skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I have found that the absolute best way to handle this is to make sure the customers are good customers before you acquire them. Here are some tips:

1) Charge for your services. If you don't charge, you get people who undervalue your work and treat you like you are their servants and will whip you every chance they get. Don't work for free.

2) Treat customers with respect. Try to understand why they are upset or angry or not being a good customer. If you empathize, you'll probably find that you have behaved like they are with some other company or service provider. Why were you acting that way? What could have pulled you out of it?

3) Under promise and over deliver. If you don't deliver, they feel cheated, misled, and abused. If you say you will do something, do it. If you don't, you're a liar and people don't like liars. They will treat you bad out of spite. When you over deliver, customers are shocked and amazed and will sing your praises to the world!

4) Take a break. If you are getting abused, simply stop responding to the person for a week or two. Let them contact you again in a nicer tone. When you let them sit on their bad behavior without responding, they usually try another approach.
You are correct, but the author's big leap of faith is that our particular one case of the problem is intractable. I'm claiming the reduction from 3-SAT to his market problem is likely broken because the general market problem is subject to at least some additional constraints for it to reflect our reality. For example, you can't have MSFT stock rapidly alternating from $10 to $200 every day, which might be what happens during your 3-SAT reduction.

More importantly, I'm calling out the author's representation as bogus. He proves that anyone who represents the markets his way is trying to solve an NP-complete problem, and that given the problem is NP-complete the hedge funds and banks can't possibly have computed the solution.
Actually depending upon how the warrant is structured it's most likely a pseudo-derivative, not a pure play on pricing action.
It's not really age discrimination per sec but a lack of adequate compensation. It's known that good developers are 10x more productive than average ones. Aged developers are usually pretty good since they have survived this game for so long and with all the experience coming with it. But a developer with 15 or 20 years of experience is rarely making more than 2x or 3x of someone just started. Older developers just quit after this realization.
But people may wonder why I'm forty and still "just a programmer".

I'm 54 and "just a programmer". A few thoughts:

- I've done all the other jobs. Now I'm doing what I love best.

- There has never been a better time to be a programmer. I can't imagine doing anything else right now.

- I'm on the critical path. Of all the things I could be doing, programming is where I'm needed most. It's much easier to find people to do all those other things that to build the software. (Not a judgement, just an observation based upon many instances of supporting data.)

- I don't care what other people think.

- If I did care what other people thought, I'd just tell them that I don't remember the last time my boss made as much as me. That usually shuts them up.
The problem with Silicon Valley is that it doesn't respect intelligent women any more than the rest of the US. Sure, companies or "startups" will hire women as marketers to pass out badges or tshirts at big I/O events, answer phones, serve lunches, or vacuum the floors, work in the "massage" parlor . . . but being a female professional who actually has talent is about 1000 times harder than any guy who lives there can possibly understand.
The iPad is not for some web browsing.

Most of it should work fine and with time developers will utilize new APIs for this new(ish) browsing style. Not a huge deal.
I didn't even say that I disagree with his position...
Unless you only want to get a users home location make sure to allow them to search by city/state since most people don't know zipcodes for places they're researching for travel/work.
The purpose of casinos is to entertain.

No, although many people go there for entertainment. The purpose of casinos is to separate suckers from their money.
Intel, Venture-Capital Firms To Make $3.5B In US Investments
Which zip codes span multiple states?
We are a UK micro software business who have developed software products for equity in a start-up before (although to be fair the guys we worked with were able to drum up half a million pounds in Angel investment). You could pitch us your idea in confidence to Mike at MYcartons.com (which is an email address that I can kill) - we will respond with a proper address to any initial contact.
I had this problem too. We had a whole closet filled floor to ceiling with boxes of stuff that hadn't been unpacked in over 5 years.

One Saturday afternoon, I pulled a box at a time out of the storage closet and the wife and I unpacked it onto the livingroom floor.

Each item either:
1) Got placed in the "we will use it within 3 months"

2) Can sell for at least $20

3) Freecycle / Goodwill / Salvation Army

4) Trash

I made 10 trips to our dumpster and 2 to Goodwill. (Am now working on selling the $20/each items)

What am amazing relief. I had no idea how much that huge pile of boxes was weighing down the back of my mind.

So far, we've encountered 2 things we regretted ditching. Honestly though, the only reason we regret it is that we know we had those things. If we hadn't unpacked those boxes I would almost certainly have bought them simply because I didn't even remember they were in a box "just in case I need it someday"
The First YC Conference
Please tell me I'm not the only one that thought this would be about password salting and not table salt.
I used to work for a company that had a large number of constantly-AB tested web forms that required an address, and we tried auto-filling the state (and state/city) from ZIP, as well as only asking for ZIP and it actually dropped our conversion rates, in every case.

Our data could have been inaccurate in some cases (but I seem to remember testing a few hundred addresses vs google's geocoder and getting correct results).

The demographic wasn't very tech focused, so it could be that they were either weirded out, or (in surprisingly many cases) just didn't know their zip code.

Anyway, just make sure to test this before blindly assuming that it increases usability in your case.
Sweet. I'm in!
So you basically agree that it is designed to sway the opinions of people who don't like to think hard about what they hear?

Another place I know parables from is the bible. Does that mean I have to be religious?
There is no exact way to pump it out. No part of the Zip code actually comes down to a city.

[#][##][##]
[State][County/Parish][Area]

Instead you should be giving your users a choice made on exact facts instead of probabilities.
Internet Freedom: Beyond Circumvention
I've lately found myself doing more of this, rather than switch statements or if/else. It works when you find yourself in a function that does only that thing, but often, you're in much more complex function, and you're not ready to return a value. Should you split this code into it's own function, allowing this type of structure, or use the switch, or if/else? I don't add functions for reasons as weak as this, so in those cases, I still have to use 'else'.
IPhone developers angry as Apple purges adult apps
Ask HN: What questions should a business ask an ASP before signing up?
There have been quite a few discussions around here about experiences with different hosting and SaaS providers, but I have a more general question: what sorts of diligence questions should a business ask an ASP or email hosting service before signing them up? I'm more curious about ASP and email hosting than managed hosting companies. So rather than questions relating to how their infrastructure and business will keep my server or slice running (managed hosting), I'm thinking about situations where the provider has a shiny package of software/services that they have built their systems to run. I'm curious what sorts of questions people would ask to get more comfort that they've got their bases covered.

I've found myself wondering about security, data integrity, backups, DR, etc. for a number of these firms, and I can't help but wonder if there are questions I should be asking that I've missed. At the end of the day, it requires a leap of faith- but I'm guessing there are plenty of small businesses out there using these services who might not have the breadth of expertise to ask all the right questions before taking the leap.
I have friends who have always been very conscious of the monetary cost of items, but seemed to think space is free (that is, "hoarders"). They very recently began a transition away from that, triggered partly by the local health department and partly by a worsening medical condition leading to full-time wheelchair use. It's fascinating to see people who spent decades accumulating stuff suddenly getting rid of it and turning down new free stuff, all because their valuation of "space" changed.

One of the reasons simplicity is hard is that owning stuff has psychological connotations for everyone involved. A digitial copy of your photograph or document "in the cloud" seems less permanent and less under your control than one on your hard drive, which itself seems less so than a physical copy -- and this perception is at least partly mistaken. Those seeking control and "certainty" may still accumulate paper copies far beyond what is reasonable, all because they have a psychological desire to do so.

IMO, it all boils down to how we value space, time, money, effort/frustration, certainty/risk, efficiency, and a whole host of other factors -- and how accurately we understand those factors. Remembering to account for "a few feet of counterspace" or "a week getting stuff done" are key to simple living.
I occasionally run into the (really) bad customers myself. Here's one:

* Doesn't know how to place an order through the website, so I write out a step-by-step tutorial of what to click to do so. It's rather short, as checkout is a one-form process with about 5 fields.

* E-mails me back that it doesn't work and I'm clearly discriminating against him for some reason.

* I reply with apologies and a screencast showing how to place an order.

* E-mails me back that his credit card was declined and I must be doing it on purpose. The mail to me is carbon copied to the White House and to the FBI.

* I e-mail him back that this is completely untrue, and his card was declined because the billing address provided wasn't correct according to his bank.

* He e-mails me back a week later telling me that he is going to "bring suit under Federal child custody interference laws" as my not accepting his order is harming his "ability to provide for his son". This mail is carbon copied to the White House and to Senator John McCain. I decide at this point to ignore the mail entirely.

* He forwards the same mail to me 6 times from multiple e-mail addresses, each time carbon copied to another government agency and random senators. I continue to ignore these mails.

* Two months later he sends a fresh set of e-mails, reiterating that he will have to sue me under some federal acts for failing to help his business, saying that "this is a hate crime" because it is "only hate" that I would not accept his order, and carbon copying the mail to USA TODAY's editor e-mail and some address I don't recognize @whitehouse.gov
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZIP_code#By_geography check the unordered list at the bottom of that section
All my old phones had stupid features which caused them to accidentally dial 911 about once a year while bouncing around my pocket.

One of the greatest things about the iPhone is that it doesn't seem to have this propensity.
You might be surprised. I used to think I would never get rid of any books. At some point after N moves and a decade of my decor being dominated by bookshelves I decided I no longer needed to own every book I had ever read in my life. I sold most of my text books on Amazon, except for my intro college science texts which I gave, along with most of my pop-sci books, to someone who worked with gifted high school students so he could pass them along. Most of the rest of the books went to a local used bookstore, or to the library. I kept my favorite books by my favorite authors; only the stuff I was sure I would reread. And, it turns out, I don't miss any of the books I got rid of.
This is why I almost exclusively use COND in lisp. Each clause has the condition explicitly spelled out and I am much less likely to err.
Scrolling Google Maps like elements: Doesn't the iPhone use a two finger scroll for this?

Only seeing drop down menus and interface elements when you hover over them: Make them respond to a click as well as a hover. (and I think Facebook does this already, I certainly remember having to click to get the log out link)

I think that's all the objections answered. Did I miss anything?
The Management Reality Distortion Field is not required to be consistent.
yeah, it's just weird not having CBC cover the olympics
No reason to incorporate, that will just be a waste of time at this point. Better than trying to find out how to make enough money to hire someone or how to land vc money, just learn to code or make some friends.

Most startup incubators won't fund startups founded by a team lacking developers. Learn to code - Idea people with coding skills are dangerous in the long run.
To tweet or not to tweet
I'm just kind of wondering what the OP found at 7-11 to put the mole ON. It was unidentifiable from the picture. Also, I was sure they would have gone with some sort of salsa instead of spaghetti sauce. When they were saying "What has tomatoes and garlic and onions and liquid already in it?" I was like, oh, he's going to use sals... WHAT? No, not spaghetti sauce!
If You’re Passionate About Something, You Can Make a Living From It Online
χdb: A didactic RDBMS
Are you saying we should just leave it?
Learning about our customers
Sorry for taking so long to get back to you. Thanks for the reply.

What about if it's not a public company? That is, 2 or 3 people and an LLC?
A few more reasons to use Progressive Enhancement
Apple's stance on multitasking and why most tech users are clueless
Command and Conquer Classic Games Downloadable for free.
I've spent a lot of money traveling and I've never regretted a single dollar of it.
Three reasons: it sounds reasonable, because the eye muscles are probably not 'designed' for prolonged use in short distance focus. Second, I've seen similar things mentioned from other sources, which also seemed credible. Third, my experience - I can't abuse my eyes the way I did twenty years ago, and the "pause and look at a distant thing" seems to help. Actually, I prefer 20 yards/meters or more, instead of just 20 feet.
To do be basic GUI testing, you don't actually need to test aesthetics, just some basic morphological/topological perperties like "is this button touching that button", "is this window visible?" etc.

But this is not likely to happen either.

Part of the problem with making a windowing system query-able is that your talking about a number of distinct components that each separately paint themselves onto the screen. The screen's properties vary by system's configuration, the graphics driver, and the size of the overall window being painted. Sure, all of those components could be rewritten so at least relationships like "above" and "beside" and "touching" could be queried. But this stack involves hardware vendors, OS creators and software tool vendors. Moreover, hardware vendors and OS creators wouldn't want add anything that got in the way of performance since that's their main claim to fame.
What's In A Name? For Startups, It's Crucial
I would pay money to attend such a thing. Is this open to the public, or invite only? Not a whole lot of details listed here.
Q&A with Google's 'green energy czar' on sustainable computing
Death by Duck-Typing
> The harder the experts try to save Americans, the fatter we get. We followed their admirable advice to quit smoking, and by some estimates we gained 15 pounds apiece afterward. The extra weight was certainly a worthwhile trade-off for longer life and better health, but with success came a new challenge.

Huh? I think that that's a rather poor example of "oh noes! public health officials have no idea what they are doing!"
"ramifications of poorly-constructed SQL"

Surely the best defense against this is writing every query yourself rather than letting Rails do it? (As implied in the article).

My argument isn't Ruby execution speed vs PHP execution speed, it's Ruby writing it's own SQL vs me writing it.

I agree 100% that the database is usually the bottleneck, it certainly is for my site.
Good question :) Well that is one of those things that we just stock up on at the grocery store: chicken breasts. I was originally going to see if I could ONLY cook with stuff from 7-11 but that proved impossible for me when I want to include meat. Since 7-11 only carries things like bacon. Which is yummy nonetheless.

So I expanded my rules to be like "if I'm at a grocery store by chance and stock up on some staples" then those can be used. I just want to get away from the habit of getting a recipe and writing out the list of stuff I need then having to hope we find the time in the next couple days to actually buy that list. This way, we use what we have more often.

And yep, might have used salsa if I had some. But we had pasta sauce on hand already.
Become your own developers by learning to program.
Tell HN: Mixergy Interviewing Heyzap (YC W09),  Etacts (YC W10)
Top 7 SEO lessons for start ups along with Y Combinator Rand Fishkin slides
> While you might look around and see the signs of diversity, how often do you have a conversation with someone who has totally different goals and aspirations to yourself?

If you are interested in doing so, you have the opportunity.
You wouldn't if you were living in Kansas.

You seriously believe that London's ethnic and cultural diversity isn't a genuine attraction for many who end up there, nor a genuine asset for the city?
TLDR: Touchscreens are different from desktops. I don't have an iPad, but I doubt Apple considered this.
ditto. I'm the same way in my lisp code. It's almost the only conditional I use. Well... maybe condp as well.
Peace is what we need - This is so touchy
Mobile Audio
This is very similar with my experience with the N1. The screen sensitivity problems and outdoor screen visibility were too great of issues to ignore and I returned the phone for refund.

One additional comment about the scroll ball and hardware buttons is that the UX is poor when used in landscape mode and now you have to move your finger in a different position to perform the same task.
> Are you saying we should just leave it?

I don't know what you mean.

I'm saying that you'll understand what Mark is talking about after you've gotten married and had children and want to keep your family intact.
It sounds like it's only open to YC founders (and invited guests) based on the following: The speakers were completely open, because they knew they didn't have to worry about someone cherry picking quotes in a blog post to make them look bad.
It works for us.
Now I want to do YC just to get into these conferences.
The conference was incredibly useful. I'm looking forward to more of these.
I just finished reading "The Happiness Hypothesis" by Jonathan Haidt which has an interesting discussion of what "diversity" means and this post reminded me of that.

Haidt argues there's two kinds of diversity: demographic and moral.

People who want demographic diversity are arguing for he inclusion of previously excluded groups.

Moral diversity is a lack of consensus on normal norms and values, and Haidt argues no one can coherently want moral diversity (e.g., if you are pro-life, how can you want there to be a diversity of views on abortion with none dominating?)

In his article Patrick touches on this I think. Some people want Silicon Valley to be more demographically diverse for reasons of justice; but they would not feel comfortable if that diversity led to moral diversity. People want to associate with others who think and believe like themselves.
Breaking Weak CAPTCHA in 26 Lines of Python Code
The Java 7 Features Bound to Make Developers More Productive — Developer.com
Coincidentally, the first step is to go shopping.
The Bucky Bar Unsolicited Architecture
A molecular millisecond
Yeah, there were a lot of anecdotes ("one time, when I was working for company X..."). It was very useful to see concrete examples of how different companies have handled (or mishandled!) a wide range of SEO problems, but of course also very obvious why this stuff could only be talked about off the record.
Here's a related take on why there are no more women in startups from an evolutionary perspective.

In reproduction, which is what evolution is made of, men and women are very different. A woman can only have one baby every nine months, and realistically maybe every other year. This limits her choices for reproduction so she has to find the right man for the job meaning someone that has the resources to take care of the kid and make sure he grows up and has offspring. Men on the other hand can reproduce as much as they like given they can find a willing woman. This has some interesting consequences on evolutionary selection.

- Women are risk averse and look for security, knowing that they only have a few shots at successful propagation.

- Since men can have many women, but women can have only one man (a women with many men will not produce more offspring, but a man with many women will) the offspring of the men will be unequally divided. The bottom of the pack won't have any offspring at all while the top of the pack will have a lot. Ghengis Khan had lots of children with many wives, and so do people with harems. This means there are men that have no offspring at all.

- Women look for men that can take care of their offspring. They care more about them since they have fewer chances than men do. This is why women go for rich men, and why only rich men have harems.

What this means is that a woman is somewhat guaranteed to find a man that she can produce offspring with if she is conservative in her choices, and that she will tend to mate with the most successful man she can find. Men, on the other hand, don't have this guarantee and have to play a risky game of trying to make it to the top. The more success a man has the more women will want to mate with him. On the other hand if he is conservative there's a risk he won't find anyone to mate with at all thus ending his gene pool.

I think this combined with Patrick's post explains pretty clearly why there are no more women in Silicon Valley. It's simply too risky.
This is similar to Return ASAP. http://patrickallaert.blogspot.com/2008/10/readable-php-code...

Reading that prompted a major change in my coding style, and in my opinion, a major improvement in readability.
I seriously believe that when people say they want "diversity," what they mean is:

1) People where I currently am aren't like me, so if I go somewhere more 'diverse,' there will be more people like me

2) And the restaurants will be better

EDIT: That's meant as a generalization, BTW, not a pop-psych analysis of anyone in the thread.
The Point-and-Click Botnet: Allowing beginners to craft sophisticated attacks
Exactly, I think the prevalence of to-do list type apps shows a huge bias in the startup world. Looking at the successful website few of them target people building startups. EX: Facebook / Twitter (extroverts and stalkers), EBay (people who have or want stuff), Google (people looking for things), Fark (people with nothing to do).

IMO, the most important questions are “what type of person would actually use this?” and “Why would they use this?”