skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I have to say that I'd need more time in order to properly think through your argument right now, and I don't have such time at the moment.

But the first thing that comes to mind is that no, these people shouldn't be ignored. This feels like saying "the very big thieves are always gonna be thieves, lets not worry about that. Instead, lets focus on the occasional thieves".

You might argue that since the items are not being lost, that doesn't have an impact, but I digress. There is no way to tell what would really be the pirate's action were him totally prohibited from pirating. What would he do.. pay for the stuff he likes, turn to a new hobby? Sit still thinking about all the things he is not doing? We can't know.
Hehe, couple this with the amazon mechanical turk and you can have real I (instead of AI) controlling telepresence robots to do work.

Rent-a-brain for remote control of your robot to do the chores, such as laundry, vacuum cleaning and feeding the animals.

I can see a tele-operated McDonalds capped robot smiling and saying 'hi may I help you' with a bit of an accent in your near future.

Outsourcing is about to enter a whole new phase.
silt settles at the bottom of a pond.
I worry, like the other posters, that cloud logging + search is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist.
Xbox Indie Game Sales Numbers for 2009 (GamerBytes)
I have mixed feelings about this guy, but it's telling that a lot of the objections are to this guy acting like a lawyer. I mean, how dare he! What does it mean when they object more, as if morally, to the people who are filing pro se---and winning anyway? Hmm.
> Still...I'll take solace in the fact that it averages out to 1 link every other day.

No solace need be taken! One post every other day by someone actually reading the paper in depth is a great service to the community. So, thanks and cheers. I come here for my science/tech/business fix and comment, I wish I found more interesting links to submit!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Source_code_escrow
> From the link you provided I can't tell if he's a dodgy person or not?

That wasn't my intention. my intention was that when someone Googles his name they'll get lots of pages saying he's a dodgy person.
Ok, so lets say you have a data set that consists of items that tend to cap at 2000. Already, half of all possible numbers begin with 1.

I think 1 is special, in any base, because it's the first digit used when a new digit gets added. If you're talking about quantities that vary easily by, say, thousands, once it crosses the 10,000 threshold the first digit changes much more slowly.

There's more to think about here for sure, though.
If it's a tablet, it really isn't an iteration.
Emacs Tips
I know, I didn't mean you. I don't know if you have enough karma yet to downvote.
That's one of the problem - most people don't know enough about SEO to know what exactly is going on. They place blind trust in those who are featured in the mainstream media.

While Jason goes out in public and says one thing, based the examples in Aaron's blog post he does just the opposite in practice.

Sites like Mahalo that auto generate content and scrape content are increasingly becoming a problem online as they clutter the search results and hurt the publishers they scrape and steal from. Google is doing worse than turning a blind eye to this as they actually are encouraging these very large "content providers" to create content for filling ad space (see the Wired article on Demand Media).

With SEO being an industry that has a negative perception by many, those involved in the industry feel the need to defend their profession.
"The cold hard facts of freezing to death"
The fact that it runs on Google's servers doesn't make it any less valuable to me. It does give Google some valuable data, but this isn't a zero-sum game.
Microsoft Awesome Silverlight Facebook Client for Windows and OSX
MapReduce jquery plug-in Release Candidate
I think this could be a really good source of data for Google. If a lot people use this it could be used as one more way to ensure search quality.
But after gzipping most of that whitespace will be gone anyway.
Damn. Just tested it on a site that I lost interest in [1] because a feed isnt offered. The service doesnt work for the particular site because there is an RSS feed, but it contains the wrong content. :(

[1] http://www.kuro5hin.org/section/Diary if anyone cares. The RSS feed points to the main page rather than the diaries page.
"... said the article, according to Guardian"

Why couldn't Wired quote the original article instead of getting it second hand from Guardian?
I was talking about the whole page itself -- I hope no one actually has a 300 kilobyte CSS file. ;)

My point is that it sounds impressive to say "Hacker News can cut down its CSS file by 14.3%"... however in the real world, shaving 225 bytes off of a single file (actually even less after gzipping) will not improve page-loading by more than a millisecond.
At least Google's initial rationalization was (paraphrasing) "even though China's censorship sucks, we think we can still benefit people's lives there by censoring the bare minimum possible". They've always acknowledged that China's censorship is a form of repression, and never emphasized the "we're just following the rules" bit over the actual ethical problem they were dealing with.
Agreed. And it's a great way to crowdsource checking of "What parts of this page are meaningful?" (Provided there's a way to give feedback)
Why has Jason's comment has been downvoted? People don't consider it relevant? Amazing.
I think every mere mortal uses a variation on the "cluster problems" to do mental multiplication and division.

But what about the lattice method, how is that better than the standard algorithm for humans doing math on paper?
The price is unreasonable, because no one would pay that price if given the choice.

The only reason textbooks cost $100 is due to agency costs: the person choosing the textbook is not the person paying for it.
In some cases, I can agree with you. There are predatory practices that shouldn't even be legal.

But this guy went out and borrowed $100k to put directly into risky investments. He also bought four houses at zero down, maximizing his risk of default. He wasn't suckered into this, it was a calculated move to try and get rich quick. Then it blew up in his face, and while that is not his fault directly, he's clearly smart enough to have known the risks. Now that his (not so) little bet has gone against him, he doesn't want to pay it back?

I call bullshit.
As far as I understood the license the primarily is a very important. I had some discussion at work some time ago about Winsplit Revolution, which is licenced under CC:BY-NC-ND. They even have a statement in the Winsplit FAQ:

Can I use WinSplit at work ?
Of course you can ! The actual licence's "non-commercial" term just means that you can't directly make benefits with WinSplit Revolution. For example, you can't include it in a commercial package of software that you would sell. But as it is a freeware, you can distibute it freely as often as you want.

The primary goal of using Winsplit is 'helping us make money' (by helping us do our jobs easier), which only slightly differs from 'making us money'. The only way it could (primarily) make us money would be if we sold it or if we would put a download-page up only to collect ad-revenue.
A good portion of the top CCP leadership were promoted based on loyalty rather than meritocracy, so they are generally not the brightest of the bunch.

That being said, I can understand how this would make sense for an audience in China. China was ruined by one revolution after another for the last hundred years, each time under an idealist with a new promise of salvation, people have inevitably become cynical to the idea of violent changes.
Shenanighans?

Perhaps you should try and write a language from scratch, see it come into wide use, develop millions of users and then issue opinions?
Agreed - I think Emily Post said your date should never cost less than the dinner.

Blatant libel aside, I would guess that the majority of it is quality of service + price targeting. i.e. The kind of people that would go to an event where a fancy escort would be necessary are those with the means to pay a high premium.

Of course all this is with a grain of salt - my expertise lies more in the realm of economics than paid companionship. After skimming the study, it seems like they've fallen in the classic academic trap of too much analysis, not enough data. All the regressions in the world don't make up for a little bit of investigation.

Specifically regarding this field, of course, the major red flag is the inability to gather data on the consumers. They tend to keep their precious data to themselves, giving no thought to the poor grad students.
What is the screen_name of twitter user_id=6253282?
I saw the special and I honestly think that's a myth, at least most of the time. It just seems like a rationalization, the guys can tell themselves they can't find a suitable mate and have to pay these women, the women can say and think they're paid for more than just sex, everyone wins, it's not just high dollar prostitution. The other thing that the kind of guys who pay for super-high-priced call girls want is silence, silence regardless of who asks and silence when a tabloid offers $10k for the story. To me that's much more logical than a rich, educated guy not being able to find an educated female to converse with.

It might be true to some degree but the reason you pay a hooker isn't for the sex, it's for the discretion. Think about it for a second, if she's hot and educated and can be with him in public, why doesn't he just marry her? He's rich, she wants money, it's almost perfect. Why do they maintain the prostitute and john relationship?
See also: http://developers.facebook.com/scribe/
I think vaksel's comment "Mahalo is monetized through Adsense..." at least partly explains it. Other than that, is anyone lodging policy-violation complaints when they find dodgy pages?
There's definitely room for innovation in the space.

A lot of Geo data on the web right now is unclean and there's not a lot of people other than Google and Yahoo and MapQuest providing API's to it.

Also, Twitter recently acquired geoapi which was going in the right direction. So, go for it!
Obviously you would not use this for anything you wanted to keep secret. And, how else should they help you?
This is the sort of stuff I'm curious to hear. I have rudimentary experience with both Hg and Git. I have a project being managed in each and have found them roughly equivalent in basic use. I'd love to hear more details and stories from people who actually know both really well.

Actually, in general, I'd love to see more comparisons (not just VCS) that assume you understand the problem space and talk about nitty gritty details. I feel like I would learn more that way. Frequently, I find the same simplistic surface level arguments over and over, but rarely deep competitive analysis. I guess that kind of analysis is just harder and can only be done by people who have idiomatic expertise in both (and idiomatic experts are already rare).
I think personalization is the only way to reduce web spam.
No bugs in my teeth? That definitely makes jetpack > puffin. Electric jetpacks are a way off, though, so it definitely wins there.

Free protein!
There's a Mexican produced movie that is about this. Really interesting actually. I recommend checking it out.

http://www.sleepdealer.com/

Rent it at your local blockbuster.

Subtitles are fun.
One day I'll have an idea that nobody had before ;)
Google Product Ideas
Well, I don't want companies or anyone else profiling me based on what I read. So I generally try to avoid using services like this.
I've had that problem alot with my last phone number. And now it started happening with my new number. I dunno what to do other than change the damn number. It's stupid, and I had a guy call twice just to make sure. And I have to keep this phone on for emergency calls (I'm a sysadmin). I put this number on the no-call list which didn't do anything. They can probably get away with by saying they had no clue the number was reassigned and that they already had dealing with the person. This is a loophole of the no call list.
Mayflower Madame is an autobiographical piece with some info related to this topic. She had a few women working for her who were paid $500/hr (iirc), in part because they were just so much more beautiful than the others. The book also has some hilarious tales, for example of gay men hiring the same girl over and over to be a fake gf for weddings and other family events. In one case, the family liked the girl so much, she and the gay man had to stage a dramatic break-up because his family wanted him to marry her. The author had insider information and didn't have to do a survey to get her numbers (or her explanations as to why X amount was charged), so they are probably a bit more reliable (though dated at this point).
The fact is, credit needs to be tightened up. People like Cunningham get in over their heads. That's on them. The onus of extending risk to such borrowers is on the lenders. These lawsuits are just going to be another factor in calculating risk, which will ultimately, one would hope, tighten up credit.

Rampant, aggressive debt collection is just the flipside of loose credit and lending.
No, it's not a zero-sum game, but it would be a game I'd feel more comfortable playing if they didn't require me to give up this information.

Fortunately, the world of stand-alone non-spyware applications isn't quite dead yet.

Having said that, I just realized that that's what web-based services like this are analogous to: spyware.

All these web-based services, from Facebook to MySpace to Google itself, are actually web-based spyware, and people are eagerly using them.
Absolutely no contest:

http://www.liberalhistory.org.uk/uploads/keynes.jpg

http://www.topnews.in/light/files/salma-hayek.jpg

Or did you mean a different 'bust' ?
Apple's guidance for Q1'10 was $11.3b-$11.6 which as EPS translates to about $1.74. Based on this, I wouldn't be surprised if Apple deliver actual results close to Q1 in this next off-holiday-season quarter, which would be both impressive and a support of Jobs' statement.
This is why websites is 'compiled', not written, in the future.

Other tools like Closure Compiler, CSS Sprites make it happen.
With emotion, Sun's long goodbye nears the finish
Linear data is measured using logarithmic scale (..., 0.1, 1, 10, 100, ...).

If you saw logarithmic scale ( http://www.ieer.org/log.gif ), you know that distance between 1 and 2 on logarithmic scale is much wider than between 2 and 3, and so on. So, no surprise, if you seed linear data through logarithmic (non-linear) filter, then numbers will follow pattern of logarithmic scale.
Think of binary: Any number will start with a '1', except for '0'!
I've been tempted to learn Lua for quite a while now. I think I'll start tonight.
Their defense seems to me like a lie. By the sheer amount of occurrence of these lawsuit, you'd think they would make sure their employees don't break the law. Except they probably don't think their business could work without breaking the law. This business is as scrupulous as the mafia. They have no way of making money without breaking the law. How many people would pay if you told them all we can do is wreck you credit that is already wrecked.

On the other hand, they do bring in a balance that allows us all to have cheap unsecured debt. So.. these evil guys are necessary for the system to exist the way it is today.
Buying local works for things that are unique and unavailable outside the "local" context. So, the local pizza joint or local dining chain may be successful in getting people to "buy local" but the mom and pop retailer selling Tide detergent or Whirlpool will likely not, since they add no value aside from being a local business.

Local businesses must provide something beyond what can be provided by national or regional chains. People will not spend more money simply to subsidize an inefficient business.
"human-powered search"

How can you call Maholo a search engine when the majority of the traffic you get comes from other search engines. How is Maholo any different than About.com?
Ask HN: Kind of company to create for App Store?
I am going to release an iPhone game in the App Store and don't want to release it under my name. It looks like I will have to create a company to do so. What sort of company should I create? Or is there a way I can avoid creating a company yet be able to register as a company? I don't want to get hit by all sorts of taxes and fees in the future, especially if this is the only game I end up making.
The author closes using another Nerd Culture favorite of Firefly as his example. I watched an bad cam of the Firefly movie on my netbook and the video and audio both kept dropping out. Anyway, I thought it was a terrible movie.

But wait a second, you say, I was watching a bad cam on a tiny screen. Well, yeah, but the story's the same, no? My total experience of the movie, (arg! wtf? stupid half-broken rar files stupid torrent software, etc) contributed to my total impression of the movie. If I'd got to a theater opening night and there a few dressed up in costumes and the crowd was buzzing with excitement, my opinion of the movie might be higher.

Not having an easy mode on video games is like saying 'can only be watched on a big screen'. Theres a sense of accomplishment and pride by the end of the game that, if you were wanting to share in the experience with, that, as some see it, a minimum level of difficulty is required.

(For the record, I did rather like the Firefly movie.)
"Why do they maintain the prostitute and john relationship?"

Financial diversification for the prostitute, and selection diversification for the john (and maybe the prostitute as well).
You are only technically correct. Eire is the Irish name for Ireland, but is not commonly used in English. In Ireland, everyone calls Ireland Ireland. Similarly, the language is Irish, not Gaelic. You only hear the words "Eire" and "Gaelic" used outside Ireland, typically in America (except for the small section of the population who actually speak Irish).

If you were to use the Irish term Eire, then it would make sense to use the Irish name for Dublin, which is Baile Atha Cliath, or Dubh Linn, depending.
This is awesome. Also, I can't help but wonder if this could be used in some sort of bar trick to impress members of the opposite sex.
I'd like to point out that the methods employed here to survey the wages of prostitutes leave plenty of confounding variables in play. "Analyzing wage information on more than 40,000 escorts in the U.S. and Canada collected from a web site, we find strong support for EK."

1. Remember from statistics class what the problem with conducting polls via random telephone calls to thousands of different homes? Not everybody has a phone, and the reasons are nonrandom. Well, not every prostitute has the internet...or advertises on the internet...etc.

2. Just "a" website? Only one? Well, this isn't _necessarily_ a problem-- so long as the conductors of the study can provide reason to believe the population of prostitutes advertised on this particular website is demographically no different than the total population of (be it "high-end" or "all") prostitutes into whom they attempt to gain insight. Yeah, good luck with that.

3. Are we assuming that the listed hourly rates of the prostitutes on the website exactly correspond with what ends up being charged? This can swing results in several different directions: perhaps some bartering occurs on occasion, maybe special deals can be had ("Two-for-one, ehh? Oh, but only for the 26- to 30-year-olds? Well damn."), maybe they round off the time spent "on the job". In addition, the _averaged_ 'hourly rate' a prostitute charges often decreases as the total time billed for the evening increases ($50 for 15 minutes vs. $100 for 45 minutes, for example), which would make it difficult to guess at true wages from one number alone ($/hr), given that the math will inevitably be done differently from prostitute to prostitute (as well as from pimp to pimp, if one is involved). And let's not even start down the road of analyzing the "a la carte menu"...just know that each girl could have a different menu with different prices, or even no menu at all. Again, good luck to the study conductors in dealing with all these confounding variables.

4. Etc.

Point: Though I haven't read anything more than the abstract, I nonetheless highly doubt that this study was done in the proper statistical manner. "Good enough" never really is. If there are confounding variables, they need to be eliminated. Otherwise, no conclusions can be reliably drawn.
Not really. Banks have a fiduciary responsibility to lend out their money with some caution.

The banks colluded because they too wanted to make a pile of money quickly, then when it all blew up they went after all the collateral leaving the private individuals holding the debt after the foreclosure.
Amazon.com delivers product suggestions by profiling you. Google provides better search results by profiling your search history. How can this be a bad thing for you?
The client app is called BananaClip.
http://forums.xna.com/forums/t/45585.aspx?PageIndex=1
is the link to the forum where the numbers came from
Interesting facts:

1/3 of the stimulus bill was tax cuts, and the TARP money has mostly been repaid.

Take a look at the graph of govt spending as a % of GDP -- it shrank a ton under Clinton, skyrocketed under Bush, and if you assume that we won't pass another TARP or Stimulus bill next year, it's set to go down again after one year in office for Obama.

But who needs numbers? We've got a democrat in office - government must be growing! And it must have shrunk under Bush!
Also, as you add more friends, the network effects increase.
Google grants patent priveleges to the Go language
> Remove the nofollow's from the attribution links to content you've scraped. Anything else is just plain rude.

I think this is a question we all, other [slightly petty] arguments aside, want to hear an answer to. I doubt we will though - care to prove us wrong Jason?
If this gains wide usage, it could be a boon to RSS adoption. Users could eventually learn to think of websites as collections of changing content, so they'll have less difficulty accepting the use case that RSS offers.

Some people might even think RSS is introduced as an enhancement to this Google feature.

(Or maybe this implementation will become so solid that RSS becomes unnecessary, but I doubt it.)
What happened to e.g.?
One big improvement in educational content i can think of , is the addition of personalized content, that fits to your learning style.It seem to really improve learning.

Of course this fits very well to computerized platforms , and works nicely with 70% revenue share. This could be a much stronger disruption of the text book market.
The Market cap of Apple is $182B, +$50B in Revenue? Many iPhones/Tablets to sell in 2010! http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ:AAPL
Event-Driven Web Application Design
I'd like it more if it allowed the user to define the search pattern and output template for each created feed like some services which I already use and pay for do.
It's not only the cloud, it's also in the datacenter :)
Ask HN: Review my web based twitter command-line interface
Similar to how McDonalds no longer has a 'small' size of french frys?

How many people are going to play a game on easy and then also play it on normal? I doubt very many at all, and those who do probably won't take the time to go back and compare the two difficulty levels. So you could make normal and easy the exact same. (Hey, this thread was started as an appeal to marketing...)