skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Most startups have to be 10X (1000%) along a dimension of interest to be able to break through. Because you will be weaker in other areas, you normally can't compete across the board with existing players as a startup, you don't have the resources. You have to pick your battles. See Kathy Sierra's post "How to come up with breakthrough ideas"
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2005/1...
Pics from the meeting with Warren Buffett
Ask YC:  Is it legal to advertise gambling sites in Canada?
Also, does it matter in which country your server is located?
I recommend PHP, and SQL, using MySQL/PHP/Apache/Linux. For an editor, I recommend Bluefish. After that, go with Perl(Old style, but it has it's uses) and then Python. Ruby is the next step after that. W3Schools is a good place to start learning, but the best way to learn is by doing.
"I use "Project Management" or "Planner" available in Ubuntu's repositories."

Same as me. Free, and easy.
Tough one. One option is to use a poll. The best option is to go with your opinion, and that of your fellow founders. If you think a feature would make a good addition to your software, go for it. If the feature takes away from what your project is, don't use it.
Using very low prices to undercut competition and then later raising prices only works where there is some way to lock customers in.

Exactly. That's why many utilities (water, gas, electricity) are granted government-sanctioned monopolies on their products or services. The infrastructures required to provide these utilities are so great that competition is near impossible.
Can Social Bookmarking Improve Web Search?
It won't be "wasted" it will be performed by end users, in much the same way that Excel allows financially knowledgeable folks to develop applications in a few hours that would have previously taken man months. Wikis and blogs eliminate the need for most of what a "webmaster" used to do (put new content on a website). Google Alert does what a clipping service used to do. I am sure that folks here can think of many other examples.
Except for the part about fruit juice, your advice is perfect for those considering doing a startup.
Take a look at http://www.netbooks.com/ from one of the guys who managed Quickbooks at Intuit. There is absolutely a market for what you are doing.
We use unfuddle (http://unfuddle.com/home)

It's a bit basecamp like, but it has a better support for tickets and reports. We moved from basecamp to unfuddle 4 months ago.

And it has an svn repo built in it also which updates your tickets based on your commit comments:

A commit with a message "Closed #44, #45, assign #54 to Joe" does all that in the tickets repository, which helps developers who don't like visiting the management application too much.
If you are doing a ham/spam type classification, then you won't need the alien language. I am almost a total tech novice and I was able to do well with just some bash scripts. Of course the docs will teach you about better ways to train the system, if you are interested in going from 98% correct classification to 99.5% correct.

learn ham.css < file_to_learn.txt

learn spam.css < file_to_learn.txt

classify < file_to_classify.txt
use de.licio.us or bookmark it
File ‘sharing’ or ‘stealing’? If IP is property, where is the property tax?
Before I got to this, I was wondering if anyone was going to mention PHP. I'm at the exact same stage as the OP and I'm just going with PHP (and learning MySQL simultaneously). I do want to play with Python eventually, but my first goal is to actually be able to find a job doing this stuff by the end of the year. Plus, even though every virtual human I run across has been programming RoR since 1963, everyone I know in meatspace uses PHP... and those are the people I'll be bugging for help.

Go to your local craigslist web/info design job page and run a search for PHP and count how many ads come up. Then run searches for Python and Ruby. That's enough help for me when it comes to making a decision.
Don't forget the one key issue that almost all hackers (including myself) continually overlook.

We do the HOW.

They determine the WHAT.

Doesn't matter how efficient we get at doing the HOW until someone figures out how to get more efficient determining the WHAT.

All of us (users, hackers, managers, entrepreneurs) are so bad at determining the WHAT that we don't even try anymore. We build something "close" and we iterate until it's "close enough".

Until someone comes up with a methodology or technology for tying down the WHAT into a rigorous functional spec, I wouldn't worry about anything becoming too cheap.
As performance increases we'll to have worry about it less and we'll get the luxury of choosing more powerful abstractions. This makes us more productive (e.g. garbage collection - static typing too is partly compiler optimization).

Regardless of performance increases, sometimes more powerful abstractions appear anyway. e.g. the relational database, Amazon S3, the git filesystem.

Better abstractions are what makes us more productive, not methodologies.
So, basically, you don't have an alpha version of anything, you don't need a 20% development push, and you're not looking to gather 4 more people. Do you folks have anything to do with YouNoodle, perchance?

Not cool.
Bang a really hot chick. Unless you're a chick, in which case you should bang a really hot chick.
Starbucks Begins Phase Two Of Operation
I am NOT doing ham/spam type classification. I need to define some classifications for specific types of content.
How does Weka differ from CRM114?
What interests me is the cause of freeconomics. People easily pay lots of money on all kinds of stuff, but are extremely hesitant to buy anything on the web.

My gmail account is worth at least hundreds of dollars to me, but I pay nothing for it. $25 per year seems entirely reasonable considering the value it offers, but if Google charged money, nearly all users would flee.

Why are people so reluctant to spend money on the web?
Trac.

If you're a small enough team, you can also get by with a notebook or stickie notes. At my last job I just used a 5x8" spiral notebook, wrote down tasks when my boss asked, and checked them off when I was done.

It's kinda ironic that I've got a more formal process with my one-developer startup than at my last job, but I found that I needed to write lots of little design notes on each feature and cross-reference them as I was implementing. Flipping through pages is a real pain. Plus, it's really satisfying to just say "fixes #11" in a commit message and have the ticket automatically closed.
how does a site that does not use tipjoy ever find out that someone tipped them? Is it one of those if they login they'll find out things?
Because it's so hard to pay for stuff, and so easy to go elsewhere.
“we the news.ycombinator.com mutual admiration society”

And don't you forget it.
Hopefully in 6 months, there will be a bigger upgrade, with form factor changes. That will be a good time to buy.
Okay, point taken. Let me rephrase.

Will we ever be able to create abstractions or systems of abstractions that make software development significantly (orders of magnitude) more productive than what we have now? And if so, will we ever reach the point where users/customers/clients can have very capable and sophisticated custom made or customized applications for a price that warrants "wasteful" or "trivial" (for trivial reasons) software development?
We actively seek out people that have received money that aren't users. We're thinking about ways to automate this, but making it personal is probably going to be the most effective.

You can search for a domain, url, or email here to check if it's been tipped:
http://tipjoy.com/domainSearch/

If it has, you need to authenticate that you own it through one of a few methods.
With linus, you could even claim you were naming it after the cartoon character or chemist and not the uber-hacker. ;-)
So perhaps we've been focusing on the wrong series of problems when it comes to software development productivity. Doing the HOW is not the bottleneck, but rather determining (rigorously enough) the WHAT that is the bottleneck.
Be brilliant and innovative then. People like to work with people that are just a bit more brilliant than themselves...
It's actually kinda cool, going around the web, reading articles on my favorite blogs, and for once, leaving a tip. It makes me feel good.
I'd need to know what it is, and it needs to be something that I believe really, really needs to exist. Usually, anything that's LAMP doesn't qualify unless the LAMP stack is just a backend or accessory to something more exciting.

(Speaking hypothetically, of course. I'm not actually looking for anything - I've just turned down offers from startups that are very, very attractive, because I believe my current startup needs me more.)
some further food for thought:

http://weblogs.hitwise.com/us-heather-hopkins/2008/02/yahoo_...

random blog with some thoughts:

http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2008/02/16/who_cli...
In chapter 14 he lays out the concept of pagerank and online forums and advertising. In 1990. Wish I would have read this back then.
Because there are so many companies willing to provide comparable service that supply is nearly infinite. That offsets any feeling of what it's actually worth in productivity.
i would relaxxx.
This is already occurring. I work at a large engineering company. The engineers, even those with no coding experience, are writing one off scripts to solve problems and then throwing them away. Some write 10-15 scripts a day. All of which used to be done by IT. Our IT department has shrunk to glorified data managers. Make sure the data is reliable and the engineers write all the logic themselves.

It's much nearer than you expect.

It may not be agile or maybe it's the extreme of agile.

Our finance guys started using the scripting language just 6 months ago.

The requests are drying up from them as well...

None of the script would pass even basic IT standards, but they work. And they only have to work once. Answer the immediate question. They don't care if it takes 1 min or 8 hours.

It's not pretty, but it is disposable code with no IT involvement.
More acquaintances than friends... A point well established in Malcolm Gladwell classic "The Tipping Point"... Here's an interesting read on tipping point in social networks. http://www.stanford.edu/class/symbsys205/tipping_point.html
Daem Interactive’s Skuair Image Reader
Bram Cohen: Thoughts on driving
you could make a game out it? People watch tv show about commercials, with commercials in between. So i guess I'm clueless.
Index cards and a Moleskin. But that's because I'm a one person team right now.

I'll move to FogBugz eventually.
Learn it with a framework, like CakePHP. Turns it into MVC programming like Rails or anything else.
Killer robots pose latest militant threat
You need to use Rally. There's a free version--go try it now for an iteration. You can trust me on this.

http://www.rallydev.com/
Do usability testing and then some more.
Eric Drexlers classic on nanotechnology: "engines of creation"
yosefk has better commentary on hardware design ( http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=107221 ).
convert everything to lisp?
Most of Hewlett Packard’s revenues come from products that did not exist 24 months ago.

The only way this could be true is if you count new models as entirely new products, a mistake I think only a novice could make.
Let's just say that, in many cases, we have gotten so good at the HOW that it's true.

I prefer to say:

SUCCESS = WHAT * HOW

Neither can approach 0.
Thanks for the link. I thought it was just me going crazy with Emacs/Apple keyboard bindings.

I do the Capslock/Ctrl swap, but I really want to make the Apple key my meta command, since that's the location of the Alt button on every other keyboard I've used
Balancing startup and school - with a Jolt
As I said, PHP with a framework like Cake/Symphony/Zend and this entire argument between "php or no php" is null. I personally use cake and I must say you'll be going in seconds, and then you can move on to Ruby/Python, and then you can argue.
Agree with yourself that you'll do whatever it takes to make it succeed. Otherwise, don't bother.
Close a deal to deliver your first product (or do the web-equivalent to be sure your market is there).
Eric Drexlers classical book on nanotechnology.

Besides, of course, nanotechnology it also, as aswanson pointed out in a comment, describes the idea of the world wide web, forums, advertising and pagerank, in 1986, 4 years before Tim Berners Lee launched the world wide web.

If you haven't read you should.
We've had a lot of success with Trac. Over the past 18 months, we've tweaked our milestones/iteration process several times, and each time we've found Trac suited to our style.
I think that's a dig at Harvard...
Some of my very best friends never signed my high school yearbook--it's filled with signatures of people I guessed I'd never see again after graduation.

You don't really need records (digital or otherwise) to know who your real friends are.
It stands for "rupert murdoch sucks." It is an intentional coincidence that it is the same initials as the real rms.
Ask YC: Monitor setup recommendations?
I'm buying a macbook pro (17") tonight and looking to fix up my monitor setup. I currently have an 18 inch monitor and have never even tried a dual monitor setup.

I'd like to be able to easily have 2 full size windows open. I'm curious what other people have used and recommend. I'm a little reluctant to shell out the extra 800 bucks for a 30 inch cinema, but also tempted as this is the device I spend most of my time staring into. On the other hand, 2 side by side monitors might accomplish the same thing and I could buy the 23" and set my 18" monitor next to it. I'm wondering if two monitors better than one and if a 30" is worth the expense. Thoughts?
Larry Ellison wasn't completely destitute but he started out less than well off. He's done pretty well.
Backpack - http://www.backpackit.com
If CAPTCHAs are decommissioned what comes next?
Yahoo Buzz - Digg & Reddit Competitor?
Marc Benioff (Salesforce.com) on AIR (and Flex plus Flash)
What goes up must come down. Don't forget, this is a marathon, not a sprint.
I recently set a client up with a GroupReady installation (http://groupready.com/). They make some pretty solid scheduling, contact management, and office communication software. Almost every time I've called them, I've gotten friendly, competent service. (I'm not affiliated with them in any way other than as a customer.)

The reason I mention them is, they're not a big business. They're family owned and run, and they're doing gangbusters.

Pretty much, I'm a complete ignoramus at what it takes to be a successful software company. But, if I were to look at those guys -- who I don't think are all that far off from what you're doing -- then I think that the following formula will work:

1. Make sure people can find you. I found GroupReady while digging through Google looking for scheduling software.

2. Be really straightforward. I ended up disregarding some competing companies because they wanted me to fill out an online form to get a price quote before they'd even talk to me.

3. Keep improving your product. Looking at what Quickbooks is doing is useful in that it can give you hints for what people want, but mostly, concentrate on your product. Like Guy Kawasaki says, churn churn churn.

4. Be reachable. I absolutely love being able to ring up GroupReady once a month or so, when I get stuck, and talk to Barry or one of the other guys there. It lets me get a call from my client, visit their office, work on their problem for a bit, and then if I get stuck, immediately get an answer.

I think if you hit those points, your market will find you. Maybe not all at once the way a lot of startups like, but you'll have a sustainable business and that's not so bad. As you become more stable, more people and small businesses will trust you.

Also, I'm interested in what you've got. My little one-man operation just picked up a second person, I'm drowning in work, and my books are pretty much ... well, I don't wanna talk about it (eek).
We're using redmine, http://www.redmine.org/
Yahoo Reveals (Some) Details About Its Ad Plans
Unless we become extinct, there will always be people whose expectations exceed what is trivial to produce with the existing state of the art.

The only question I wonder is how long before software development as we know it becomes no more intrinsically difficult than other forms of expression (e.g essay writing, public speaking, etc).
I don't see 25 innovations and predicting a market downturn by 2018 isn't a bold prediction. Regardless, I'll add a few more accelerating trends.

The disposable razor was invented in 1895 and patented in 1904. It took 70 before a razor had two blades. Nowadays, five blades are widely available. If this trend continues, we'll have a shaving singularity before 2015 ( http://larvatusprodeo.net/2006/03/25/to-infinity-and-beyond/ ).

Lucky Charms were first sold in 1963 with four types of marchmellow. In 2006, this had risen to 14 and we'll have a Lucky Charm singularity by 2012.
It's not a "waste of time"; it's a "learning experience". ;)
Ditto to mtoledo's comments. Handy for virtual teams as well. We moved from basecamp to unfuddle a few months ago as well.
Botanicalls Twitter DIY
Um, can you use two external monitors with a Macbook Pro?

I have a 20" widescreen and a Macbook, sitting side by side on the monitor arms recommended here:

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000959.html

I find that awesome. The arms are like $200 from Provantage; you can get a 24" widescreen monitor for $300 to $400. That puts you at $500 or $600; buy another arm for $100 and you get to use the 18" monitor too (although, again, I didn't know that worked. Are Macbook Pros even niftier than I thought?)
Really? A post-mortem report about that app would be very interesting.
No Silver Bullet: Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering
I don't know. Focusing on school and a startup is sure one circus act that I'm still having trouble with, but staying up for two days straight is not a good idea. The best way to get things done is to manage your time well and get as much sleep as possible. I try to focus on working out, making my launch stay to one date, and keeping my grade above average. This requires me to get as much rest as possible, I sleep for 8 hours a day and I get a lot done.
I think it all depends on how one can handle small amounts of sleep. I know that I am able to go long periods of time with little sleep. I once worked landscaping for a summer and would work 15 hour shifts and consistently get 4-5 hours of sleep.

I guess to each his own though.
@barackobama has over 6,000 Twitter followers; @hillaryclinton has under 600
Charming gestures that won’t break the bank
Romancing someone doesn’t need to be THAT costly.
Let’s say that you after three years of work you were granted a week’s off, which isn’t the best part yet, being that it would be paid as the most most thrilling aspect. So, what would you do on that precious time with your beloved? Surely, what would play into mind is to surprise them with the most romantic and heartfelt gestures to make them feel that they are still and will be the most important person in your life.
I always meant to ask you what it meant. You don't like his comedy "news" channel? It's great if you're into propaganda parodies.
What happens when you design a product for everyone…
Basically is anyone of the opinion that we will ever be able to create software development methods which are significantly (orders of magnitude) more productive than what we have now?

The canonical essay on this topic, is Fred Brooks: No Silver Bullet. http://info.computer.org/portal/site/computer/menuitem.eb7d7...;

His argument, is that there isn't a single programming methodology that creates order of magnitude productivity gains. It's worth a read.

I don't really think that the answer to your question lies in user of programming methodologies. I do think that you can get great improvements in productivity based on tool selection, however. See PG's essays on beating the averages.

will we ever reach the point where users/customers/clients can have very capable and sophisticated custom made or customized applications for a price that warrants "wasteful" or "trivial" (for trivial reasons) software development?

I think it's already being done.

Non-programmers are already using specialized scripting languages like BBS code, or html tags to customize their web pages, forum posts and blogs. People are using Excel scripting to write their own mini financial applications. Graphics programs like Maya, Houdini and After Effects have built in scripting languages for procedural graphics. And, years ago, the Word Perfect word processor was built on the idea of a template language for document layout.
There are other smoothing techniques more prevalent in NLP that I'm learning about in my NLP class which distribute probability mass more evenly, but really won't help (at least I don't think so) in a classifier. Witten-Bell and Good-Turing are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
The Brash Boys at 37signals Will Tell You: Keep It Simple, Stupid
Response from 37signals: http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/881-37signals-featured-in...
On the 17-inch MacBook Pro: http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/specs.html

NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processor with dual-link DVI support and 512MB of GDDR3 memory * Dual display and video mirroring: Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to 2560 by 1600 pixels on an external display, both at millions of colors

But maybe I'm misunderstanding that (as in, maybe it can't drive two external ones)? Can anyone confirm?
While the statistics are interesting, one of the reasons I love this site is it leaves the politics to the other sites. Not that I am discouraging the avocation of any candidate. I simply came here partially to escape the online political war.
What to do when you get a 4-digit rebate
Nowadays, we all embrace products and deals which will let us save, that even a savings of a dollar or a two is worth looking into.
And one avenue where we can definitely get more to add to our savings is when we get rebates.
I draw the line between feedback and advice.

Advice is worthless, feedback is priceless. Advice is a user saying, "Holy sneakers, I just thought of the biggest idea for how you can make a social networking online publishing app!". Feedback is a user saying, "I keep clicking this and it doesn't work" or "does the site do x?". Big difference. Advice, even good advice, is easily come by.

Feedback is a whole nother animal. Feedback is the voice of the capitalism speaking through your users.
It's kind of a love/hate relationship with the idea that "sucks" is the highest honorific that can be bestowed on someone on the internet.
Facebook Adds Multi-Tab For Profiles
Hmm... looks like I AM misunderstanding most likely.
Well, from a Google for "travel affiliate" I found that priceline will give you $7 for a regular price ticket or 3% for a name your own price ticket and there is an international bargain airfare booker that will give you $20 per flight booked through them. So there are definitely some affiliate programs for booking airline tickets.
It's confusing, at best, to view yourself in opposition to another human being. You've had an account on here for 369 days and still are comfortable viewing yourself in terms of what you're not. I'm NOT Rupert Murdoch --- 'cause he SUCKS!

It just seems a little... silly.
"For two months in 2002, Google’s Chinese site, Google.cn, got a different kind of bad-address treatment, which shunted users to its main competitor, the dominant Chinese search engine, Baidu. Chinese academics complained that this was hampering their work."

It's nice to know that some people in China also use Google to do their jobs.
I'm thinking you probably wouldn't have known you had a gem before your eyes.