skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Please share your (non-computer) system hacker stories
The new question from the yc application "Please tell us about the time you (...) most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage" filters me out right there, so far I can't think of anything. How about you? I love that kind of stories, and I suppose giving them away now won't hurt the applicants chances?

I can only imagine that my whole live is a kind of hack: I hacked my girl-friends brain so that she actually went out with me. I hacked my own brain so that I managed to learn Computer Science, exercise regularly and eat reasonably healthy. I twisted my CV in the right way to land that job etc. And so on... But I guess that is not quite what YC is looking for... But I mean, people's life are essentially an attempt at optimizing their standing in the system, are they not?

I guess I am also not quite the "real world" systems hacker, because often it seems to entail taking advantage of somebody else? Ever since I read "The Art Of Intrusion", I remember it's lessons in all sorts of situations. Like today I was standing in line for cinema tickets, which were likely to be sold out before my turn. It would have been fun to try something, but not really fair towards the other queuing people. Not that I had a really great idea, but who knows, something might have worked (art of intrusion style, discover name of some employee of the cinema, then call cinema and pretend that person was supposed to reserve some tickets for me - one idea).
Do it the Web 2.0 way! ;-)

pwgen -A0 6
Is there any chance of YC expanding to Europe in the future?
It's not a paradox.

Well, that's why I quoted that passage. To point out that it's not a paradox.
Mine has colors, too ;-)
US spy satellite has lost power - will crash to Earth
I assume that the PG et al. mean "hack" in the positive sense -- as much as news.yc occasionally sounds cultish, I don't think they're following the usual cult scheme of having prospective members confess their crimes in order to ensure that the cult has blackmail material on everybody. :-)

That said, I'm having trouble coming up with a good example of what would qualify here -- the best I have so far is when I was a new graduate student at Oxford and dug through the Exam Decrees And Regulations (also known as the "big grey book") to discover what nobody else in the Computing Lab was aware of: That instead of writing a 50 page dissertation at the end of my first year and being examined on it, I could count the fact that I had a paper published in a major journal as equivalent to holding a Master's degree, and thereby transfer from Probationary Research Student status to D.Phil. Student status six months early and with hundreds of hours less work.

I would personally call this "reading the rules and understanding how they work" rather than "hacking the system", but maybe that's what they mean.
Have you had an egg moment recently?
That sounds excellent to me.
TheFunded Creating Database of VC Term Sheets
ooo, new question:

Please tell us about the time you, username, most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage.
Nice idea, like my own personal google.

Is there a way to download the history from their servers? Can I also upload my bookmarks, google history, etc?
Hmm. I was bored in high school, and wanted to keep up my summer job. So I enrolled in a dropout prevention program intended for people who had to work to support their families & such. My high school career was a short morning of advanced-placement classes & then my "real" job. The counselors and teachers didn't like it, but couldn't do much about it.
Bookmarklet version (Safari and Firefox compatible):

javascript:function update(e) { var a = e ? e.target : window.event.target; var s = a.nextSibling; if (!s) { s = document.createElement("div"); a.parentNode.appendChild(s); } var words = a.value.match(/\S+/g); var num = words ? words.length : 0; s.innerHTML = "word count: " + num; s.style.color = (num > 120) ? "red" : "green"; } (function() { var a = document.getElementsByTagName("textarea"); for (var i = 0; i < a.length; i++) { a[i].addEventListener("keypress", update, false); update({target:a[i]}); } })();
Novel chess-like strategy game -- take 2 (modified rules lead to promising game play)
I have played a game with these modified rules and was quite pleased with how it went.

Still, I would be interested to see if you can find potential flaws in the game play.

* as in chess, each player gets 16 pieces placed in the same two rows on each side on an 8x8 board

* every piece starts out with a "1" on it; CHANGED: 1 pieces cannot capture any other piece

* you can think of each "1" piece as a king; once you lose all of your "1" pieces, you lose

* on each turn, you may either move a piece or increase the number on one of your pieces (provided you would still have at least one "1" piece left)

* CHANGED: a piece with a number k may move up to k steps either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally (it suffices to have k <= 7); every step taken must be on a free square except for the destination if k >=2, which may contain an opponent piece to be captured

I plan to build a Facebook app and/or web site for this soon!
It was not. The class ran a year ago.
usually when you're so popular you run out of space, it's not a problem to get more
Ask YC: Sharing everything in our startup via a videocast - what do you think of our approach?
I'm wondering too. We were pretty much at the limit last summer. When we had investors there for demo day, we literally had to put the founders outside in a tent.

Fortunately we can expand in time if constrained in space: just have multiple dinners per week. That would get us 7x without needing to find a new building. I've had my eye out for places in Cambridge, but it would be really hard to beat the current one.
The agile web dev with rails book is junk. Get Obie's 'Rails Way' book like nickb suggested.

And yeah, there's some good new stuff in Rails 2.
There are a bunch of new questions. That one was suggested by Sam Altman.
Congrats on the launch guys. Great work!
Grats guys! Great work in such a short time. Your launch has kicked me into higher gear working on our next release...
That is exactly what we mean.
This got 24 upmods but no comments. But what can you say that isn't ridicule? Scoble lives in this strange world where he can exert his hob-nobby influence over the rich and powerful by making completely pointless requests...such as increasing a 4999 friend limit. And Zuck, being the person to take such a request, is of course a great man, and not at all just a smarmy, lucky copycat whose big innovation was spamming everyone at Harvard.

Have you ever sat through the entirity of one of Scoble's video interviews? Has anyone?
Interesting idea, but a couple thoughts. I understand the desire to be transparent, but be careful what you share.

Also, condense everything into a shorter video. This first video could have accomplished the same thing in about half the time. I don't have time to watch 10 minute videos (unless they're really interesting/captivating), but could probably watch 3 minute videos. Maybe try writing out a script rather than rambling off the top of your head.
a kid without a college degree that's been racking up job after job on his resume is way undervalued. hiring some kid that partied all the time but with a piece of paper is the safe bet. but startups aren't in it for the safe bet.
I agree that setting up straw men and other fallacies is a bad thing. There's two sides to every argument and they should be heard without reducing the argument down to insults or misrepresenting the other side's point of view.

On the other hand, I think you're yourself abusing the association fallacy by making a bold assumption that because the article points towards examples of laws with unintended consequences that they also automatically applies to the specific examples you've given. (i.e. opposing the minimum wage doesn't mean you hate the poor, but it equally doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to cause negative unintended consequences as implied)
I did a start-up some years ago where we were four founders. It was a pretty good match, a technical guru, a marketing guy, a sales guy and me to bind it all together. The sales guy was employed at a fortune 500 company and was managing a sales budget of around 300 mill. $ at an age of thirty. An absolute hotshot. Unfortunately it turned out that he was used to managing large budgets and lots of people, and he simply dragged us down. He couldn't make the transition from a large corporation to a start-up where the rules are very different.

It all worked out well in the end - we bought him out and he went back to corporate. And we still have a beer together every now and then.
What do you mean expand to Europe? European founders can apply.
Years back, I helped run 6.270, the LEGO Robotics contest. The winners got a very cool Lego watch. One of them was a friend of mine. She was more than a little bummed because the stem on her watch didn't pull out far enough to allow the time to be set.

Recalling that an adage that "even a broken clock is right twice a day", I suggested she remove the battery. Then, when the current time was the same as the time on the watch, reinstall the battery.

I've never seen her so delighted!
In that case, could I suggest making the question a bit clearer (perhaps s/hacked (.*) system/made $1 system work/ or by giving an example of what you mean)? The fact that I apparently had exactly what you were looking for, yet wasn't sure if it qualified at all, is I think a good indication that the language is ambiguous.
I thought they store it on your harddrive atm
If it had been me doing the application (haven't seen it) I would probably build in some ambiguity. It gives a greater degree of freedom for the applicant, and also in the real world you have to deal with ambiguity on a daily basis, so I would like to see how an applicant deals with it.
Quality. Plus one just for mentioning 6.270.
Facebook Extends Platform to the Web
Plus one for the punnier title.

Whenever people ask me whether racism still really exists in America, I pretty much point them at NASCAR. Maybe point out that in hockey players are lauded for fighting if the first point doesn't hit home.

Sucks that it takes hitting people's pocketbooks to get them to notice that "hey, maybe we should let some black people drive cars..."
people still read a lot - they just don't read books at the library anymore.

the only ppl I know that go to the library only go to rent video games and movies; or use the internet (in big cities)

when ppl want books they typically read at BarnesNobles or Borders (since they have more locations and they have coffee/food)

o yeah - no need to be a jerk
Same thing, new libraries for Javascript. I don't see the big deal.
Who won?
That's a really awesome question.

If you don't already have a copy, you might enjoy Rod Beckstrom's book Brainticklers. It's basically just a book of questions about the year 3,000.

The questions range from

"When we can match or exceed many or all human physical and mental skills with computers or appliances, how will we define our reason for being?"

to

"What will be the most popular baby shower gift in the year 3,000?"

It would probably be a fun toy for the YC dinners.
Europe's Philosophy of Failure (what schools teach about economics)
User Interface Design Pattern Library
Iconize Textlinks with CSS
I actually was hired as a developer for a b2b portal for hairdressers once...

How about checking webcam picks to indicate to users when they need a new haircut. Would that be a viable idea for a startup? ;-)
True, Scoble can be annoying, but the content in this "piece" is pretty interesting. Amazingly, Scoble got Zuckerberg to admit that he is shy. The other arbitrary stuff, like the friend limit and Scoble's questionable grammar, are are worth dealing with.

But why in the hell was Scoble at Davos?
I've found most of my traffic coming from google on articles I have written in the past.
Calling illiterate people fags isn't actually ironic and witty.
I read some library books recently. yeah amazon delivers, but there are a lot of books not worth paying to own.
I have another one for the application, but this one would have been a better hack had it worked.

I use to work at research lab where they named all the buildings after numbers. No rhyme or reason. Building 1 was next to Building 9, which connected to Building 42. For the important buildings, they were named after famous ex-directors. They were building a new building, and I decided to name it after my roommate (who is no director), Ian Montoya (name changed), who also worked there.

The whole campus is connected via walkways between buildings, so you can walk to the cafeteria from your office without going outside. So, you often ended up walking with other employees on your way to lunch. What Ian and I would do when we found ourselves in a cluster was to act out a scripted conversation as if it was normal conversation:

me: did you hear about that new building they're building?
Ian: You mean BUILDING 23?
me: yeah, THAT'S THE ONE.
Ian: Yeah, what about it?
me: I hear that they're going to call it the Ian Montoya Building.
Ian: The IAN MONTOYA BUILDING?
me: Yeah, the IAN MONTOYA BUILDING.
Ian: huh, I should remember that, the IAN MONTOYA BUILDING.

I'd correct people when they mentioned it, at meetings, in the hallways, at lunch, hoping it'd spread, but alas, I only was able to get the new hires to call it that.

The only other one off the top of my head is a small one. From June until April of next year, whenever people would ask, I'd tell them my birthday was on April 1st. I also changed it on friendster, and other places mentioning my birthday that friends would see. Come April 1st, I got a couple calls for my birthday. "Happy Birthday!" they'd say, and I'd go, "Thanks! April Fools!" After that, I had to convince them that I wasn't joking.
Wal-Mart Announces Plans for Internet Domination By 2009
Wal-Mart launches Internet invasion.
Cool!

But I wish there was a way to store all the pages locally instead of on a website. When I travel, I'd like to be able to go through my pages without going on the web.
Extension transfers you to www.webmynd.com/reel when you click the brain icon... it does not work without net connection.
This is a puff piece ("things have unintended consequences" is as pablum as it gets).

The anti-environmental slant implicit in the piece is intellectually offensive. If land is in the hands of developers with plans for real estate development, the wildlife is already screwed. That doesn't mean tanking environmental regulations is somehow "better" for wildlife.

Ceteris paribus, this article sucks.
Wow, I was not expecting that many helpful links. Thanks.
From the makers of mochikit - MochiAds: the largest ad network for flash games
For those who only care how it's done...

a[href $='.pdf'] {
padding-right: 18px;
background: transparent url(icon_pdf.gif) no-repeat center right;
}

a[href ^="mailto:"] {
padding-right: 20px;
background: transparent url(icon_mail.gif) no-repeat center right;
}

CSS can match the beginning or end of attributes ("href") of a certain tag ("a"). Pretty simple, but neat.
Sorry, that means you didn't pass the test. Best luck next year.

;) nah, just kidding.
Ask YC: Can twitter-like products go mainstream?
Looking at a product like Twitter, which is seemingly a news feed rip-off, I'm hard-pressed to see a product like that going mainstream outside the tech world.

Same with pownce and others.

Now to be successful not everyone has to use the product, that's not what I'm saying, but I think there's a tendency in the tech community to think that just because a product is useful or meaningful to us (because we spend so much time online, sharing our thoughts and wanting to be connected) doesn't mean mainstream users want or need it.

Can ___________ (fill in the blank with web 2.0 derivative) go mainstream?
I like it mapping to underscore. My python code always have a lot of underscores because of PEP 0008 and I hate to press shift+[-/_].
In the case of minimum wage, it does. I thought it was a good example.

http://blog.russnelson.com/economics/minimum-wage.html
You guys have a bright future. Congrats on having a solid business model right off the bat.
yes they do, and the data size does bloat up rather alarmingly ...
I used it for around an hour and the directory size is 50Mb now.
It's all about networking, I guess. I've met Scoble a few times, he seemed to make the proper assessment in that in his world I'm not very important - I'm just a programmer. It's all about PR, too.

Oh, and I hope that I made the proper assessment too. He doesn't really matter in my world.
I'm really curious why the downmod. Think I'm overreacting and it's good to use "fags" as slur with no context? Problem with my phrasing? Hate homosexuals? Thought "illiterate" wasn't precise enough a paraphrase? Annoyed with faint echoes of xkcd? I don't understand.

Edit: Can one of the downmodders write an explanation? Or is wanting to understand something bad here?
I don't think the article is any more anti-environmental than it is anti-deaf people. Isn't it a benefit to the environment to point out policies which damage it when intended to help it so that they can be replaced with policies which help it?
Read the YC FAQ.
If you need a good architect to build something remarkable for YC, let me know :)
"... he most important fact, that technology companies can expand much faster than other types of companies. ... But you can have lifestyle tech companies too, or can't you? ..."

Facebook & Apple for example?
How Real Was the Prosperity?
Editing in something accessible online -- like Google Docs -- is just so much easier than dealing with the form.

You should write to clearly emphasize your point, and only when you're done ask yourself if you've violated the spirit of the 120 word limit.
It seems to be stored in [path o FF prefs]/ScrapBook folder. But you can't view the stuff without being online :( Hope this is fixed soon.
I think the images are local. They mentioned on techcrunch that they'll be making an offline app.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/26/webmynd-could-change-th...
What a load of crap. He had no feel for design. "Fix the design"? This guy has no skill.
PR and code both matter.
Gagarin was not the first man to fly to space. Just the first to live.
Ask yourself this question: what is it that makes you want to visit another website? Whatever channels you use to receive information will probably work for getting the word out to others about YOUR website.
Timing makes sense. Thanks. I am not I want to hold too much back on the startup though, I'd like to share as much as possible, we'll see.
Social tagging and voting was invented at Xerox PARC... 15 years ago
hmm drupal spam module is also good just got tht.
They also invented the mouse and original Mac interface. And they haven't cashed in on anyone.
I disagree that it is that clear cut.

As a recent counter-example to the blog, view the UK's introduction of a relatively high minimum wage in 1998 which, despite above-inflation increases over several years, have caused little-to-no problems. Incidentally, the UK had it's highest employment rate in 2007 according to National Statistics Online (http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=12). By the blog's reasoning, the exact opposite should have happened. For the record, I was fairly indifferent when it was introduced, but now I see it as a positive thing.

The blog makes the rather bold statement that "anybody whose labor is not worth the minimum shall not be employed" based around the assumption that anyone who earns less than the minimum wage's job is redundant and can be replaced. This simply isn't true, thinking about the large amount of service industry workers (e.g. waiters, supermarket-workers, fast-food workers) who are typically paid a low wage but are unlikely to lose their jobs. It doesn't mention that many companies can afford to pay more for unskilled workers but choose not to in order to create bigger profits in the knowledge that the employees don't have the choice of getting a better paying job. It avoids mention of the effect of increased consumption in the local economy, or the likelihood that price increases which require more manual labour will effect premium goods and services the most. There's plenty more additional variables too - it's simply not a case of the situation being summarised as "Higher wages = less jobs".
In the book Super Crunchers, the author describes how he went about determining the name for the book: He ran a Google adword experiment between the name he wanted for the book and the name suggested by others. After running the ads for a few days, it was clear that 'Super Crunchers' had a ~50% higher click through rate. Since the book highlights such randomized experiments and their benefits, it made sense the author would have chosen this approach.
I applied, because, well..

he who never tries, never succeeds? One should never be afraid of failure or rejection!
Well, I have developed something similar (all your history is stored in a Database in YOUR sever). It is a free package.Check it out here: http://history.sansj.com
suppoes someone in india then will u consider them?i mean cost of relocating there is high so is it ok?
http://cag.csail.mit.edu/ps3/blue-steel.shtml
Whoever decided to sue almost every tech company in the world has a ridiculous amount of balls.

On a side note, this may cause a backlash against the patent system.
Web 2.0 workplaces [PICS]
What happens when you put stupid people in charge of stuff.
Here's a very minor hack. One time I was going to the movies at Shoreline (Mountain View) and I wanted to go and see "Spy Game". Unfortunately, it was sold out.

But I have really good eye sight and I could see from the door which movies were playing on the same side of the theater as Spy Game. There's one control point on each side of the theater and so I bought a ticket for a less wanted movie on the same side as Spy Game. Showed my ticket to the guy who let me through. Then I simply walked into Spy Game and found a really crappy seat near the back (all that was left).

Good movie, though.
Offline Basecamp
he says "sometimes, mystery is greater than knowledge..."

- such in conflict with our information age. -- maybe I'll start watching Lost, now, if only because the man is a compelling speaker
This sounds just like a spiced-up ScrapBook

http://amb.vis.ne.jp/mozilla/scrapbook/
python-crack - Python bindings for cracklib
What I think people should consider as a good course of action in some cases is not throwing their hands in the air and saying "shucks, we can't do anything", but rather considering things carefully, and perhaps modifying policies as they go in order to improve them given actual outcomes.
Bruteforcing md5 in python
People are Starting to Wake Up to This Idiocy
Finally.
More http://www.jewsagainstcircumcision.org/
Does the piece moving have to move k steps in a straight line like a queen or can it take an arbitrary path up to k steps long?
I appreciate this is a YCombinator start-up, so apologies for being a little negative. Firstly I think the app itself looks good, but I visit a lot of sites and I was alarmed at the space being taken up after just a couple of hours of use. Also, I don't want to remember everything - just some sites. Currently I use Furl for this and it works well for me. Click one button and the page is saved into Furl - and fully searchable also. I appreciate that this WebMynd looks slicker, but having this kind of option for me would be better than saving everything
cool, but this is another echo-chamber "non-product"
Wright State?
Hacking Real World Systems