skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Perhaps instead HN could adopt a Creative Commons license for comment text; that way no permission would be needed, and it seems like the Right Thing anyway.
Ah man, too bad. It says live coverage on the site.
M. C. Escher is a genius. I was so inspired by his Circle Limit drawings, that I've been working on an iPhone puzzle game.

Early Prototype Here: www.circull.com

The math isn't that difficult to understand. Circle inversions are analogous to reflections about a line in 2d Euclidian geometry. It's fun stuff.
Yet he doesn't realize he's supporting Adobe and Flash...
"As our ability to search for media content improves, the economic value of that content will approach zero."

In simple words, he's just saying:

Piracy makes your content worth nothing.

I just don't think this is true. Piracy has been rampant in movies, but movies continue to make money in theaters, pay-per-view, netflix, or just good old TV.
$1000 will definitely sort you out with macbook. Be sure you get the education pricing when you buy it. I think you'll actually be able to get the macbook for $900. Theres also the 'buy a mac, get a 8gb ipod touch' special happening now, which is a pretty nice bonus for buying a mac around this time.
IF they find out somehow, though, providing false information on an application/resume is grounds for termination almost everywhere.
Apache Libcloud Slides from Open Source Bridge
I agree that's the key part. However, perhaps the reason upgrades are so slow is that Google is moving too fast for OEMs. Their profit margin on these Android phones is lower because they're more powerful and costly than the typical Symbian phone. No other phones (Blackberry, Sidekick) require them to be as involved in updating software. Apple ships iPhone OS updates via iTunes, not AT&T or Samsung.

I think we'll see a fundamental testing of the limits of Android fragmentation this year as OEMs have to support so many different phones, starting from various points on 2.x. At what point will they cut off a phone as too old for updates? Will it be similar to Windows where you have an extended support period with only security fixes? Who patches security flaws in your browser on a G1 running 1.6 in 2011? HTC?
Ask HN: How do you license music for web only playback?
As expected, Lala shut down today.

I already miss streaming entire albums on Lala for free (for the first time). My Tuesday morning ritual for the longest time has been to listen to new albums on Lala before deciding whether or not to buy.

What would it take to bring just that feature (1x free album stream) back? Would that model even be sustainable? How do you license music for web only playback and what would the costs associated with it be? Will iTunes put out an embeddable player like Lala's?

(I've been working on a music related side project and I thought HNers might be interested in this void the Apple/Lala deal left behind.)
> little of the software I'm using handled the exceptions raised while this was happening

Are saying there is a library you are using that failed to treat a timeout as an issue at all? (if this is for SQS, may I ask what that library is?)
The market is efficient. When this sort of thing starts causing real problems, the problem will be made to go away. He just need to pick on the wrong big company, and patents are all over.
WorldofNokia.co.uk closes citing ‘nothing to write about’
correct. Any suggestions would be appreciated
The dumbest ad ever.
Solid scientific concepts don't need to be packaged, managed and sold to the public.

Many people understandably belive that they do need that when such concepts are opposed by well funded industry lobby groups and everyone's preference for not having to change their lifestyle.
I much prefer reading from paper books. Even when I read my kindle, I just don't absorb as much info as I do from a physical book. Reading on the web is a whole other story, that I don't remember anything.
In Case They Didn't Come Back From the Moon
Congratulations! Best of luck on whatever comes next.
Cool. Good work on the site anyway, I had a quick look at it and it seems like a nice and easy way to learn haskell.
It puzzles me how an already extremely wealthy man, who is described as being a family man also, would care so little about his legacy and how he is remembered.

It's not so much how the world tolerates these people - how do these people tolerate themselves?

I can imagine doing some pretty seedy stuff in desperation, but the people participating in shenanigans like this are usually very intelligent, wealthy, and already successful. Surely they have higher-level goals (e.g., leaving a proud legacy, making the world better, etc) than merely more cash?

This reminds of the story of the creation of the Nobel Prize: a Parisian paper accidentally published Nobel's obituary early, and having read it he became concerned with being remembered as a merchant of death (being the inventor of TNT). It's one of the main drivers of why he established the prize. Surely smart, already successful people care about what they leave behind?
Hanns.G's are always very, very reasonable -- I picked up 2 x 1920x1200 (if memory serves) 28.5" Hanns.G from Best Buy last year at about 399 each. Ridiculous price. They're still working nicely too. I think you can still get them around.
I'll let you know when we write that post :)
Have any of you become sick of computers at any time in your life?
It seems I have become absolutely disgusted with computers for the most part. Though my entire career is based on them, so there is no real escape. Have any of you experienced the same thing and if so, how did you work around it?
To be fair, I've been using that joke for years.
If you consider rotation, the iPhone currently has 4 resolutions and will soon have 6. There's also the expanded green status bar during calls, a red one during voice recording, and another color for background VoIP apps in 4.0 -- so it'll really be 12 resolutions.

The real difference is that with iPOS, Apple doesn't expect developers to automatically handle new device resolutions, and no developer expects to not be informed of new resolutions. Android developers are expected to use fluid layouts, and don't expect to be able to keep up with the release of new and customized devices by a bevy of semi-incompetent manufacturers.
> Nobody in their right mind would even consider this.

I am.

I figure, either you can be part of the problem, or part of the solution. It's so easy to just sit back and complain about the way things are all the time, but it's much more interesting to actually try to change them.

'Sides, it would be a good introduction to dealing with municipal governments, and that could be useful.
Advice on Beggining a Career as a Freelance Web-Developer.
Can I buy both of you guys a beer, talk things over, and make up?
What about a freemium model where you could purchase optional support, like MySQL?
True, but commercially speaking they're the minority.
Definition of Irony: The new 'Nimble' content report from Razorfish is in Flash.
Yeah that is a risk. But if they're unaware that he's lightly tasked, would they be likely to realize that he's working on a side project 6 hrs a day?
It's very common for newer releases of SDK toolchains to drop support for targeting older SDKs. Apple has done the same thing with OS X several times.
You say "boring", I am going to assume that is accurate. ("Overruled by idiots" isn't boring, it's frustating, and I'm assuming that while that may annoy you it is not the core problem.) Try to automate away the boring; its what software engineering is for. If you're writing the same code over and over again, that means it's ripe for refactoring.

If this doesn't apply to you, well, I'm sure somebody reading will find it helpful. If you're a "software engineer" and writing the same code every day, stop! Don't do that. It's bad engineering. Write better abstractions. You'll learn something.
This is just my personal experience with friends who had add. My previous 2 roommates at two different places were taking ADD pills. Somehow after their pills ran out they kept complaining how they're not gonna be able to do their homework, study, etc, yet they were able to sit and play complicated computer games for hours on end.
If you're a trial lawyer with a family you don't have the time to be very introspective. There is also a class of people who don't give a fuck about the world, they are just here to win a game. New York is filled with these types.
yes I did. At that point I bought a little stone house in France, in a remote mountainous region called Auvergne. I made a vegetable garden and fixed the house up for a year. Then I felt better and returned to computer ;-)
Even if the standard said SQL92, the only practical, shippable embedded SQL database today is SQLite. I don't think browser vendors are itching to implement their own SQL databases (or if they did, that they would be any more interoperable than the various relational databases today).

So realistically, if we go the SQL route, what will get is SQLite. SQL is a great language and SQLite is a great implementation. But Mozilla knows what happens in the long term when we end up with a web standard that is actually defined by a single implementation: It becomes very hard for anyone else to implement the standard interoperably, or for the standard to evolve by design rather than by accident.

Programming languages are the most complicated standards of all. SQL is good, but Mozilla thinks it's better to give up the advantages of embedded SQL for a lower-level API that is more standardizable, and doesn't add another language to the web stack. (The language we have now - JavaScript - is just starting to be truly interoperable itself.) IndexedDB can and will be backed by SQLite, and the SQL language can be built back on at the JavaScript layer where it will be portable to both SQLite- and non-SQLite backends.

ActiveJS already includes a SQL parser/compiler in pure JavaScript for its in-memory datastore: http://activerecordjs.org/
I'm not really sure if the author is correct about what's happening. That all depends on exactly how much of Panasonic's revenue comes from selling professional quality SLR cameras versus its cheaper point-and-shoot models. Anyway, I don't think that sales of the former are in any kind of jeopardy because of cell phone cameras.
Yes, IndexedDB is a lower-level API. As the article says, we think it's both practical and desirable to implement SQL on top of IndexedDB. I think this is a harder but better path to a true interoperable standard, for the reasons I outlined here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1396453
http://www.ascap.com/weblicense/ and http://bmi.com/licensing/website/ or negotiate with the labels? I think.
“The good story about nonpracticing entities is that they are developing liquidity in the market for these patent rights,” he said.

Good fucking god. Have we become so beholden to capitalist buzzwords even after the financial wizards stole reams of cash from the taxpayers and made it impossible for the middle class to afford a home, that we unequivocably deem "liquidity" to be a good thing?

Before making such statements there has to be some analysis of whether the sale of said "asset" is beneficial to society in any way—doubly so in the case of government-granted monopolies. Otherwise we may as well just jump right to urging serial killers to become hitmen so we can add liquidity to the murder market and boost the GDP.
Top 20 selling apps in the Apple store[1]. A quick perusal will convince most people. I didn't check all of them, but I saw ONE which used standard display components at all in the screenshots (the guitar one), and it only does so for setting preferences.

Think it's coincidence?

[1] : http://www.macrumors.com/c.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.c...

edit: and again. Pixel art. 3D / vector art isn't the only kind, you know. Just look at any favicon, for example.
The aws-s3 gem was throwing an exception correctly after a fairly long timeout ("We encountered an internal error. Please try again.")

But none of the software that was using the aws-s3 gem or causing it to be called caught the exception. I ended up with exceptions getting thrown all over the place, mostly in views from methods on data coming out of models (Rails was catching it at the top-level as ActionView::TemplateError)
VC investments in education
Who would do the invites, or rather, who would administer the invitation process? As someone who hasn't done any programming since Fortran 77, I'm not sure I would meet the selection criteria. :o)
That's a rather extreme point of view. There might be contractual obligations for him to stay (being sued isn't nice even if it won't kill you) or personal reasons (as stated in the edits), family, friends and loved ones. "Breaking free" from a family is not what most people want to do.
The author of this article seems to totally forget that Microsoft sells something other than Windows.
Hi Jmathai,
Best feedback about this sort of thing is often some questions.

I guess my main question for you would be: Why would people do this on Facebook when most educational institutions (Stanford included I suppose) already offer curriculum management software?

Cheers
Dan
The true entrepreneurial lesson to be learned from this is that the opportunity is ripe for someone package up the side effects of these patents into complicated IP instruments nobody understands and become the market leader in patent trolling derivative trading.
"it won't be the same 320x480 device anymore."

Well, it'll be 640x960 which is a nice integer multiple of the current iPhone resolution, allowing older apps to remain visibly unchanged without and code changes. As for the iPad, it's distinguished from the iPhone and iPod touch not by its resolution but by its size, necessitating new UI for that reason alone. I expect Apple to continue along these lines, requiring UI designs tailored to a few physical screen sizes, using integer multiples of existing resolutions to insulate developers from these changes.
Wouldn't you agree with the general idea that Microsoft has lost their ability to successfully innovate and release products that anyone cares about? They've failed so many times in the past decade that their reputation is greatly tarnished. They may still be making money from entrenched customers, which means ongoing profits, but you have to be nervous when there horizon looks so bleak.
Is it possible the OP 'cannot' (or more specifically does not want to) switch because they're waiting for options to mature, or something similar?

That's one reason I've seen people stick out jobs for a few more months.
I guess this explains why Unfuddle was down earlier today.
Apple tries to bring order to a world of online chaos
Google Wave is insanely slow, trying to look through these pages is hell (using Chromium).
Great post but, If this equation was all it took for VCs to switch their attention away from software, biotech, and energy maybe they would also be investing a lot in social services, retirement homes, and other growing sectors of the economy. I think you miss the point that VCs are not just after market size, they are primarily interested in value creation through strong cash flows and large profit margins which are not strong in the educational sector.
Dan
Odd, it's a guy who's not nor has ever been a freelance web developer giving advice on how to become a freelance web developer.
My interest in computers waxes and wanes, but in the past 20 years I have never felt sick or disgusted. Maybe the week here and there that I take off is enough, or maybe I just haven't reached that point yet.
On a related note, I was just remarking to a friend today about how hard this oil spill is to think about without seeing any sort of visual diagrams of the well, what the seafloor looks like, where the relief wells would be drilled, etc. These sort of visual aids have been conspicuously absent in mostly everything I've seen about this catastrophe.
A poignant reminder that Tor is just one of many tools and practices necessary to maintain security and privacy.

I remember during Wired's "Vanish" contest ( http://www.wired.com/vanish/2009/11/ff_vanish2/ ), the guy on the run was using Tor. As such, there was talk about setting up a bugged Tor exit node with lots of reported bandwidth to try to intercept his Gmail sessions. I ran the odds (figuring his client chose exit nodes at random), and there was a decent chance that his traffic would have been captured at least once over the month of the contest. Unfortunately, someone pointed out that it ran afoul of wiretap laws. And the SSL MITM shenanigans to try to capture his email password would definitely have been illegal. So the idea was shelved.
I've never tried them, and I'm not even sure how I feel about them, but you might want to try some of the 'Executricks' mentioned in this article:

http://blog.trailmeme.com/2010/04/four-hour-workweek-or-exec...

" “retire at work,” develop an under-the-radar personal brand, and achieve covert lifestyle design."
Does that mean that Apple is the authoritarian and Microsoft the anarchist? ;-) I know that's a bit of a mental shortcut here but it is an interesting idea, isn't it?
How is this conflict of interest? They were eavesdropping on private tor communication, albeit morally questionable action.

Either way I lost most of my respect for them long time ago, they are not much different from other news organization, they just put a sensationalist spin to their news. Take whatever they give with a grain of salt and understand that they are only portraying one side of the story.
Yes, a few times during my life. I never really left the computer but I did start some parallel activities which are fun. Parachuting, kung-fu, eletric guitar.

I never quit suddenly, going days without turning on the computer. But I do wonder sometimes if this is the best use of my time. Is it really worth typing this to you? Why the hell am I not at least trying to have sex with two world misses?

In the end, I've decided that I quite like my life the way it is. I love my fiancee and I plan to have four kids with her.

I guess it's matter of finding what you want. Now, knowing what you do NOT want is useful too. Just act on it. Start with a few things that you've ever wanted to do, like kung-fu in my case, and develop into a hobby, a passion, and maybe someday you'll earn money to do it.
Everyone using SQLite instead of trying to implement their own independent interoperable stuff would be fucking awesome. There is very little software that's anywhere I would say that about, but SQLite belongs in valhalla. Reimplementing it is too much wank even for the FSF to muster.

Anyone telling me that they were going to implement their own SQLite (especially a browser vendor) and ship it to millions of users to run untrusted unsanitized input would get my door smashed into the face, their nose broken and bleeding. They would deserve it.
I wonder how many decades it will be before the laws concerning copyright, patents, and all things related are updated to reflect the realities of the information age. I don't see things getting better anytime soon.
None of these will help if "we're adding a desktop, get rid of all desktop apps" order comes from the top, and that's not a single mistake, that's a strategy.
re:1 - No. If the page is primarily content based rather than app based then a fixed width design may well be the best thing for the user; the readability of a design is heavily effected by the interrelationship between factors such as type size, line length, line height etc. Changing the line length without effecting any other aspect of the design can easily have an adverse effect on readability. If your user's primary task is reading, you have just done your users a disservice.

While some fixed width designs are because the designer went nuts with the rasters and making it scale is hard, many designers are doing it for good reason.

[citation needed ;) ]
I do not like this guy.
I certainly can't think of a lonelier place to die than the moon.
> Reimplementing it is too much wank even for the FSF to muster

This must be a typo, becaus nothing is too much wank for the FSF. :)
Thanks for the great summary. IANAL, but I've been wondering lately if it wouldn't be prudent to borrow from the Lanham Act and try to add a requirement to US patent law that patents must always be defended by their owners or they're invalidated. What do you think?
Good post - check this out for aerials of the disaster on the coast:
http://healthygulf.org/201005281321/blog/bp-s-oil-drilling-d...
I trust my friends to organize an intervention if they ever find me sending them pictures of pizza joints (especially real time) or calling them "peeps".
Which shows a serious flaw with the contest. The only people you would go to these lengths to avoid would be someone from the government or a criminal organization. Those are exactly the two groups who either don't have the law apply to them, or are willing to break the law.
Does anyone have recommendations on which of these to watch?
BP's also denying the existence of large underwater oil plumes that have been spotted by many science vessels:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/06/bp-denies-existence-...
Good One. So ... what did you do at Google?
Change the reason that you can't switch. I can only think of two legitimate reasons.

1) Switching requires moving to an entirely new town where you have no friends and no family. I'd double check that this is actually true and start working on building up a social network in a different metropolitan area if this were the case.

2) Immigration reasons.

Anything else? Options are never a certain "win" (think about lack of an exit, reverse splits, stock taking a dive). Worried about what your resume will look like? Worry less about your resume, worry more about yourself. Worried about loss of income? Don't just quit the job, search passively. "Counted on" to ship a product? Announce your departure in advance (more than the usual two weeks), hand your responsibilities over to others. Starting bonuses you will have to pay back? Money isn't worth not having something to wake up for in the morning.

So, honestly, switch. However, before you make the switch, very carefully think what is that you will be looking for in your next position and how to verify that it provides that.

People claim that you should "work to live" not "live to work". I call bullshit. Your work consumes plurality of your day and majority of your own waking hours. When I feel underused, micro-managed or otherwise unhappy at work, it means I am not looking forward to waking up in the morning. Personal projects are important (and I try to have several even when I am absorbed in interesting work), but they happen at the end of the day when you've already given up your best hours.