)

Well, it is certainly unfinished, and I'd probably be eaten alive by the perfectionists if I launched today. But I think I've put enough together that people can either get excited about the project or dismiss it as having no potential.

Email me for link.
The Fabric of Creativity
Submitted on another another post
So what? Egypt and Sumeria were organized like North Korea today, worship of the head of state. And Napoleon was a tyrant trying to impose his will on an entire continent. If freedom is incompatible with Napoleonic dreams, that is not a bug.

Freedom fighters have often chosen the guerilla way.

A better example for your point would be the Americans in WWII. But even then, soldiers are not robots and the best commanders give their underlings the freedom to get the job done.
sorry for my english on my post :-)
I work for a large company and I also feel the way described in the article. What baffles me the most is the constant need of approval in case I'm about to do something that goes a little beyond the "company policies", like setting up a public repository for code that's going to be released anyway.

Often these mysterious company policies are not explained in the first place, yet I'm supposed to adhere to them. So I find myself pondering, "Is it ok to do this?" Engineering-wise (and by common sense) it would be a no-brainer. Then I waste time and energy asking approval. Sometimes I get denied and so I wasted my whole train of thoughts related to an otherwise obvious choice. What bothers me the most is that the majority of people seem numb to these problems.

Why did you hire me if basically you're questioning my trust, and why are you blocking me from doing what I'm supposed to do? Then why you invite me to "fun" events afterwards?
You should write a country song! ;)
One more thing to do would be to add a start_time via js on the top of the page. Then, another at the tail end of the page - then use a javascript function to calculate the difference. This will give you the time for the server (or your web app). [You can also do some code to your controller or view - however you have it to generalize for all pages].

Now, this time is not the same as the time that firefox takes to display the page. For this, you will have to use the start time on head and then use a js function that will be called on body onload. This can now take the difference and show you the browser rendering time alone.

I have often seen that some pages get generated in the server in under half a second, but takes more than a few seconds for firefox to render. [For example, table with lots of rows, with lots of divs and esp. if there is any dynamic modification of nodes].

Another technique I use is to also display the times for both server/browser, only when I am logged in - and also use color codes to show the severity of the situation. [Like Green for under half a second, red for over a second..etc].
Safari 3.1 - may have broken your keyPress events
I just noticed one thing. I added a comment directly. And was hoping that mine would probably go to the end of the list. But my response got inserted between posts by prakash and pg. Curious to see where this comment ends up.
I am pretty sure that every trainee and junior programmer I have ever mentored has come to me with a "bug in the compiler". I always try and find the gentlest way possible to tell them that it's unlikely that there is a bug and if there was then in all probability their more experienced colleagues would know about it.

Usually however it is a good start point for revisiting the topic of program structure and the tricky question of "state". A quick re-write of the offending routine usually removes the "bug".
Great essay.

I work at university (as assistant prof. in CS, not in US), and it feels a lot like working in a big corporation.

The difference is that we are free to do what we want. But this is because nobody cares about what we do, so it might be even worse in the long term.
[email me for link]