skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
"MBA is a great way to get a solid business understanding"

Having an MBA, many years business experience, and heavy hacking experience, I would have to strongly disagree with this statement.

If you want the initials after your name, fine. But please don't be deluded into thinking there is any real correlation with a business school education (at any level) and "solid business understanding".

I always hated the expression, "Those you can, do. Those who can't, teach." But I think business school may be my one exception. Make no mistake about it, these are two different worlds: those with business battle scars and those who like to talk about the theoretical. Even when I go back to my alma mater and watch an alumni's business presentation, I actually cringe when one of the professors gives his take.

I would never discourage anyone from getting more education; this is one case where getting that education from actual meaningful work experience blows away college.
Uh, how much does the adult entertainment industry make compared to any other internet industry? I thought it was a truism that the internet runs on porn...

Here's something I found by a quick google:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11640411/

Even without stats, it just seems like something that's blatantly obvious. It's a very common problem with couples for the guy to be lusting after other women. We, as a culture, are inundated with erotica. The internet allows people to look at pretty much anything they want in privacy. There are loads of adds for web history cleaners. Etc.

It just doesn't seem like a hard conclusion to draw...
Recent Searches To Influence Google's Results
It's been brought up a couple times here that email software sucks for people who get a large volume of mail. This is the problem Xobni started with before they moved in a different direction. I think a lot could be gained by applying machine learning to this problem. This is the sort of product people would pay for if it was good. Life changing? If you have 20000 unread messages in your inbox, it just might be.

Not that there's anything wrong with bioinformatics.
This sounds a lot like my startup Embought (www.embought.com). After making the decision to donate 50% of all profits to charity it gives me another reason to 'not die'. There are people out there other than myself that can benefit from me making this project work, and that's a powerful motivator.
If it's really something that needs to exist, the second step may be harder.
[citation needed]

Seriously though, that seems to be a self talk thing in the hacker community, making me skeptical it's true. Places like Slashdot and the like seem to be echo chambers of ego boosting phrases.
AintaBlog: Open Source Tumblogging/Feed Aggregation with Ruby on Rails
How do you determine which enhancements are "better"?
The problem was not so much how little evidence you supplied as how irrelevant it was. I expect Philip Morris has good customer service too. When convenience stores order cigarettes from them, they probably deliver reliably. Would you argue that that makes Philip Morris a good company, ethically?

Your theories about why Digi-Key wouldn't want their prices to be publicly known are very inventive, but Occam's razor suggests the explanation is what is usually is in such situations: They are trying to suppress competition.
First - If you want to "write software that will actually make a difference", your best bet is to stop worrying about advertising markets and twitter clones and focus on exactly that - finding some problem in the world and fixing it.

Second - the advertising dollars in the valley are not zero-sum, because the potential market, while finite, is not nearly what it could be. How to do effective brand advertising or video advertising on the web are very much unsolved problems, and whoever solves them will substantially increase the size of the pie that everyone is fighting over. These aren't technical problems, but they could have technical solutions (Ooyala in the video advertising space is a good example).
It would be part of the chat UI. You can reject a poor response to get another one or you could accept a good response to respond back.
Isn't the real cause of their problems maintaining backwards compatibility? As I understand it, Apple doesn't do this, making it easier for them to create a good OS.
The only talk I thought was mediocre was the legal one (good advice, but everything I got out of it could have been reduced to a few bullet points). Every other talk was fantastic.
I honestly can't think of any good reason today why someone who could hack would want an MBA.

If you're concerned about learning, you will learn more about business in one good hands on project than 2 years of formal education.

If you're concerned about having a mentor, you will meet infinitely more business saavy people in business than you ever will in school.

If you're concerned about money, 2 years of earning will put you hundreds of thousands of dollars ahead of 2 years of spending.

If you're concerned about what others think of your credentials, you're focusing on the wrong thing.

If you're concerned about climbing the corporate ladder more quickly, then fine. Get an MBA. What are you doing here?

And, most of all...

If you're concerned about making yourself the best you could be, then hack, hack, hack. You already excel at the weakest link in the business chain. You will get better by continuing to "do" in your specialty. More school will add little, cost you time, cost you money, but most of all, cost you experience doing what you already love and what the world needs most right now.

(Response to Bonus Question: One of the best post-graduate business programs for technical people is Carnegie Mellon. Ironically, they don't award an "MBA", but an "MSIA", Master of Science in Industrial Administration. Even they don't care for the MBA.)
That would be more like asking Digi-Key for the contents of their warehouses.
You're taking the point about a hacker being able to get a job anywhere far too literally. He has his pick among the top software companies and startups but, no, he probably won't land a job designing rockets for NASA.
You need to recheck your assumptions. There is no finite pool of ad money. Ad money is infinite as long as people are buying products and services online and offline. Reddit & Digg are algorithms none the less. Writing powerful algorithms need MARKETS willing to pay for your time and provide returns to your investors. Anyway, if you want to change people's life; its very easy. Think about Darfur and software that can help. Think about an algorithm that can use GoogleMaps, RFID, GPS, SocialGraph, CommodityPrices, UNICEF api. I am sure such a project will be challenging and help with your depression. Goodluck.
Well, again, look for everyday pains. If there is something on some of your customers' minds when they wake up, find that something and solve that for them, so they have one less thing to worry about. Really that's what even Google says AND does, focus on the customer and everything else will follow.

Having said all that, use your skill as a tool! Let's take Octopart as an example - the founders' pain was they couldn't find their parts easily online. So, they put their skills (algorithms [well, technically, they were physicists, but any good physicist is a good mathematician]) to work - they built a great search that Google doesn't cater to.

Lessons:
1) They identified pain - no search for parts
2) They used their skillset - math (algorithms)
3) They are making the world a better place* (as in much more of an impact* than those playthings you mentioned).
*-very very relative

As about bio-informatics, who knows? Heck, no one really knows about any industry's future. If someone claims to know, he/she is trying to sell something - may it be an idea, prophecy, or plain bull-shiitake mushrooms :) Point is that if you have really identified your customers' pain, then they will happily send their wheel barrows full of love AND money towards your solution.
Oh, yeah, there's tons of horrible food in Japan. But there's also a lot of much healthier dining options that nominally cost less. For example, I tend to eat a lot of Bi-Bim-Don at Matsuya, with a side of salad. Costs less than 500 yen (about $5 US), really healthy, and tastes great.

You also left out Okonomiyaki, which is not only delicious, but surprisingly healthy. And onigiri...

Damnit, now I miss Japanese food again. :)
Can you think of any examples where a particularly excellent hacker is stuck at a crappy job to pay the bills?
Watch this, hashbucket. Seriously. Take the time. I hope this gives you another angle to think about.

http://www.justin.tv/hackertv/98115/David_Heinemeier_Hansson...
Yeah sounds cool ... just allow all my followers on Twitter to make comments for instance! Social YouTubing...
I find it ironic your empirical evidence is a sensationalistic article with no empirical evidence. I was hoping for better.

Porn makes money therefore it is abused? Lusting after other women predates the modern porn industry. For example, "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbors wife."

Very often our assumptions about what "must be" are wrong.
Second that AND if you really want to make a huge impact, write a "social responsible" network for the mobile phone; Android dev contest rewards well!
Sims 3 Site Release
Sims 3 promises even more customizable and worldly Sims--enough to actually replace the 'real' world. Finally.
What am I missing?

http://www.paulgraham.com/good.html
One idea in general, is jumping out of the browser, and not in the Silverlight/Apollo way. It's important that we begin thinking of the Internet in more abstract ways instead of the current primarily visual experience. We've reached a point where a lot of objects we deal with on a daily basis are augmented by computers (e.g., our cars). We're on the cusp of these devices and many more being augmented by the Internet. What does it mean for my fridge, book shelf, or weight-lifting equipment to have Internet access? Questions like this have been left in the domain of so-called futurists or academics. But I think it's time for industry to start taking these seriously. The technology is here.
D.I.Y. Startup News: Your startup news in 240 characters
As per the comments in the article, you'd think this would be helpful, but it's actually quite annoying.
Awesome! I wish there were more Merb tutorials like this.
I think an emphasis on taste can be good, but not when it leads to a holier than thou attitude. Not only in terms of decency, but it also means less efficiency and aesthetics.

Say efficiency and aesthetics are two sides of the same coin. So, if you put them at odds with each other you won't ever reach the epitome of either.
The Million Dollar Web Page (there is a wikipedia entry on it) made its owner about a million dollars (and started a fad called pixel advertising or some such) and although it entailed execution, the effort required to execute seems to have been very low relative to the payoff: the guy probably made thousands of dollars an hour on his time investment.

I am aware that this example does not meet the 3 criteria in the original question. I am answering a related question, namely, Can a good idea act as a large "effort multiplier"? The Million Dollar Web Page suggests that the answer is yes.
Why is it sensational? I might look for stats later, but surely a certified professional in the field has some credibility.

"Porn makes money therefore it is abused"

That isn't what I'm saying. Porn makes so much more money than any other online industry that it seems very likely the money comes from abuse. Similar to why the drug trade is so lucrative.

Also, I did not say lust is a new phenomena. In fact, you agree with my point. Since it is such a common aspect of being a male throughout history, then it seems easy to infer men are likely to indulge in an easy outlet for eroticism.
The problem with that is that while there are millions of computers that can connect to the internet, hardly any cars/fridges/whatever can do that right now. The technology is there, but not widespread. So as a young startup trying to get attention, the millions of potential users from traditional computers pulls much more strongly than a few thousand internet ready fridges.
There must be something in the air right now. I published an article about this very issue on March 27th (you can view it at http://uberdigi.blogspot.com/2008/03/secret-of-life-in-parti...). My main point is that being useful is the most important value in the participation age. If an individual or business makes usefulness their number one priority they increase their chance for success. In this case I think goodness and usefulness are synonymous.

I got this idea from Buckminster Fuller. He failed miserably until he had an epiphany that he would not concentrate on success, but rather on making himself a servant to the universe. Ultimately this meant that he would just start working on good and useful things. As a result, he became a controversial figure but also pretty successful.
I'll echo the praise here, Omnisio is fantastically well designed. The picture quality, UI eyecandy, and overall presentation are stunning.

It's raised the bar for me. I'm drawn to hold myself to a standards somewhere near it. Thank you.
Market research - tipping your readers?
Nuclear Pulse Spacecraft -- propelled to .1c by a continuous stream of exploding fission bombs
how is this any different than disqus or intensedebate,etc... ?
Matt Maroon: Startup School 2008
Yes that is way too much of a percentage of your company to give up! Anything below 50% you lose the majority vote (try to keep 60% or more, if possible) and your idea due to you being a minority may get changed. In turn and in the long run your startup becomes a job rather then a passion!
This is actually not a bad idea, considering that pretty much everyone uses distributed version control now. Set the timer for an hour, commit commit commit, push, read hackernews, repeat. :)
Enterprise 2.0 To Become a $4.6 Billion Industry By 2013
2 thumbs up on the player ^_^
Both. I prefer the former; the latter pays better at the moment, I'm sorry to say. That may just be a reflection of the fact that I'm not yet where I'd like to be WRT the former.
The first one literally changed my life.

I quit my job, found a co-founder and moved to California. It hasn't all been easy since then but it has all been worthwhile :D
This one was great but I missed seeing the YC founders talk.
Hi there. If you have a good idea, then do it - there are LOADS of companies that make good money out there. You may not have heard of them, but they pay the bills for their founders and a whole lot more. Here's an interesting, if possibly dated, article about Ultraedit, a PHP Editor and how the history about how the founder quit his job. From what I understand he makes very good money from this:

http://www.ultraedit.com/company/IDM_full_story.html
How ironic: "Freedom enforces freedom"
What makes you think that "software that will actually make a difference" is non-web software? A lot of web-based fluff is being churned out these days, but that doesn't change the fact that almost everything that has made a difference lately has been web-based, too.

Counterexamples welcome.
The optimizations are turned off until 1.0 is released.
I've found Dr. Richard Hamming's talk to scientists, "You and Your Research," to have useful advice on the subject. http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html

In particular, he talks about keeping track of a set of important problems worth solving. Then, whenever you find an interesting new technique, compare it against your library of problems, and see if there's a good fit. I expect the reverse is also similarly useful: keep a good library of techniques on hand, and look for one that's applicable whenever you run across an interesting problem.

This type of approach isn't necessary for building twitter or facebook clones, but it may well be ideal for looking for new ways to apply machine learning and other types of advanced algorithms, because it's primarily applicable in cases where there's an actual problem to solve.
What does an algorithm think?
For a slightly less drastic solution, install the Firefox plugin LeechBlock.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4476

It will allow you to block time consuming websites at time you configure.

I block Reddit, Digg, and Hacker News throughout the day with the exception of the first hour of the morning, over the lunch hour, and from 5:30pm on.
or 8aweek.com
the only problem with this is that I use the internet for coding a lot (online docs, etc) I guess 10 minute spurts of freedom might be nice.
Yep. It's true. Which is why it's annoying when posts like the article linked from the top of this thread attribute effects to one of those “properties” which are clearly mostly caused by another.

Anyway, I wasn't trying to be overly aggressive in calling your grayscale conversion “shitty”. Hope it didn't come across the wrong way. :)
The 1930's and 40's in Color, from the Library of Congress
I totally agree with this. That is why I'm building my product right now and not thinking of anything yet - but the product
Shoot. Can someone give this guy an upmod... I accidentally clicked the wrong little arrow. :-(
Thinking of a problem to solve? What happened to ones that already exist?
This is something that really needed a ? resubmit
So, on a daily basis, what piece of software really pisses you off? What task can you just not find the right solution for? What do you hear your friends complaining about and think, yeah, I feel ya?

Build that solution. Sell that solution. You'll have done two things: solved your problem, and solved someone else's. If you make a few bucks along the way, so be it!
Not all these companies are doing lame things. Particularly check out 23andme and the stealth bioinformatics startup; http://snaptalent.com/ads.html
So if I understand this correctly, you're trying to build a chatterbot by essentially letting the crowd write a large number of if/then statements.
Luckily you don't need this if you have a mac mini. The wireless card in it is so shitty that it essentially performs this service for you randomly throughout the day.
Is it ever good for a startup to anticipate the future, or should they try to surf the wave?
Agreed. If you buy my house, that means I wanted your money more than I wanted to keep my house. So I've gained from the transaction. Likewise, you must have wanted the house more than the money. So you also gained. Barring fraud, we've each done the other a service.

The problem is that people either never learn this, or they forget it somewhere along the line.
Wow. Never thought I would be endorsing another video/slideshow product this late in the game but Omnisio truly is head and shoulders above anything else. Just goes to show that if you can isolate a large subset of customers that are not being served very well even in a very crowded market (e.g. videos of presentations), you can do really well. Now show me a way of doing non presentation videos much better than youtube (yes, I did notice the mid-video user comments, good but not ground breaking!) and I'll be floored :)

Not to beat up justin.tv since they aren't really made for this kind of video but the contrast between the same video on justin.tv (or youtube) and on omnisio is just huge. Great work guys!

Edit: O.K. just noticed the subtitles that so subtly pop up at the right time. This keeps getting better..
It's pretty clear that VCs are more like hedge fund managers than their name would indicate. Hedging, trend following, even arbitrage are more important to maintaining the IRR of the fund than developing innovative companies. This is by necessity, rather than by preference, I imagine. No Managing Partner will or should allow significant bets to be placed on the roulette wheel of technology, no matter how interesting or exciting, when the entire fund, and the livelihood and reputation of the partnership could be at stake.

A possible solution is to expand the availability and amount angel/seed financing available to entrepreneurs by an order of magnitude, or more. This could be done by creating a quasi-public market (offshore, since the SEC wouldn't even consider it) that would allow individual investors to buy small pieces of early stage companies.

Individual small investors with a high tolerance for risk and a more certain knowledge of technology, innovation and particular industry sectors would form the basis for this new financing engine for startups. Companies would need to publish some kind of prospectus and they would also be rated by the number and quality of current investors, who would also be ranked.

This is not unlike the angel networks of today -- but would take the model to the next level by allowing millions of individual investors to participate in the $1,000 to $10,000 range in each venture.
"While they worked feverishly at overcoming the technical challenges" is an incredibly optimistic depiction of the challenges of exploding a string of 4 kiloton nuclear bombs to propel a spacecraft to orbit.

I think the nuclear lightbulb designs hold a lot more promise than the Orion design. Even the NERVA and ROVER systems seemed more viable and efficient. They too have many unsolved technical problems (how do you store the fuel while the lightbulb is not lit or what to do with engine abrasion on NERVA and ROVER) but those problems seem quite small when faced with the very idea of blasting a hundred nukes in someone else's ionosphere.

Still, an Orion launch must be something very cool.

Just my $0.02
Yeah, I actually had wanted to edit the grandparent, but it was too late. Your talk yesterday was too rich for me to follow -- I spent the second half thinking about the first half -- and I had trouble following anything today. Sorry.
Watch out, we'll all be working for the hat guy some day.
Just keep asking "why?" over and over like a 5 year old.

Combine that with a solid knowledge of history.
Has anyone signed up for this yet? What are you experiences?
"They hire for talent and passion"

Microsoft used to say something very much like that.

But at the top of the application: "State your skillset".

...You use PHP, Perl, and Java? Not by choice, right?
Dancing Teas for the Dinner Table
Watch blooming teas dance for the dinner table.
One way to summarize that is to say that a moral* and successful business is necessarily helping people. However, there are other benefits (to your business) of acting morally: see the "Morale", "Help", and "Compass" sections of the essay. ;)

* "moral" may be too broad here, but "honest" is too narrow
I am slow... I should have dropped you a line before I had gotten there. What a pity. I'm out of SV already, heading to Boston.
Open source as corporate joint venture
random question....what did DHH use for his slide transitions? Is it just standard powerpoint? I thought the slide transitions were nice =)
Texture Synthesis
The idea that a corporation should be managed for the benefit of its shareholders, also known as "fiduciary duty", arose as a reaction to snake-oil salesmen of the 19th century who would sell interests in phantom companies and run off with the money. The advantage of such a principle is that it tends to be fairly clean cut and easy to judge when someone has violated it. If we allow managers to work by some other standard, such as balancing the interests of all stakeholders, it becomes very easy for them to find some weak justification for any wrongdoing or defrauding of their shareholders.
wow

lol
was there any indication from Nintendo that they would come out with a market-leading console (after the disaster that was the GameCube) ?
Why do we plan up front?