skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Well, someone has to earn more.

When there's a labor market, being male or being female is going to be a factor in your desirability in that market, since it's, at the very least, a marker for other characteristics. Same with race or even height.

It's certainly a problem if the disparities get too large.

Now, the question is, how one can determine what is "too large"?
Those articles are about the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA).

http://daringfireball.net/linked/2010/09/27/coica

This post is about wiretapping.
Speaking of being good at chance games, I heard about the guy who cheated Press Your Luck for the first time yesterday:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Larson
Ask HN: Utilizing wasted time, to work on my startup?
I work in a startup. Naturally, the environment is very focused on getting things done, rather than hours put into the day.

I however have created a reputation of coming to the office early, and staying all day, every day.

I'm not a developer. My specific role sometimes leaves me with gaps of time where I'm left waiting for things to do.

It kills me to think that if I were putting this dead time into my own side projects, I'd be moving at a much faster rate.

Talking to my boss about this seems like a pretty insane concept however.

Any suggestions?

(used a throwaway account here)
I wonder whether the writer might take a hint from Johnson on "Cymbeline", that it is impossible to criticize unresisting imbecility.

This is not to say that Ms. Sobon is an imbecile, for obviously she is not. But apparently she finds it easiest to fill up her blog with stuff that is not worth reading closely--worth a smirk from the indulgent and evidently a scowl from some of the rest.
> Also the non-rich often succeed in an investment, startup, etc.

For very small values of often...
Document Foundation forks OpenOffice.org, liberates it from Oracle
Does anybody know how the study defined "peer group"? I'm guessing from context that it was some sort of age grouping.
They directly leaked the names of informants in a country where such information is an obvious danger. This is reckless, irresponsible, and unforgivable now that we know that Assange was aware of the poor quality of redactions prior to the documents' release.

Their poor editorialization of the Collateral Murder video also put a large dent in their credibility for me. Much effort was spent pointing out the journalists shot, but it was not even mentioned in a glancing note that they were in fact with armed insurgents, and that the group was armed.

If they want to be a credible whistleblower organization they need to be objective and impartial. Right now they reek of fame whoring and partisan bias.
AirBnB is a great program, clever and cheeky (real people), but the one thing that they'll always have to reckon with is that they have no rewards program. This might change in the future, but people are incentivized by rewards.

I travel regularly to Starwood hotels, sometimes under Cash and Points, or I use my free weekend nights. Rewards are real and incentivize people to be loyal to a particular service or brand. Because of the credit card program and because they offer free nights as a regular promotion (stay 3 nights, get 1 night free at category 1-6 hotel), I'm heavily incentivized to lean towards the Starwood chain, and 2 out of 5 times I'm staying for free or under a discounted rate because of Cash and Points.

And the hospitality industry, in general, has real people (not the faceless org we're used to) and provide excellent service. AirBnB has individuality, which is a great selling point, but for some others, that is a risk (at least if you're going to a St Regis or Westin, you know it's going to be nice and reliable; with AirBnB, you don't know if you're going to be compatible with the people or the housing arrangements). But, AirBnB offers a cool incentive to meet new people and make friends outside of a professional arrangement that a hotel would usually entail.

Of course the difficulty of administering rewards program is it that it requires the program to flex its muscle to require that some rooms are offered available to the program at a discounted rate. Chains have this power, but AirBnB wouldn't be in a great bargaining position for a rewards program.

They're not cheaper than the hotel chains, so it doesn't give any excuse to provide less service. If anything, they need to step it up a bit by offering just a bit more. A rewards program would level some of the differences.
Interested in what you're working on... is the source up anywhere? Will it be?
You know what this sounds like to me? It's a classic case of DLL hell. The shared lib people solved it by giving their libraries ".so numbers"--versions increment when incompatible APIs are introduced.

> Debian typically won't include two versions like that; they might include library1 and library2, but not 1.3 and 1.5.

That is because shared libs actually increment their .so number when they are incompatible. Note that library1 and library2 are not necessarily versions 1.x and 2.x--the 1 and 2 are the .so number. In the past Debian has had to increment the number themselves because the upstream introduced an incompatible change and then didn't increment it.

It sounds like the Ruby people need to pay attention to history and add an "so number" like field to their programs to signal compatibility changes. Or perhaps just adopt the fairly widely accepted "major number increases when compatibility is affected" technique.

> I don't have to go through my source to change "require 'library-1.3/file'" to "require 'library-1.5/file'" when I want to upgrade.

That is a red herring. In the ideal packaged world library-1.5 would install into the proper gem location such that "require 'library/file'" would work the same way it does if you had installed it by hand, regardless of its package name.
It's more than just footage, the hardware itself can be a problem.

In this same vein, here are some other old and NASA media- and hardware-related materials that may be of interest:

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/mar/22/nation/na-lunar22

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1066370...

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/25183

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwbw1vhtZ0g
Do they use the name of the credit card holder? I hope not, because that can cause lots of issues. What if you're a kid and use your mom's card? What if you borrow a friend's card because you don't like banks? What if you use a company card because you're a game developer and it's a legitimate expense to research competitors? etc.

I assume that like most places, they register a separate name that you provide, not necessarily linked to your card.
Someone fix timetracking
My work is on us to log our hours while @ work(moreso then we already do). Most of the developers take time-tracking as a chore and hardly any of us reliably enter hours. The software is horrid and the entire process is ridiculously tedious. Someone has to fix this.
Even G often seems to perform quite poorly. Viz Dodgeball / 4square. Thoroughly alienating Dennis Crowley seems like an enormous mistake. Or Paul Buchheit. Or the Delicious guy who worked at G but didn't find it a welcoming environment. If they were serious about social, they'd do whatever it takes to keep people like Joshua who've built successful social products.

I'm coming around to Zuckerberg's opinion that social is something a company is built around, not something you staple on or buy after the fact.
Higher Hurdles for Colorado's Medical Marijuana Entrepreneurs
>...but it's not fair to compare the efficiency of a 375 MW gas turbine against a 100 kW fuel cell

Why not, they are substitutes for each other.

>(assuming that customers care about local generation...

Why should they care about "local generation"?
This is the worst kind of pseudo-science, using a single example to make sweeping generalizations far beyond what the data even shows.
James Gosling on JavaOne
Stephen Hawking: time travel should be possible
How often does one cofounder think he is contributing more than the others?
I hear about all these 2 or 3 person startups and get the impression that somehow they all have perfectly distributed the workload and each cofounder is completely content with the performance of the others. Yet, I have tried working with a few different people, and each time I get frustrated and demotivated because I feel I am contributing more than the others towards designing, building, and releasing a product.

I am wondering whether:

1) this is a problem with my attitude and my ability to work with others

2) my feelings are justified, and is why I need to choose cofounders very carefully

3) my feelings may have validity, but to be successful I need to do the best I can instead of worrying about who deserves what, and everybody will win as a result

I know distinguishing between these three depends a lot on the specifics of the situation. I'm wondering what your guys' experiences this have been, and how you may have learned to tell them apart or handle it.

Thanks.
I have found that the "power users" are moving towards multiple monitors and fill a single screen with a browser.
You think it is, why? And what evidence do you have to prove it?
What the TechCrunch Deal Means to Me
Gruber had some interesting speculation on last week's episode of The Talk Show podcast.

I'm paraphrasing but he was essentially wondering aloud if, due to AirPlay capabilities, iPads and iPhones would be able to deliver content to the Apple TV . . . and then become a remote control for the content on the TV.

This could be video like the MLB app delivers, or other apps that would lend themselves to being shown on one (big) screen, and controlled on another (small) screen. Think: games.

All of this sounds very "Apple" to me, in that it's completely consistent with how they think about integrated solutions.

And if true, I'll buy an Apple TV for the first time.
Sorry, I thought GOF was a common name for it.

I don't really have time to type out a long reply as to why C++/Java style design patterns don't occur in better languages, but I'd recommend putting some time in on lisp, ruby, or haskell. If you read idiomatic code in those languages, I think you'll understand my point.
lol, the users were ahead (192%) when I ran my simulation.

72 bucks back out of 1040 for me.
The title says "We Got TechCrunch" like a general coming back from battle.
The apps would be written for a TV resolution, like 720p (1280x720), the same way apps were written for the iPad resolution. No one knows for sure if the AppleTV has flash or not, yet. The touch interface could be handled by the iPod/iPhone/iPad, i.e. you use them as a control to the TV.
That's probably just a more regional thing, as I've been seeing the exact opposite of that for years.
You don't need money to not care. That's a childish notion.
If you are going to a PhD, do it in something you like to do, even if it does not pay (then or later).
No, by squeaky clean I mean someone that can see the difference between having your own agenda and passing on information in as neutral a way as possible.

By taking sides he's lost the advantage that he had.
Ask HN: an ethical dilemma in recommending an Android DRM solution fix
An alternative Android app store invited me to sell my apps in their marketplace, which requires integration of a complicated in-house DRM scheme to protect apps from piracy. Upon investigating the docs and sample code for the integration process, I was amazed to see heaps and heaps of unnecessary complexity, brittle design, and many opportunities for mistakes in integration.

Somehow the part of me that abhors terrible software design took over, and before I really thought about it, I had sent them a very detailed proposal for an alternative design that both fully integrated with their existing infrastructure and reduced integration complexity from a collection of scattered changes to Java source (which would break compatibility with other marketplaces) to a three-line XML change in an application's manifest (which could even be applied in an automated fashion upon upload to the marketplace), with no need to even recompile existing code.

The issue now, after a few rounds back and forth with their team, is that I've come to privately realize a major exploit in my design which would allow the creation of a general-purpose launcher app that would completely evade the DRM scheme I recommended.

Should I continue to help this company improve the developer friendliness of their egregious DRM solution? This would (1) make them much more attractive and lead to many more adopters of their marketplace (2) stop a precedent from being set for Android developers having to customize their code for a distinct marketplace and (3) rid the world of a piece of software design that, at best, discourages integration, and, at worst, inspires a new era of terrible DRM design.

Alternatively, should I tell them about the exploit, its mechanism, and its implications, and suggest they stop implementation?

Thirdinatively, should I just keep helping them fix their stuff (which has its share of existing exploits already), and keep quiet about the exploit, leaving it as an easter egg for the curious few with both a deep enough understanding of the Android framework and experience with this particular marketplace to discover on their own?

(Actually this is really two intertwingled choices: {continue helping vs. suggest stopping} and {reveal exploit vs. keep quiet})
A while back at SXSW, Tucker said, ""You turn your nose up, but there is a reason that I'm sitting on this panel and you're not"
It's not surprising that DF readers are so engaged; if you're a regular DF reader, you implicitly trust Gruber to promote stories that are going to end up interesting. There are vast amounts of new stuff put up on the Internet every day, and Gruber posts only a miniscule fraction of them to his site; it's heavily curated, more carefully groomed than any other referer on the list.

IIRC, Gruber specifically called out this article as an interesting read, which means that if you clicked through to the article, chances are you were doing it with the expectation of reading a good long-form article.
I think this post makes some very bold assumptions.

It assumes that there is no place for innovation in industrial design with glass. Apple's dominance in industrial design has given them the advantage to set the standards for industrial design.

Additionally, I think Jason assumes that industrial design and software design are mutually exclusive. He ignores that part of the beauty of Apple's products is the interaction and combination of software AND hardware and the quality of interaction between them.
not as exciting as you think, since the "rejection" happened as a nobody before he made his website.
If you want to learn to draw and don't know where to start, get a copy of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards. You will be stunned at how quickly you can improve.

http://www.amazon.com/New-Drawing-Right-Side-Brain/dp/087477...
I had three months to blow about two years. I drove across Canada viewing its beauty. I also competed in a ton of downhill mountain biking races.

What I suggest to you, is take your favourite hobby, be it sports, art or computers and just run with it for three months. You most likely won't have the opportunity again for a while.

On a side note, I also started university in the month of January rather than September. I spent those extra months working.
What should it be like?
>also because all the energy, utilities and power companies got panicked as they might go out of business...

I don't think the gas utilities would mind customers buying twice as much gas. Nor would the oil industry supermajors mind a new market buying their products and stamping them with "green" branding.
I'm not sure if you can consider Press Your Luck to be a chance game, especially in light of Michael Larson.
Basic Religion Test Stumps Many Americans
I think Steve Jobs gets this.

"One of our biggest insights [years ago] was that we didn't want to get into any business where we didn't own or control the primary technology because you'll get your head handed to you.

"We realized that almost all - maybe all - of future consumer electronics, the primary technology was going to be software. And we were pretty good at software. We could do the operating system software. We could write applications on the Mac or even PC, like iTunes. We could write the software in the device, like you might put in an iPod or an iPhone or something. And we could write the back-end software that runs on a cloud, like iTunes.

(ca. March 2008 via http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/fortune/0803/gallery.job... )
As an aside, where's the cost benefit in nearlyfreespeech.net? After transferring a hefty 10,000GB you are still charged $0.20/GB, while (say) linode charges you $20/200GB = $0.10/GB from the outset.
Southwest Airlines to Aquire AirTran
That's true, the health care industry is a massive opportunity waiting to be tapped. Not just in the western world, even in the developing world, where the incidence of insurance is increasing.

Many developing countries have had none or next to nothing health insurance till recently. But the market penetration of the healthy insurance is increasing (but still very low now). Because of that more people who could not afford advanced diagnosis or treatments earlier are able to afford them now.

Imagine the potential size of the industry when 1 billion people in India and 1.4 people in China (not to mention a billion or more in other developing countries) can afford as good health care as the 300 million in US, the 450 million in Europe, etc
Exception that proves the rule means that since their is an exception a rule must exist.

For instance - Tonight we got an exception and are allowed to stay out till 11pm, would imply that there exists a rule that forbids them staying out that late. Hence the exception proves the rule.
Lottery is a tax on people who don't know statistics (or math).
Yes I do. You, sir or madam, are a smart one.
Assange's private life is not relevant to the public interest. Videos of our helicopter pilots killing children are.
They are hitting everything on all cylinders – industrial design, mechanical engineering, material selection and finish, manufacturing, supply chain, hardware, customer service, marketing, advertising, retail stores, their website, company structure and internal product development processes. And the software they make is deep and wide – OSX , iOS, respective dev platforms, all the productivity utilities they make, iTunes (owning the music industry), whatever cloud apps they are working on now…

All are benchmarks of the industry.

I'm not a blind fanboy, just impressed and happy to witness a company constantly iterating and making themselves better.
ML definitely seems to be more on people's radar these days but as far as I can tell the job market is pretty small.
Charging more for Solaris support and providing less of it, for starters.
I think you're confusing HDCP with Blu-Ray. There is no "backdoor secret" for Blu-Ray. Technically, there isn't for the X360 either, and to the extent the X360, PS3, and BluRay platforms are fundamentally vulnerable to breaks, we're all vulnerable to breaks --- our banks, credit cards, personal computers, email, all of it --- because there are platforms where the fundamental security decision was to rely on platform integrity instead of e.g. broadcast cryptography.
The options are not mutually exclusive. It is possible, though more difficult, to design pages that accommodate resolutions as low as 1024 x Y, but that also expand to fit higher resolutions. Any good browser should support "min-width" and "max-width" properties, and even if they don't there are still ways to define at least the min-width.

Perhaps I'm old school, but I have respect for websites which utilize my entire screen and still function well and look nice. It takes talent to pull it off. Amazon, for example, has always made me proud. Starting 10 years ago, and probably because of blogging, the trend of fixed width with centered pages kicked in, and thankfully stuck.

It's so much easier to deal with fixed width, but you do have a choice in the matter.
I guess once there's a Jailbroken version of iOS 4.2 for iPad we will be able to put that theory to the test.
Although the darwinian in me has no problem with lotteries as a tax on those who don't understand probability, I'm uncomfortable with the fact that they generally constitute a regressive tax -- the common wisdom is that the poor spend a larger percentage of their income on lotteries, though a bit of fact checking reveals some debate here. In any event, I welcome this, though I'm afraid that the ones who really need it are unlikely ever to see it.
I don't get it. Did they actually do something wrong (on purpose?) or did the gubment make up the charges because they didn't want competition for the dollar?

Could someone start a legit service like this today?
No, it's not hard at all - I don't think it took me more than one minute to figure out. It is, however, an example of a gratuitous change.

With respect to the OpenSSL stuff, I'm not talking about the GPL license - I'm talking about http://www.debian.org/security/2008/dsa-1571, one of the most painful security issues in recent memory and caused by a meddling maintainer. (Certainly, the upstream team could have more clearly warned him, but without the maintainers changes everything would have worked just fine.)

I understand you spend a lot of your free time working for free, and I appreciate your good intentions and the good that Debian and Debian's developers have done (e.g. writing lots of man pages for programs that have none) - but I do think Debian has some really questionable sides as well.
At the hourly rate of a decent C++ hacker, that will cost more than Microsoft's entire product range at retail...

There is an entire industry of VB and VBA programmers who customize MS Office for organizations. I gather even OpenOffice.org has some of that capability. But to do something to OOo that you can't do in VBA with MS Office is a substantial amount of work.
I really enjoyed Iron Sunrise. I'd also recommend Iain M. Banks and Vernor Vinge as other authors you might enjoy.
I think the answer to all three questions is: Yes.

Yes, you need to watch your attitude and ability to work with others. Allowing your thoughts of "unfairness" affect your motivation is counter-productive.

Yes, you need to choose co-founders very carefully. Find people you can trust: I speak from (painful) experience.

Yes, to be successful you need to do the best you can and not worry about who deserves what.

Now, that being said: the best solution to all of this is communication-- preferably in advance. Sit down, say, once a week, and talk about what the priorities are for each of you for the coming week, and what you expect to accomplish. If everybody is on the same page in terms of priorities and expectations, the other problems are minor. The weekly meetings server two purposes: 1) if there are slippages between what is expected and what is happening, it's best to be able to deal with those quickly (i.e., within a week) rather than let the pressure/dissatisfaction build, and 2) once you've agreed to what your co-founders are planning to do during the week, you don't have to think about it again until the next meeting-- you can give your expectations and comparisons a rest.
It wasn't Arrington who said that. He was quoting VC's who had said that.

There’s a worry among venture capitalists, [Arrington] said, that angels are training “an entire generation of entrepreneurs who are building dipshit companies” that sell to Google for $25 million. In fact, that criticism might be extended to Y Combinator as well, which could be seen as “the king of the dipshit companies.”

Arrington said he isn’t on-board with all of that criticism, but that it holds a “kernel of truth.”

http://venturebeat.com/2010/07/29/angelconf-ron-conway-micha...
Hard to read with one or two sentences separated as paragraphs.