skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
> With respect to the polar bears, I searched around and found many articles which state that the population in the 60's had been diminished because of hunting and that, currently, the plurality of polar bear populations are in decline because of climate change.

I note that you didn't mention the relative sizes of these changes, the former being >4x while the latter is close to the margin of error.

Then again, doing so doesn't fit your beliefs.
I bet space exploration will start to take-off with this more privatized approach as it is a little similar to how computers were funded by DoD - government contracts for building new technologies that private companies can compete to decrease the costs of.

http://history.sandiego.edu/GEN/recording/computer1.html
if we follow this graph, Steve will have an actual intelligence of a god in 2030
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A bit more about the cancellation of the moon program here: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/space/os-no-moon-for-nas...

Hopefully their approach will be to further encourage private space travel. A quote from Rand Simberg, an aerospace engineer: "It’s not NASA’s job to send a man to Mars. It’s NASA’s job to make it possible for the National Geographic Society to send a man to Mars."
"...could hardly be more open...?" Except that you have to pay $100. Oh and you have to develop on a Mac, so you should probably buy one of those too.
Current trends aren't necessarily good. Open plan offices kind of suck. Especially since they are often an excuse to reassert the hierarchy of management --> employees (the management needs private offices to do 1:1s, evaluations, etc).
On iPad
I absolutely love the term "webless trolls".
// HANDLE: $(function)
// Shortcut for document ready
} else if ( jQuery.isFunction( selector ) ) {
return rootjQuery.ready( selector );
}

Calling jQuery(fn) twice will trigger the .ready() call twice. Apparently they are stepping on each other.
http://panopticlick.eff.org/
It's been solved http://twitter.com/atmos/status/8350201154
I wonder if this passes building codes, fire and safety regulations, much less compliance with the ADA? What happens when you have a bunch of these and interview a good developer that's in a wheelchair; pass on him because your whole team likes playing in treehouses?
I have a K1, and a K2 Kindle, and played all sorts of games with book lights trying to figure out how to read books on my Kindle in low lighting. One of the hidden warts of the Kindle, is that while it's performance in bright sunlight is superb (actually, the brighter the light outdoors, the better the performance) - It's performance with a direct book light is horrible. You end up always having to try and read around the glare of the book light. Enter the Kindle App for the iPhone. I've read about a twenty books on that application. Devour Science Fiction - nobody I know has been more eagerly anticipating the iPad for book reading.

For Outdoors, Bright Lights, Beaches, Camping, Burning Man (really!) - Nothing beats the Kindle for reading books. But, in dark offices, in bed at night, on the subway - Apple wins the day.
Ten Best FREE eBooks.
Data Center Says 'I'm Going to Disney World'
How to tell an epic story
Two words: G4 Cube
Why Lisp and Clojure, of all the things?
Pixar spends at least 10 times as much money on materials alone, and has architects and ergonomics experts on staff to assist.

A lot of their people have two full computer setups: a Mac with a Wacom Cintiq monitor for using standard Adobe shit, and a beefy Linux workstation for their whole custom toolchain. Most of them have at least two workspaces: standard desks, standing desks, couches, etc.
This time tho, I demand that all R&D funded by such contracts results in non-patentable tech. My tax dollars buy the research, I'll access my results.
Most months I use 0 voice minutes on my iPhone. The phone quality is just so bad that I'll borrow someone else's phone or use a softphone on my computer if at all possible. It barely occurs to me to use it as a phone.

I've lived in SF with it, and driven 25,000 miles around the entire US with the 3G and 3GS. It sucks everywhere.
For me the kindle is not so much about the hardware. It is more about the ability to buy most of the books I want for less that I would pay for the paper version, get them within 60 seconds, pay less than the paper version, and not have to stack and store them for the rest of my life. I don't really care that much about the hardware. iPad, kindle, computer - they are all fine for reading to me. The real breakthrough here is the electronic distribution.
> The % of income paid as taxes by those people went down.

How about some actual data? Note that tax rates aren't the whole story.

And, even if it was true, that doesn't tell us what fraction of the tax revenues that they're paying.

Do you really think that it's good when most people don't have much, if any, skin in the game? (As CA is discovering, collecting the bulk of your revenue from a small number of people makes tax revenues very volatile.)

> As a matter of fact, people in the top tax brackets typically pay a lower % of their income in taxes than their secretaries.

Nope. They pay higher rates on their earned income and they pay higher rates on the investment income. You're "confusing" the two.

And, their deductions are phased out.

> Also, where does this persistent myth that "half of all people pay no federal income taxes" come from?

The IRS. http://www.irs.gov/taxstats/indtaxstats/article/0,,id=133521...

The relevant data is formatted better in http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html

> When I made small money right out of college I paid income tax beyond FICA.

You may have had it deducted fromyour paycheck, but unless you were someone's dependent, you could have gotten it refunded.
The most productive period of my life was when I lived in our dorms at college. The dorms were arranged in suites of six small rooms, each of which was big enough to hold a bed, a desk across from the bed, and a nice big window at the far end. Each room was probably about the size of one of these little houses.

Outside was a common area where the six folks in the suite could gather, watch TV, hold parties, conduct mysterious pseudoscientific experiments, et cetera.

It was great. The secret is that when you wanted quiet, you got quiet. But then when you wanted to interact a bit, you opened the door. To interact a little more, wander up and down the hall. To interact even more, walk out the door into the common area. Then there were larger common areas in the lobby downstairs, the yard outside, the dining hall down the road...

I work in an open plan office now. My coworkers are great, but you can't have a phone conversation without being afraid that you're destroying the productivity of ten people, and it's getting increasingly difficult to focus. Which can make you really tired and lower your rate of doing work. There are times when I've had to start breaking out the headphones and the ambient music, which is a real sign of desperation.
Sex Toy of the Year is Lelo NEA
Because near-term job creation is the government's job, right? If this were such a good idea, it would have been privately funded. It's nice to know I'll be paying for another state's rail system for years to come
Questions for iPad skeptics
Negative energy feeds it's positive counterpart
It's a big deal because the iPod had all of this but its size meant the number of apps you could write lived in a small petri dish. The size of the iPad's petri dish is much larger, when compared to the iPhone.

For example as they showed: Keynote and iBooks.

And for us to design: Electronic Restaurant menus, interactive car manuals, Medical Industry, mapping/aviation, un-maned drone control (planes, vehicles, robots), and so on.

The above list are applications that neither the iPhone or a laptop can do. We are entrepreneur we should see this, we should not be the ones complaining iPad sucks because x or y.
The only thing missing is purpose.
HN feature request:  hide button
I would like a small button (somewhere near the vote arrow) that permanently removes a submission from display.

Maybe an "unhide all" button as well, for when I make a mistake.

Thanks.
Will a Space Cannon Fuel the Next Moon Landing?
Miguel de Icaza: "As a software developer, I find the iPad inspirational."
It's interesting to me how dramatic music always tends to accompany this subject. Whether you prefer the religious or secular variety, I think it's safe to say there's something universally spiritual about visualizing the universe.

A thought which pretty much begs a link to Symphony of Science: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGK84Poeynk
Spoken like a true revisionist imperialist. "Since the Indians are dead anyway lets monetize this land which was never monetized before and lets get our government to back us up."
Other funding sources for California’s bullet train include $10 billion in voter-approved bonds and cash from private investors, which the California High-Speed Rail Authority hopes will provide about $10 billion.
Don't forget the Apple TV and the Mac Cube. There's quite a survival bias in people's recollections of Jobs II-era Apple products.
I've commented here before about the shittiness of Android as a platform: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1064415

I think Android is a huge mistake on an unpocketable portable device, and I don't think Google disagrees. It might work out on a TV / Media Center device, but Boxee is so far ahead there that it's quite unlikely.

Google's plan for Smartbooks and iPad competitors is ChromeOS. I think they'll succeed handily if they ship it with only a content-addressed-filesystem exposed (think 'media picker'), and with a fleshed-out Google Native Client for local apps. I'd love for them to get some competent hardware manufacturers lined up with solid build quality, but Apple has that market mostly cornered (the Nokia netbook looks great though).
That is actually a very good analogy. I'd almost forgotten what a good one was like.
His book "Selected Papers on Computer Languages" collects a few more papers that provide more context for the discover and subsequent application of the invention of attribute grammars.
Ask HN: looking for a linux script/app to block my Internet from 10pm-6am?
2 months ago I didn't have the internet for about a 6 month stretch. In terms of going to bed on time and being rested, no other time in my life compares.

I'm looking for something similar to http://macfreedom.com/ but for linux and instead of setting a 3 hour break, I would like it to start automatically at 10pm and stop automatically at 6am.

Any scripts/apps out there like this? Or any pointers on how to write one?
Article underground
I think Android is a huge mistake on an unpocketable portable device

Why? Or, more, importantly if iPhone OS work why doesn't Android work?
note: I didn't have TV and still don't (as it would foil this plan)...
Are they publically funded? In Australia?

>BOX 4080, University of Melbourne

>Victoria 3052, Australia

Yeah, that could explain a few things.
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No, they wouldn't be in trouble. The laptop form factor will always have the advantage of a physical keyboard and higher performance or battery life as compared with the iPad form factor. $400 sounds a bit smaller than the expected Apple markup to get those two advantages, which probably indicates how much more miniaturized the iPad components are compared with the MacBook. If you compare the iPad to the MacBook Air, which is similarly miniaturized, you get a $700 disparity, of which about $500 can be attributed to the difference in form-factor and the resulting expectations, and about $200 of which go to performance and storage improvements that aren't consequences of the relaxed size and weight limits.
"Can Apple’s success with its walled-garden environment be characterized and justified in free-market capitalist terms? I.e., do you believe that Apple’s policy of encouraging consumers to forego certain freedoms in exchange for greater utility, and consumers’ decision to accept that tradeoff is an ethical one, in that ethical framework?"

Exactly! iPad will not kill openess it will inspire open platforms to be better.
I agree. An essay is only good if it produces a change in at least one person's thinking. But because you are writing about something that is essentially a part of cognitive development, and because each reader is going to be in a different formative stage of their life, it's not really possible to write about a topic like this in a way that creates value for everyone.

For me personally, this essay would have been more useful if you had taken into account the fact that the words 'thinking' and 'ideas' have various definitions. For example, an idea can be a plan, e.g. a business idea. But an idea can also be used to mean a schema. You use the word in both senses interchangeably, and your use of the word thinking itself is also muddled. The essay would be more actionable if you enumerated the different types of thinking, when to do each, how to do each, how each creates value, etc.

But I would imagine there are other people for who would get a lot out of this the way it is.
With the introduction of the iBrain Capsule, no doubt.
I lost my sister in late September 2008. Your first posting about Dan hit me on the anniversary of her death.

It hurts. And it will for a long time.
Just in time for the singularity.
Point one is misinformed. Netbooks had a great year in 2009, with 2010 expected to be even better.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10421063-1.html

Just how many ipads does Apples expect to sell?
Transportation infrastructure is a great investment in the future: where would we be today without our highway system? With air travel becoming more of a hassle each year it'll be great to have an alternative. Note that about 8 billion in total was approved, SF to LA is only one of the routes planned.
If Apple switches its pleasure to displeasure and blocks the Kindle app because they don't like the competition, I'll be right there with you at the front of the crowd, carrying my torch and waving my pitchfork.
what's an iPad?
To me, the core of this article is always make sure you have the right team for what you're trying to achieve.

Allowing 'hanger-on' people who have installed themselves into positions within the company, displays a clear lack of leadership and the ability to make and carry out difficult decisions.

If you don't know the kind of people you need in your team, recognise this as a weakness, and seek help. Then be prepared to follow the advice you get.
Why is every laptop company trying to copy the mac book air if its such a failure. Did it actually lose money? (I honestly don't know). But I do know the Mac Book Air is a great laptop (well not the one that over heated :) If I had the money I would buy a Mac Book air in a second. I think PG mentioned he owns one, so they must be great :)
Invasion of the European Economists
as su, add crontab entries to call ifup and ifdown:
("crontab -e" to edit crontab)

* 22 * * * ifdown eth<X>

* 6 * * * ifup eth<X>

where <X> is your ethernet interface.
I guess the lesson is, anything truly game-changing needs to first seem stupid to most people?

Sadly, that's not so actionable since you get the same reaction when your idea is actually stupid.
Java was the first real language that I learned, back in the days of BufferedReader and no generics ... I'm still young in the programming world, but to see my first and favorite programming language's developer being bought out is ... most sad, to me.

I suspect it is because I'm in a period of mourning, but ... Java just doesn't feel the same to code in right now... like it's been killed, even though it's still around...
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This company is interesting. They call themselves a "venture development firm", as in they invest in your company in exchange for equity, like a VC. http://developertown.com

What I'm wondering is, how do they eat? Even if this model did work, it'd be on a 10 year time horizon like VCs. Are the Limited Partners (programmers) all wealthy ex-startup people or something? Or do they also charge actual money for their services?
But you still get the same flash cookies, which are persisted across browsers.
You get to think really fast as long as you only think thoughts that Steve Jobs doesn't want to think for himself.
Why You Desire for Sweets after your Meals?
Nintendo chief unimpressed with iPad
Just putting it out there, and I'm not 100% sure, but I suspect that stackoverflow.com might have been a better venue for this sort of question.
Using the iPoad for programming could be tricky; there is an explicit policy disallowing user-accessible runtimes.
so this should work? (I am using Lan so I'm guessing eth0)

# m h dom mon dow command
* 22 * * * ifdown eth0
* 6 * * * ifup eth0
I would guess so. You can check your interfaces with the "ifconfig" command.
My roommate in college had one. It was certainly art, if not a great computer. It got a lot more attention than my Dual 500 Mhz G4 Tower.
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Failure is just the industrial bi-product of a process designed to converge on success.

Actually, that's a cute aphorism but I'm not sure I agree with it, because that would make failure muda and suggest that you can eliminate it profitably. Let's try that again.

Failure is a stage of a process designed to converge on success.
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It must hurt terribly. I'm really sorry.
I find myself concentrating best when I’m taking a long shower or dancing to music with my earphones in (seriously). Somehow, both situations lend to focusing on the problem and coming up with a (usually) great and obvious solution.

On falling asleep: I have the opposite experience; I fall asleep fastest when I start concentrating on a particular problem.
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Apple Announces iPhone, Stock Soars - Jan 2007
I'm eagerly awaiting an enthusiastic article from CATO claiming credit for this development.
Hacker defaces 49 congressional websites
I disagree with their association of programming with "complete isolation". I find the best programming is a dialectic between collaboration and solo absorption. It follows that the best programming environment is one that allows for a fluid alternation between these two modes.
Hopefully this one won't lose $32 per passenger.

"The Pew Charitable Trusts SubsidyScope Project has just released a new report that finds 41 out of Amtrak's 44 routes lose money."

http://reason.com/blog/2009/10/27/riding-the-subsidized-rail...
"I know the astronauts are going to come after me for this, but fortunately they are all elderly so they won't be able to catch me."

I wouldn't underestimate Buzz Aldrin: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOo6aHSY8hU
How about one for Erlang?

Seriously though, the iPad is just the shiny new thing of the day, it won't be nearly as big news in a few days. Not worth worrying about.
http://www.murphybedcompany.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murphy_bed

"William Lawrence Murphy (1876-1959) applied for a patent for the Murphy bed on April 1, 1916 and was granted Design Patent D49,273 on June 27, 1916. Murphy started the Murphy Wall Bed Company and began production in San Francisco. In January 1990 the company changed its name to the "Murphy Bed Co. Inc."

These beds make appearances in movies, as they lend themselves to slapstick humor in which people are trapped when the bed folds into the upright position, carrying the person on the bed inside."
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Yes I agree! Very good essay, I don't know why this wasn't up voted.

Why put your paper on the web behind a pay wall that no one wants to jump over, when you can put your paper on the iPad as a native app that people beg to buy for $1.99.

I would buy a New York Times native app for $1.99 a month, I would never spend $1.99 a month to read the NYT on the internet.
I think transportation infrastructure is a great solution to yesterday's problems.

Look at the newspaper industry: some commentators think their problem is that delivering news on dead tree is overly expensive relative to what people want to pay for it. Even if you accept that diagnosis, increasing investment into dead tree processing, dead tree distribution, and dead tree delivery is not the way forward.

I use trains to commute to my job as a computer programmer. My commute is fairly inexpensive, hassle-free, and uses the best distribution system for human bodies the world has ever seen. My commute is also a jaw-droppingly stupid waste of resources.

My company and I waste three hours a day five times a week shuttling a few pounds of grey matter and a pair of eyeballs from one glowing screen to another glowing screen. The glowing screens connect to each other instantly, for so cheap next to my (cheap) train passes it doesn't even make sense to measure.
Actually, you won't. California pays out more in federal taxes than it gets back. It's more likely that your state is getting money from Californians.
the wisdom lies in failing fast on the ideas that turn out to be little, and staying committed to the ideas that turn out to be huge.

it's a mucky equation to solve, requiring smarts, luck and instinct. even causality isn't completely clear.
not sure I'd want to take a computer/ebook reader to burning man, too much sand
Of course, it's all deficit spending anyway, so no one will have to pay for it!

Wait.
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That's one way of looking at it... Another way is CA is a huge part of US federal tax revenue. They are basically subsidizing other states via the taxes they pay the federal government. If you have benefited from the protection of US armed forces, or the safety of modern air travel via the FAA, or the safety of modern food & drugs via the FDA you are reaping the benefits of CA's population. I use those specific examples because they are programs most people would not dispute as being essential government services. In my opinion it's a very wise investment for the country. We want CA to keep being rich and prosperous so they can keep giving us lots of tax revenue in the future.
Californian voters are in the unique position in American history where they can unilaterally approve bonds that will probably be repaid by other people's taxes. (Its similar to the position California unions have been in for the last few decades, where they can unilaterally approve pay/benefits raises which will be repaid by other people's taxes. These two situations are not unrelated.)
Haiti: Poor Construction, Not Earthquake, Was Real Disaster
Bill Gates Funds Research Into Climate Hacking/Engineering
I don't believe it has GPS, so not so sure about the locational awareness bit.
Here's another visualization. It overlays the objects on a grid, which explicitly sets the sense of scale.

http://www.nikon.com/about/feelnikon/universcale/index_f.htm