skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Didn't this exact thing happen with divvyshot? Facebook bought them, shutdown the company and had them working on image functions within the site.

From what it seemed they didn't get paid much since they were mostly after what the guys learned from the site. Meaning it sounded like they were just after talent and not technology or user base. Can't imagine that would be a multimillion dollar deal.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/02/facebook-buys-up-divvyshot-...
I did point it out and I didn't down-vote him (because I was hoping he would expound on it). But you know that voting means different things to different people (and HN has gone on vast navel-gazing tangents trying to define it).

If people see a controversial position half-heartedly argued, the bad marks should not come as a shock nor am I sure they are unreasonable. In the end though, the points are utterly irrelevant as long as it doesn't dissuade others from taking controversial positions and, crucially, defending them.
There is no startup success that this argument can't attribute to the intangible "understanding behavior and preferences", and no signing-bonus exit that the same argument can't dismiss the same way.

My point is simply that there are a lot of very straightforward ideas that merit far more than a signing-bonus exit.
Yeah, I probably should have done a search first. ;-) But the post about social problems in computing reminded me of this article.
This is such rubbish, and I hate that we're having this argument again. The last wave of resumes for a software engineer position came out to something like 97% male. The one female that passed the screening was really impressive with a degree from M.I.T. and a very impressive track record.

We couldn't afford her.

Arrington is not very often right, but he is in this case. Look around your average computer science classroom (from which the majority of startup founders originate) and tell me what you see. It's not because women aren't allowed, it's because they choose not to be.
You actually just lost 3 measurable IQ points by learning about semicolon insertion, so don't feel too bad.
The fact that Person A didn't know that he could use PXE to solve his problem ILLUSTRATES that he doesn't know what PXE is. He shouldn't need to take step 2 and ask "What's PXE?" because it's OBVIOUS. You don't need to be a mindreader.
We have a local FNB that I've been meaning to go help with, but haven't found the time. I was also involved in the G20 stuff here. In the meantime, I've +frontpaged /r/anarchism, been doing a lot of reading, and taking it slow.
I read that as "noodle joint was cash only", like many mom and pop shops are.
I think that Jason says a lot of stuff to be sensational. He's building an audience of subscribers for his ThisWeekIn network of video podcasts. He's really good at thinking of sensational stuff to say in order to get people to look at what he's doing. "SEO Is Dead" comes to mind.

Jason could honestly feel that a company or two has received a lower valuation then they deserved, but isn't that the early stage VC game in a nutshell? Investors trade time for value - they invest early in something they think will succeed. In the end, early stage investing isn't a bad route for people to take. Sometimes, it's the best (or the only) way for a product to get off of the ground.
You have to be logged in to Twitter to see NNT's tweets. I think that has something to do with scraping/copyright and that his aphorisms are going to be published as a book.
Dup:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1643869

... with comments:
"You couldn't have a mind that was constantly probing every tool for every limitation. Could you?"

Isn't this called "engineering"?
Well great to know. But I thinks they are some other factors apart from Fluid and Crystallized intelligence.
[BTW, this app was done over this weekend as part of Node Knockout.]
Bear in mind that programming is still a relatively new field.

HAHA what?! People have been programming for almost 60 years now. Hell, your bank is probably running code that is 40+ years old.
Right, but this can be trivially shown to be false in the case of capitalistic systems with minimal levels of homelessness and poverty and socialist economies with rampant poverty.
this is something I'm currently experimenting with at my company. My theory is that most of the management role can be done by empowered secretaries. Keep track of shit. Kick our chairs, make sure we are actually working on what needs to be worked on and not distracted by shiny. Talk to people and make them feel better when there is social bullshit.

Now, traditionally, middle management has also made high-level technical decisions, which I think is just stupid. you should have technical people make those decisions, and /if required/ have the management types help interface with other stakeholders. Quite often the best people to make technical decisions don't have very good 'soft' management skills, and the people with the soft skills don't have the technical qualifications. (I mean, some people have both, but those people become very expensive, very quickly.)

Middle management does valuable work; the thing is, I think that the soft skills required to be a good middle manager are more common than the skills required to be a good front-line programmer, so really the management role should be done by someone who is paid less.

The question is, how do I carry this off? I mean, part of the managers toolbox is that they can get your ass fired... traditionally, management getting paid more has been part of the power dynamic that makes the programmer quit slacking off when management is nearby.

Some would say that a softer approach is better, anyhow; I mean, like it or not, you pretty much have to treat your programmers well; they have options.
I must work in a really weird office then because I know 4 women engineers personally and several others in our office peripherally and no one in our office takes the attitude this guys seems to think is the norm.

Everyone I've heard in this debate argues from a subjective personal experience/viewpoint. I haven't really seen any hard data on the subject presented so it's strange that everyone is so certain they are right. (ok not really all that strange, human nature being what it is.)
You beat me to recommending "alpine" (http://www.washington.edu/alpine/). Alpine is super fast, you can use it just about under any OS (as long as it has terminal window) and it understands SMTP and other protocols well enough that I've managed to use it in a lot of different situations from my basement DSL server.
Why do you feel the need to change her life? Did you even consider that she might actually enjoy a life that is so alien to your experience?
Obligatory:

http://rdist.root.org/2008/10/24/quantum-cryptography-is-use...

Quantum cryptography (not quantum computing) is one of those concepts that appeals to the public and the more theoretically-minded, but is next to useless for providing actual security.
Someone still has to build the new technology that the young folks learn.
This has been a great post to read. I'm also considering this to reset my career early (graduated not too long ago), switching from embedded software development for $BIGCORP to startup-esque web development. I want to do it to 1) be happier with my career (and figure it out) and 2) gain solid skills to do well at the end of the "sabbatical."

The only issue is that I've had medical work done through employer-provided insurance, which I would lose of course. However, I'd quit after the insurance has paid its share (I've already paid mine). It's a commonplace procedure so I'm not too worried about complications.

I'll probably move back in with the parents to save the cash. It won't be as bold as traveling around the world, but perhaps that is for a later day.
Nice idea, i thought about something like this myself. I'll check it out.

You should keep the notices window on top/in focus when someone opens the page, though, so they know what they're looking at.
They tote Marxists? No wonder they're smug; they must be incredibly strong!
Could that be related somehow with people drinking less and less tap water (I live in US, but also seeing this in my home country Bulgaria)?

I mean nowadays you have to buy your water most places, you might as well get something "better" for that money, and that won't be water - some some kind of beverage, soft drink, etc.

So you would be drinking less, simply because you have to pay (yes, you pay for tap-water too, but that's done as part of all your water usage bill, and it's done at the end of the month usually, and probably way cheaper than bottled water).
Why can't both sides be true? I've never seen or heard of gender bias in the hiring process, but that doesn't discount the possibility that women aren't going into computer science for a reason.
A Map Reduce Framework for Programming Graphics Processors
Download This; Google Voice App w/ Widgets
That's cool. I was just having a discussion with somebody earlier about how much better discussions are in real-life places like Seomra Spraoi than they are on /r/Anarchism though. You get so many people on /r/Anarchism who take a moral high ground against people who they (usually correctly, but this isn't the point) perceive as not being "real" anarchists. Even when we disagree, discussions in Seomra Spraoi are always very pleasant and respectful, and there is a real sense of togetherness, despite our minor differences. Basically, don't lose faith in anarchism and anarchists because of /r/Anarchism, because I could see that happening to somebody. :)
Implemented. thanks
For ML, I think it depends heavily on what you want to do. If you want to develop new algorithms, prove theorems about them, etc., there is a heavy math focus, although in terms of departments, you'd probably be more likely to do it in a CS department with a strong ML group, than in either a math or stats department. If you want to use ML though, the skills are quite different. A good handle on statistics is still necessary, so you know when to use which techniques, and how to interpret the results, but a lot of the math used in ML as a research area is used mainly to develop the algorithms and prove theorems about them, and isn't as relevant if you're looking at them mainly as predictive modeling or data-mining tools to apply to various domains.
TweetDeck for Android Gets Better with v0.9.5 Beta
Tweet Quest: a Zelda-inspired node.js driven game in which you slay your tweeps
Written this weekend as part of Node Knockout.
Hah - "obviously" retracted.

From what I've heard most people seem to think that 50 calories are burned per pound of muscle per day, but I think that it's closer to 8? I was under the impression that the repairing of the muscle after workouts is where you burn the majority.
Michael Arrington's real argument was:

Few women choosing to study CompSci\Engineering -> Few women in tech _startups_.

As long as you agree that a subset cannot be larger than its parent set, I don't see how you can disagree with that. It's as close to observational fact as you can get.
I wouldn't say trivial. It's not like most economies are purely one or the other.

And to be fair to his argument, he's talking about stateless socialism.
We actually looked into that but LZX seemed like too much of a hassle. Bad call?
I pretty much agree with everything you've said, except that "everything one would normally hold against a McDonald's meal" includes much more than its nutritional properties.
Sometimes I think that I might be one of the few people who will be on my deathbed, regretting not working harder.

When I look back on my life, it's mostly been unfinished projects, or good ideas that didn't get far.

I've always been told how much potential I have, and I even feel this in myself. But so far, there's not a lot to show for it. Sometimes I've spent years not doing much of anything except looking at sunsets, walking in parks, reading books, and being creative, and all the things that are supposed to make life wonderful. These idle years weren't all a bowl of cherries (mostly it was due to depression) but it still wasn't so different from the slow sort of lifestyle exalted above. And I still find it lacking.

We only have a limited time here, and in our age, individuals have extraordinary leverage. Isn't that also a reason to try as hard as we can to make some kind of dent in the universe? If I forgo a few sunsets, but make a thousand people's lives better, did I really do it wrong?

When it comes to regrets, the literary image that stays with me comes from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. This part is usually omitted from popularizations and films. Marley's ghost has delivered the warning about the three spirits, but also shows him a vision of spirits wandering the earth:

The air was filled with phantoms, wandering hither and thither in restless haste, and moaning as they went. Every one of them wore chains like Marley's Ghost; some few (they might be guilty governments) were linked together; none were free. Many had been personally known to Scrooge in their lives. He had been quite familiar with one old ghost, in a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below, upon a door-step. The misery with them all was, clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in human matters, and had lost the power for ever.
While I think YC is way cooler than Facebook, I suspect from the perspective of Facebook YC is just a little ant below their feet. What incentive do they have to play fair with you?

From across the pond I am willing to assume that you are all really good friends in the valley and that things work out fine. But I also have to admit that Jason might at least have the hint of a point.

Or in other words - YC is about the only entity in this whole game that I personally trust. This is simply the reputation you have built. I don't trust Facebook.

On the other hand, it probably doesn't matter to FB at what stage they see a startup's idea. They'll clone it when it is successful.
Google could have waited until the bandwidth costs and the lawsuits from Viacom ate them alive. Remember, Youtube hasn't even become profitable yet. Google already had a capable clone. They just lacked the community because they were a late arrival.

If Google's Sergey, Larry, or Schmidt were as ruthless as Zuckerberg, I have no doubt that Youtube would have been left to die.
Was the genie ever in the bottle?

That's not a rhetoric question. I generally wonder whether Finance has been consider to be anything other than self-serving.
That's sweat equity.
The Right Kind of Ambition
Person A is a moron. It took me about 3 min with google to figure out what PXE was, and 2 more to find an "install Ubuntu with pxe" tutorial.

If women (or any other group) needs that level of spoonfeeding, no wonder they can't hack it in tech.
I think there are a lot more YC founders anxious to make a smaller exit than YC partners anxious to see small exits. IMO the problem of YC pushing companies to accept liquidity simply doesn't exit.

they might very well benefit from a lot of very quick exits

I fail to see how. Before they closed their Sequoia round, you could argue that smaller exits help YC keep afloat. With millions in the bank from outside funding, YC is beyond the point of trying to keep itself afloat.
This is the United States of America in 2010. It's not ancient Egypt. It's not feudal England. It's not even the U.S. in 1950. You can do whatever you want to do and be whoever you want to be. Nobody is stopping you but yourself. Might your climb to the top be steeper than mine? Sure. But realize that nobody who's ever made it to the top of their mountain complained about how steep it was. They just climbed. If you want to be the best, whatever that means to you, you have to go Jackie Robinson that shit. No matter what the douchebags throw at you along the way, you have to just smile back and hit home runs.
People make generalizations based upon the world around them. OK, so people don't expect a woman to be a programmer when they see her. Similar expectations didn't stop women from becoming lawyers or doctors or bankers, and now when you see a woman walking around a hospital or a courthouse she very well may be a doctor or a lawyer.

Women can and did overcome the same barriers to enter other fields. If you want to explain why women aren't in software, there's no explanatory power in explanations that equally apply to fields which women did become a part of.
Some current context:

http://sites.google.com/site/philipagre/
Maybe it's just hat I believe those two characters represent an appropriate response to that king of linkbait? Two more characters come to mind: PC.
You should find some new material: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1643294
The slides for the now infamous "Launch Your Startup for under $2,000" talk
Paul,

Respectfully, it is not linkbait.

This is my honest opinion based on Facebook's track record. I would give the same advice to any startup: don't trust Facebook and don't give them any access to your startup or plans.

Period. End of story.

If an entrepreneur needs any evidence of the trustworthiness of Facebook, simply talk to folks inside of Quora, FourSquare, Twitter and Zynga (among others). I'm sure you've spoken to folks inside these companies, like I have, who are infuriated with Zuckerberg's blatant stealing (without innovation).

At every chance they can get, Facebook has simply stolen. Given their scale, bringing them inside the incubators is, well, mind boggling.

If you're a startup company you should be avoiding Facebook and their staffers.

I'm sure you have great intentions PG, and you know I respect all that you've accomplished, but don't dismiss me. I really don't need press because, to a certain extent, I am press.

Add to that the fact that I'm massively overexposed (especially here on HN), and you're claim that I'm link-baiting feels disingenuous.

Like you, I love startups and entrepreneurship. I only want to see folks do well and not get ripped off by Facebook, which I consider the most unethical company in technology.

One only need to look at the mountain of lawsuits they've generated for proof of this. Facebook's long list of lawsuits are not from ambulance-chasing law firms mind you, they are by PARTNERS and FRIENDS of Zuckerberg's! Oh yeah, a lot of the lawsuits and complaints are also by privacy groups and government agencies trying to protect citizens.

If Zuckerberg has no problem screwing his friends, partners and customers, what do you think he will do to a three-person startup that might innovate its way into being competition for him?

I fear you've made a big mistake letting the fox into the henhouse.

Startups: listen to PG on everything since he's brilliant--but take my advice on this one. :-)

best jason
So many people hit this, and then use screen less, and everyone adopts a different alternative.

I suspect a screen fork which simply adopts new standard emacs/bash-compatible defaults could eventually overtake the original in usage.
3. Do not talk yourself out of saying "hi" to that girl. You're missing out on a lot of fun, it won't hurt you, and the sooner you start practicing this the sooner you'll get the hang of it.

I agree, but I would extend it beyond "that girl" and say that it applies to anyone that you think seems interesting. Everyone craves human interaction and almost everyone has a story to tell. Don't be afraid to say hello.

Another bit I would add is to avoid high debt. This will be hard because our entire society is set up to take on debt in your college years and then pay it off once you get a good job afterward. I'm 26 now, and I have nearly $60K in debt. I have to pay a minimum of $1000 a month on those debts, while my rent, utilities, and other costs typically come in under $1000. If I didn't have debt, I could bartend 10 nights a month and make enough to live on. Instead, I work 40-50 hours a week in a tech job that I hate, leaving me thoroughly uninspired and unmotivated to do personal programming work once I get home.

My grandmother gave me similar advice and I didn't take it to heart. All I thought was, "I can work my butt off now at $5-8 an hour, or I can take on debt and pay it off after school when I'm making $50-70K per year." Your future self will be pretty annoyed at you if you use this same rationalization.
مسلسل باب الحارة 5 الحلقة 20
If I can't get into the game, I can't imagine there's much chance for most other people in their 50's to play a role.

The arrogance of this statement is just mind boggling. Why exactly does the author think he's orders of magnitude more employable than other engineers of his age group?
Curious, how are we competition?

You know Open Angel Forum has funded YC startups, as have I personally. I love TechStars and YCombinator because they produce quality startups that I can potentially invest in, partner with or have on This Week in Startups.

There is nothing competitie between YC and JMC I can think of.
Not exactly thrilled by the use of the word "grumpy" since its a typical code word used to denigrate people over forty, very much like "pushy" blacks and "bitchy" women. If Dave was 25, I'd almost guarantee you wouldn't use that word.

In fact just by using that single word you've strengthened his argument.
Why do people love trying to make complex issues black and white? The fact that there are so few women in tech is an issue that is likely caused by multiple factors, some of which were addressed in this article, and some of which were addressed in the Arrington post. No one is wrong; each just seems to be arguing over which the greater factor is, but refuses to recognize the other.

Arrington cites factors dealing with biological and societal tendencies of women as reasons for them to not engage in risky lifestyle choices such as startups, or to not be interested in tech in the first place. I agree with this. This isn't 'bad' or 'good', but it's the truth. People need to stop ignoring that there ARE (on average) differences between men and women. We (women) just aren't as interested in tech or building our own businesses in general.

I'm just one data point, but based on many experiences, I would strongly argue that in general, women do not have the desire to take as many risks as males, or deal with day-to-day uncertainties. A vast majority of my female friends thought I was absolutely nuts when I first started doing startups. (They still think I'm a little nutty, despite being able to pay my bills now). The most common questions were, "What are you going to do for money if it fails?" (Answer: Get a job, or build something else), and "How do you deal with not knowing what you're going to be doing in the next [insert some time period]?" On the other hand, my male friends overwhelmingly asked about the technologies I'm building and admired me for taking a risk. Also interesting to note is that the reaction of female friends to my (male) co-founder was more of admiration than thinking he was crazy (but I was looked upon as crazy).

On the other hand, for the women who ARE interested in tech (or could be persuaded to be interested), there are certainly existing challenges within the field itself. Again, I'm just one data point, but I am always amazed at the reactions I get from males in the startup world when they find out that I code. They are SHOCKED. Not only because I'm a woman, but also because I'm a white, blonde woman who is reasonably attractive. Sometimes I really do feel like I'm not taken seriously by many people until I do something completely bad ass to prove myself. The other article certainly has a point there.
Collaborative designing
Defolio team won the Garage48 startup competition. Our product is awsome collaborative designing tool.
That seems like a dishonest presentation of a capitalist society.