skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Actually, its a little strange that they would do this for a spreadsheet program. Spreadsheets are, by nature functional, and would yield themselves to approaches like quickcheck.

http://www.cs.chalmers.se/~rjmh/QuickCheck/

It would also help to know what exactly the tests were about. One could always write tests that test (tautology) the same invariant.
Business to consumer media businesses makes the advertiser money, in that the increase in sales revenue should exceed the cost of advertising or they won't keep buying ads. The other consumer businesses you cite--consumer products, retail, automobiles--are typically sold through distribution, and the distributor makes money on the markup. Home construction is somewhere between a service and a craft business.
Thanks, this is a helpful collection of rails resources!

A bit off topic, but is nickb really PG? The whole April fools thing went over my head.
Are Multithreaded Servers Faster Now?
"... Some reasonable points, especially if you're already committed to Django as a platform. .."

Not really. There are some aspects of Django that really suck. Complex template logic for one . I really appreciated the simplicity of webpy after wading through the django api. On a side note, friendfeed's (Bret Taylor) ~ http://bret.appspot.com/entry/experimenting-google-app-engin... worked on google appengine. When he built friendfeed he chose webpy as a starting point. There is a lesson somewhere in there. They key thing is I can use CGI, webpy or django so I'm not bound to any one choice.

"... I hope you're right about being able to salvage your user data, but I would study both the license agreement and the technical capabilities very closely on this one. It would be a shame to build an early site thinking it was just a starting point and then discover that you could never change key aspects of it. ..."

Good points I'll have to think about them. The one that will matter most will be the user information. The app I have in mind is a design tool of sorts that generates object code for users. I don't think appengine as it is will work for the back-end ideas I have but who knows if users really want this?
I see it a lot when I get down to the 5th page or so. Yes, I am really a nub with nothing better to do than hope that there is a 6th or 7th page of submissions on here :-) I really can't get enough of this site.
The Webbernet is the next big thing!
On Leaving Google
What I Hate About the Internet - Everyone is a "Social Media Consultant"
Agreed. I think that the perception is that Google's biz model is less than transparent to the uninitiated consumer who doesn't understand what, exactly they are giving up in exchange for any one of hundreds of free services on the internet (eyeballs to advertiser, privacy) It's for the good of these huddled masses that the mavens breathlessly shuttle the news to the masses. "It's people! Google makes money by delivering people!"
I frequently get interrupted while writing comments and finish them a few minutes later, so I get bitten by this all the time.
Hey, next to ramen rice was my cheapest form of food.
It's hacker news because it's bad news for a ton of people living on the edge of starvation, and something smart caring minds like ours might just be able to fix.
With so much activity on YC last week regarding FaceBook - it should at least be mentioned that one good reason FB is garnering a $15 billion valuation is they had the confidence/balls to turn down the early offers.

Microsoft noticed and placed their bet accordingly.

If you turn down one billion and keep growing, then you get a much higher valuation the next time around.
That's a great quote, but I can't find the source. Do you have one?
I applied a while back they said "get some traction"
Standing Behind Your Product Means Admitting When You Are Wrong
I disagree Google had a number. It was clear from many stories that they were really not interested in selling at all, so they would throw around some outrageous number (knowing it was outrageous), so nothing would happen.

Calling such a person a seller-but-for-the-price is incorrect, IMHO.
From my limited experience, I'd say most hacking is using the results from research to get shit done - Not that hacking isn't great, its just not generally research. However, it'd be pretty hard to "hack" a new filesystem without a research component. But designing a website doesn't usually involve much research (learning a framework isn't research in the sense i'm trying to describe). Designing a new web framework could be research because you need to test different ways of doing things and people might use your results.

Where normal design and normal engineering turn into research isn't the easiest thing to define. Man, this comment isn't working out as well as I'd hoped.
I don't think that "hacking" is fundamentally different than research, in the sense that they're both forms of problem solving. The difference is one of purpose and mind-set: a good researcher is more interested in proof-of-new-concept than in implementation and polish.

"Is going though a structured process or some kind of apprenticeship to a good researcher a necessity?"

Theoretically? No. Ideas are ideas. Anyone can have good ones.

Practically speaking? Yes. If nothing else, you need the time and training to become familiar with your field, the terminology and protocols in common use, and the boundaries that define interesting problems. Furthermore, most cutting-edge research is expensive; you need the apprenticeship before anyone will take you seriously enough to give you the money needed to do interesting work.
Biofuel Subsidies Contributing to Rising Food Prices
no comments on the page - just wanted to give russel props for pursuing his dream and then putting himself out there when it didn't materialize. From the sound of it many people would have quit long before he did.
@Russel: thanks for sharing your story.
New Media Douchebags Explained
cf. New Media Douchebags (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSP8xm_gaK4)
I don't doubt that most competent self-taught hackers could learn to do CS research if they were interested. A passionate interest in the learning new things, without waiting for someone else to teach you, is fundamental to teaching yourself to hack, and that same attitude is the main component of doing research. imho the biggest difference between hacking and doing 'research' is the mental shift from building something to creating new knowledge, whether it is a way of solving a problem, or something more abstract.

The most valuable things I've gotten out of the formal process has been the built-in mentorship provided by a good supervisor, the community of fellow students, and the opportunity to work on something with no immediate economic value. If you have the time/money, and don't mind harassing strangers via email you can get some of that without going to school for it. Still, if that mentorship, community, and money wasn't valuable, no one would be applying to ycombinator.
you need the apprenticeship before anyone will take you seriously enough to give you the money needed to do interesting work.

Hmmm... perhaps not unlike venture capital a few years ago?

I wonder if we'll someday see some sort of YCombinator version of the NSF.
Furthermore, most cutting-edge research is expensive; you need the apprenticeship before anyone will take you seriously enough to give you the money needed to do interesting work.

This is a key observation. One of my advisors put it thus:

A PhD is just a union card. What you do with it is up to you.

You can use it to establish credibility in certain lines of work; you can use it to command a higher salary in industry; you can simply apply the things you've learned in some totally unrelated field. A surprising number of people choose the latter.
I read a lot, but I've only really noticed it when posting comments. I've got it maybe 3 times over the past week or two... which I guess is a lot, since I don't comment that often.
You're not old enough, it appears. I thought everyone knew how to use a template hacker and phreak all their LD calls back then :-)
I think spamming and black hat SEO tactics would make it tough to keep things fair, but if you could beat that problem sure.
He was teaching there for a bit but I think he lives in Silicon Valley.
Ok, agreed :-)
This is utter crap! How does he deal with the bully? Leaves the company..
Oh look, an Xoogler who got burned out by working on ads when it seemed like everyone else was working on cool stuff.

Who'dve thunk it?

I'm not going to judge his choice of startup. I applaud this guy's resolution to do what makes him happy, instead of taking the safe alternative at a mature company. Because for him it was obviously the right thing to do. Cheers!
Want to know if your song will be a hit? 
Platinum Blue Music offers musicians a service that will “tell you if your song has the “optimal mathematical patterns” to become a success, a necessary but not singly sufficient condition for having a hit.”
Unfortunately I can't name my sources, but they came closer to a deal than that.
Using text classifers on images
Cliaws - new ruby gem for command line access to s3
Almost every time I write a comment I get this error.

update: Including this time.
City places wireless tracking chips in garbage cans to monitor recycling habits...
They're highly valued?
Undercover blogger taped Obama's blunt remarks
"If VCs actually had solid conceptual frameworks and good data for evaluating possible opportunities, they could rely on that rather than on their peers' evaluations."

This is basically the argument for thesis driven investing. If you Google the term there is some good stuff, especially the posts by Bill Burnham and Fred Wilson.
At a 3 to 1 ratio (currently), it looks like we'll be seeing y'all at the StartupHappyDevHouse :)

Unlimited Beta Launch Party TBA later
Startup Lyrics
Google will be obsolete once the semantic web arrives ;)

I remember being pretty skeptical of Google. Better search seemed like a nice idea, but it wasn't clear how they were going to compete with the established players who all had more money, more users, more engineers, more features, etc. Also, Google wasn't the only company trying to build a better search engine. It seemed like there was a new one every month.
Because, at least according to a handful of VCs at DFJ, 70% of the work they do involves interacting with and convincing other people (usually people who can help their portfolio companies in some way, shape, or form).

In general, MBAs are better at this than those with technical training.

Further, a VC doesn't have to understand the intimate technical details of an opportunity to recognize that it is a valuable opportunity.

I'm not saying this makes for a good relationship with your VC, but that's why the equilibrium set of employees tends towards MBAs instead of PhDs.

However, I think you'll find that many VCs in the top-tier did engineering at undergrad, then got an MBA.
I was going to go to the party. Maybe next time. :)
Well, yes. But that isn't always the most useful paradigm for thinking about some of those businesses, and it doesn't always apply. When I go buy an iPod at an Apple store, what customer makes money off the purchase? When Safeway sells me a pork roast, what customer makes money off the purchase? When I subscribe to a premium account at ESPN, is there a customer that makes money off the purchase?

For manufacturers, it is certainly important to develop a value proposition for distributors and retailers. For ad-driven media businesses, it is critically important to develop a value proposition for advertisers. But it's at least as important to make something that people want. If you have a product that nobody wants, it doesn't matter how good the retail markup is. If you have a media property with no eyeballs, what good will really brilliant advertising packages do potential advertisers?
In the words of the inimitable Jeremy Clarkson, "That means that I've got to try to make what they've done, sound interesting."
Touching story about Wheeler
See the third paragraph: http://ycombinator.com/about.html
"And the men who hold high places / Must be the ones to start

To mould a new reality / Closer to the heart"
I totally agree. We aren't looking for $2M or $20k, we're looking for the $400k range. Let me know if/when your VC friends get with it.
If once = iff, that's the most optimistic assessment of Google I've ever read.
Bloggersmosaic the ript page
sometime all you want is space which is n't a blog or rss or front page
Need users to test yet another new Search Engine!
Hungry Founder Puts Mowser In The Deadpool
The Mind of an Angel Investor
Direct TV Simply Doesn't  Get Blogging (Video)
Marc <3 I, but here's an even more obvious reason:

it looks like MSFT wants to use YHOO's infrastructure to launch its own cloud computing platform (that doesn't suck). That means more competition for AWS and GAE, and that would be a massive net positive for startups that want to lower their fixed operating costs and consequently increase their freedom to dip their toes in risky waters.

(JMHO, as always)
High food prices, while detrimental to the urban poor, may be the best opportunity to pull subsistence farmers out of poverty and integrate them into the global economy.

That said, biofuel subsidies are really just an excuse for corn belt politicians to score votes at the expense of everybody else. Its corporate welfare that's good for nobody.
Top 10 traits of a rockstar software engineer
Great write up, agree 100%. My startup (getclicky.com) was seeking around $100K about a year ago. We talked to a lot of people but could only find anyone who was interested in a very small (<10K) or very large (>1M) investment. That's not what we wanted. At this point we have not taken a cent of investment and it has worked out fine, we're doing great on our own and it feels nice to own 100% of our company. But there is definitely a market for this medium sized investment that is not being fulfilled at all.
Alexis is a really funny guy. This took me back to Reddit's Startup School talk last year at Stanford. Alexis and Steve did a slideshow presentation, and it was hilarious.
Did we really choose a hackathon over free beer?
Sorry about that rms. Given your distant location, will you get a chance to stop by (if even briefly) at devhouse?
Yeah, I'll come to wherever the people are.
Dean Kamen (Segway Inventor) Solves the World's Water Problems
I love "Little Room." I could link to my blog post about it a while back, or blather some more, but I think I'll just play the song.
I feel as if the first part of that was somewhat related to the acquiring of Auctomatic.
VC take on Aesthetics in Software Products
AOL Buys Sphere - $25mm
I wonder - would it be technically feasible to page the continuations out to temporary files on the server? Kind of like cookies, but on the server instead of the client!
How about "Get a Life" by Freestylers?

http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?...

If that's not a startup anthem, I don't know what is.
Amichail, as much as I appreciate your sense of creativity, I sense that a lot of what you suggest doesn't solve any issues, or wouldn't even be something people find useful and enjoyable to use. Perhaps you're thinking about it too analytically. Take a more dumbed down approach, and be more critical of people's lives in general. You'll come up with a horde of relevant issues to remedy.
Palo Alto by Radiohead seems appropriate...

http://greenplastic.com/lyrics/paloalto.php
Among other things, this just proves the point: "the day job will be there for if your startup doesn't work out".

Well, at least he took a shot. Most people never get around to taking one.
Lindsay Mac has a song on her upcoming CD about business and change and rethinking our definitions of progress:

It's 1902 and the sky is not blue /
it's the familiar color of steel /
and the smoke from the stacks /
that will lay down the tracks /
of a country's birth at the wheel.

Suspended on high
with suspenders on tight
is a man connecting the beams /
of a building so big
it will rip up the seams
of a thousand competitor's dreams.

Intense fields of grain /
yes it's perfectly tamed /
for as far as the eye can see /
now a view from above /
where the prairie once was /
is perfectly right angled beams.

When he gets done from spraying
he finds the kids playing
in the pond with nets and fish line /
and they hoist up their prize
of a frog with three eyes
as they dance with delight at their find.

I'm finding it tough
to have just enough
when there's so much out there to try /
my affair with machines
is all for the dream
I might have just a little more time. When I tell you goodnight through the beam of a satellite
it seems like an awfully big bet /
to cut all the anchors to say its just human nature
it's all in the name of progress.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=zwAk6yusvFY

She also has a song called Lucy, which is about quitting your day job and following your dreams. You can actually stream it from http://www.lindsaymac.com
I tend to leave tabs open and when I come back later and click the more link the error often pops up.
As I clicked to vote "I spend a lot of time on YC and I'm seeing this a lot too." I just got and unknown or expired link error.....
Is the devhouse open to all? I'm not the best of hackers, so I'm not sure how I'd fit in with the vibe.
That's it Delancey Street Restaurant. Thanks for the correction :)

About the js meetup, we can't get everything hehe too many things to do at the same time. But I understand if some people can't come to the meetup.

Fred are you still up for the meetup the 19th? I wished I could stay until then.
The Cause by NOFX:

Isn't for the money
Nor is it for the fun
It's a plan, a scam, a diagram
It's for the benefit of everyone
You gotta have a little respect
Subterranean ideals
Traditional neglect
Reflect on how it would make you feel

The cause- we're just doing it for the cause

No it isn't for the fortune,
It isn't for the fame
It's a scheme, a dream, a barterine
We want everyone to think the same
Because you know what you know is right
And you feel what you can't ignore
And you try so hard to point the blame
A shame- what are we doing this for?

The cause- we're just doing it for the cause
The Avis Rule
Google now is a very large company, and no matter how much they try to make it fun, it is still a very large company, with all the politics, b,s, inefficenices, frustrations, and inability for developers to make large impacts.

Google is the new MS (well, the MS in the early/mid 90s). Talent will start hemorraging slowly and surely, and in 10-15 years it will be just like MS, or worse IBM.
Hate to break it to you, but the semantic web is a fairly tale, and is not arriving anytime soon.
You bet Paul, check out #3 on the following link: http://www.fitzblog.com/bid/2082/Seven-Startup-Lessons-from-...

I generally shy away from the numbered list blog format, but this is a classic read IMO.
I'm confused, this article says the third founder was Chris Slowe (in the picture) and not Aaron Swartz.
You don't need "business" cards.
Excellent article. I noticed recursively growing series all seemed to have the same ratio, but I didn't realize this was related to e. However, I did see e show up all over the place, which I didn't understand. Anyways, it's obvious I'll need to read more of your articles. I'd much prefer to understand the intuition behind mathematics than just learn the formulae so I can "get things done."

Regarding calc, I had a strange experience where I kept insisting calculus only logically works if it is based on infinitesimals, which I thought was obvious, but the people I was talking with insisted that it was based on limits. They couldn't understand that an infinitely small value has to be more than zero if an infinity of them is to add up to anything more than zero.

In general, my math education seems to have been particularly bad at dealing with infinity.
Sounds like you stuck with it as long as you could. Well done. Hope you learned a lot.
Ask pg: Can someone else use my startup school invite?
I and my friend both were accepted for startup school on April 19th. We were so much looking forward to attend but due to some emergency situation we both will not be able to attend. (We are still trying to figure out if we can.)

Can we change our RSVP at http://news.ycombinator.com/susrsvp ?

We both feel that if we can not attend then someone else should benefit.

Thanks
How you can control the internet? - A domain parking story
Holding off on early acquisition is a necessary but by no means sufficient condition of massive success.

That is, refusing early offers doesn't guarantee you'll be the next Google, but accepting one guarantees you won't.
moo.com! by far the coolest - everyone can be different and you can upload a library of a hundred snaps in one zip file.
It's not uncommon to hear not-coding Web people (that is, designers, marketers, what have you) refer to themselves as "creatives", and they often say it in a way meant to distinguish themselves from those who do write code.

It's a task to get them to see that writing software does, indeed, demand considerable creativity; it's akin to playing jazz or tending a garden or creating a unique supper.
note the ;)
I manage my own servers. it took a while to get it to a point where you could realy call it production servers. and I wouldn't have done it if I could have found hosting services that offered what I needed for a good price. but now that I have it's not bad.

The best alternative would be managed private servers.
Are there are DjangoConfs on the horizon?
Useful, Necessary, Beautiful: Shaker Design Philosophy
I saw an interesting statistic that while Americans work the hardest in the world they are not the most productive in their time use. Instead, Europeans are the most productive.

That being said, this doesn't mean Americans aren't the most productive overall, since Americans do work insanely long hours compared to Europeans.
Anyone know how this compares ($/life saved, or some other reasonable metric) to commonly-used water purification methods?
The other classic counterexample would be Be.
While the article may contradict his point, your cite doesn't.
China v Russia in the near future.
Video killed the ISP: Torrents of traffic and the Internet backbone
Has anyone done the analysis to see the cumulative result of the current global crises?
Right, I see.

I totally understand them...they were in a position to pick a number that said, "You know what, if someone actually puts this up, we can take the deal and have absolutely no regrets."

[If this stands to reason], it wasn't "outrageously high because they didn't want to sell"; it was just the true price.

They knew how enormous GOOG's potential was and acquirers didn't, hence the asymmetric information situation that leads to your thesis that "turning down reasonable offers is the most reliable test you could invent for whether a startup will make it big."

At least, that's how I'm reading it ;-)

Yay or nay, pg?
Nick Tredennick speaking on "Computing in Transition to Performance Per Watt" 16-Apr-08 @ Bay ACM
... in 10-15 years [Google] will be just like MS, or worse IBM.

Ugh, keep your vague abstractions on reddit.

To be qualified to make that assessment, you must be working at Google and have worked at MS in the 90's. My guess is you are 0/2.

One guy leaves Google because he likes the thrill of start ups and you deduce that "talent will start hemorraging (sic) slowly and surely". First off, how the hell does one hemorrhage slowly? Second, there are very talented people who like start ups and there are very talented people who like job security. For example, professors.
Ah, yes, this is true. I was using inequality as synonymous with poverty, while there is an important distinction.

However, in a lot of cases, especially in the third world, abuse of labor and government allows a select few to build and maintain wealth. In those cases, the rich are only rich at the expense of the poor.
Still doesn't work in a drought.