skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
It does for me:

"Bose Corporation (pronounced /ˈboʊz/)"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bose_Corporation
This is a brilliant look at the system. And you are of course correct. There is an entire overhaul needed if we ever want to make learning more individualized. This will probably never happen. However, I included one link to a school trying it out, you would probably like it: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-litt...

Your conclusion is bang on, and yes the current system is set up in such a way that it classifies students as data in a system.
This guy better get a job offer from Chad Hurley. Seriously though...genius idea.
Good luck... But you should not ask for ideas, it looks just like asking for people to do your homework! You can add some paperclips and build a rubber band cannon ;)
You think so? Well okay, it's not a topic for everybody, but with increasing data loads, it's about time people think more about machine learning technologies to use to get to know more about their data.
I do both Operations Research and Machine Learning and see many possibilities to improve a company's knowledge about the data they have - even if they don't know it (yet).

Especially as with unsupervised ML you can definitely find patterns in your data, groups of similar data and trends, you can do forecasts, imply relationships, and much more.

It's a hard topic, and you definitely need a lot of time to get into the really bloody details, but it is definitely worth it. And it makes a lot of fun if you like maths and statistics.
So would I be right in saying that to update a function from v1 to v2, in a statically typed language I can't change the function prototype, whereas with a dynamically typed language I can? Would I not still be somewhat limited in the latter case (e.g. I'd have to have the same number of arguments)?
Its good information to know there were extra ships being built. I don't think its 2.02 though. These photos appear to be new, and the ship is in much better condition than the one that appears in the photo you shared, also as you noted. Unless for some reason these photos are actually much older than the one you found on aerospaceweb.
The time which law enforcement spends in "cloak and dagger" type activity is minuscule compared to the ordinary activity of driving around and arresting people.

Most criminals aren't smart. Most crimes are ill-thought-out.

Making secret investigations more expensive seems like a fine way to keep cops focused on "the basics".
Nothing I said implied that the pilots shouldn't perform better than the baseline, unless pilots are a group in society that uniquely carry less sleep debt than average.
Bose does not strive to produce an accurate sound, they produce a unique sound, plus they have a marketing team that is probably second only to Apple.

Through careful marketing, Bose produces a product that is coveted by the semi-affluent consumer who also wants to signal to themselves and their friends 'I have arrived'.

Most people have never heard an accurate sound system, eg: a professionally engineered room. But they DO know that their plastic Akai system is NOT the pinnacle of sound. So, you get your first big signing bonus or job promotion and a new house. You've got a little disposable income and want to splurge a little. In comes Bose and their little magic speakers. You bring the system home, set it up, and the sound is RADICALLY different from anything you've heard before. It's way different than your little Akai system, and it seems as if the sound is careening off the walls (eq'ing towards the higher freqs, plus mutli directional speakers to achieve some reflections). This is WAY different( plus it wasn't cheap) therefore it MUST be good.

I have some background in audio (both in home theater and in sound studios). 'Good' sound can be somewhat in the ear of the listener, much like art can be in the eye of the beholder. And, not everybody wants Accurate, some people just want to put on a CD of their favorite artist and hear the sound in a way they didn't expect to, and Bose delivers that experience for people.
Related:
"2010 acquisitions--Microsoft: 0, Google: 23"
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13846_3-20017823-62.html

These two data points put together make me think something is Seriously Wrong in Redmond. They both speak to uncoordinated business unit strategy and paralysis in executive management. Perhaps Balmer is finally on his way out, resulting in this lack of focus.
Seconded!

If you're working 19 hours a day, there aren't many hours when you're not working.

As such, there's no reason to put too many limits on when your 1st employee can work (so long as those 40 hours/week are met and stuff is getting done).

You may wish to consider allowing telecommuting, as well as to allow employees to save every hour over 40 they work per week as vacation time ("comp-time"?).

Another alternative: as the employee what type of schedule s/he would like to set, and make it a cooperative process rather than an autocratic process. Autonomy is a huge component of job satisfaction (along with complexity and a clear payoff between effort and reward), so the more autonomy you can give, the more likely it is that you'll keep this person happy enough to stay.

The last full-time job I worked, I was the only full-time employee, and was not allowed to set my own schedule, nor to choose my own tasks, and I was frequently required to work 10-20 hours per week of unpaid overtime. Needless to say, my happiness levels jumped significantly when I quit that job, in spite of the tenuous nature of substitute teaching and non-profit work.

Hopefully your first employee will have a much better experience.
Well, you already said it. I subscribe ;)
Again, Dement doesn't argue against this. There is a tendency to get tired in the afternoon, because clock-dependent alerting (which give us our diurnal sleep schedule) dips at that time. But he's arguing that the reason this is affecting people so strongly is because basically everyone is chronically sleep deprived.
Banks Culture books are terrific. Interesting world, great ideas, and terrific storytelling. Not a fan of Vinge myself.

Also, it's "Rainbows End", no apostrophe. Oddly, I found this book a bit retro in its application of tech.
He specifically says that's not the case.
>There you go. You don't get it. Until you use an iPhone, a Mac, drive a BMW or Audi, you don't even realize how great the experience can be.

Perhaps beside the point, but...I can't be the only one who things that Windows 7 is a vastly better experience than OS X.
> Could, but doesn't

Could, but doesn't yet.

If you're not locally rehosting the 'known-good' version that you just audited, you're not being paranoid enough.
I second the rubberband cannon
Southwest to buy Airtran
I'm going to take the unpopular route and say you should not optimize for 1024 by 768 screen resolution. You should not optimize for any resolution.

You should stop using bogus web statistics based on screen resolution, because a screen resolution of a given size does not imply a browser window of a given size.

Computer displays are getting bigger. That means my efficiency should increase as my ability to manage more things on the screen should increase. I should now be able to do things such as writing a paper with multiple pages from other sources visible at the side for things like citations, and cross-referencing multiple visible documents without having to resort to toggling between windows.

I'd suggest that since so many screens now have a horizontal resolution of 1280 pixels, if you are going to optimize your pages, you should make sure they're optimized for browser windows sized to 640 pixels wide. I'm completely serious.

As a side note, there are multiple reasons why books are printed at the sizes they are. One of the big ones is that with columns of text at the sizes afforded by typical book sizes, humans read with some of the best efficiency.

~70 ems seems to be the consensus for optimal column width. Consider that 70 ems is smaller than a terminal window. I feel bad when I see people at the library open their browsers and maximize them on the Windows machines with 1680 by 1050 displays there, because they got accustomed to maximizing their application windows through conditioning at a time when most displays were 1024 by 768 or smaller. If you're reading Wikipedia on a fullscreen window at 1680 pixels of horizontal resolution, you're only degrading your own reading efficiency, whether you've realized it or not.
It raises red flags when I see a domain that is registered anonymously. I mean, it doesn't always mean the site is fraudulent, but I certainly wouldn't give my credit card to a site hosted on such a domain.

It is okay for personal stuff, but it seems like a pretty bad idea if you are trying to run a reputable business.
I think the expression you are looking for is "the proof is in the pudding".
This is a good, levelheaded response. But it makes it seem as if the process of becoming a sponsored maintainer was straightforward.

It's not.

A number of months ago, I tried getting trimage (a gui image optimizer, http://trimage.org) into debian. Since I already had a working Ubuntu PPA, I figured it wouldn't be too hard. Packaging instructions for debian are available at various official websites, but contradictionary and they all seem to presume you have packaged for Debian before. Jargon like RFP (request for packaging) and ITP (intent to package) is thrown around frequently without explanation.

Luckily, there is debian-mentors, meant to help upstream developers with becoming a sponsored maintainer. Most of the debian-mentors site links to outdated packaging instructions, using which will mean you will be ridiculed on the way-too-hostile mailinglist. Trying to do 'the right thing' is almost impossible, as most of the feedback will depend on the personal opinion of the person responding. I suspect this is because they, too, don't know which packaging instructions to use or point to.

Trying to get my application into debian has been nothing but a massive, timesinking frustration, and I wish that wasn't the case.
Sounds like "mouse hand" aka RSI / CTS !

Some suggestions:

1. Learn keyboard short cuts, to reduce dependence on reaching for the mouse.

2. Try trackball / different size mouse / tablet. I have a novel (i.e. haven't seen it elsewhere solution) I use a Logitech trackball with the right hand and a USB wheel mouse with the LED window tapped up with the left hand. That way, I'm not making fine motor movements with the right hand whilst clicking etc - which I do with the left hand. Found that taping up the window on the bottom avoided getting interfering mouse movements.

3. Check your posture, table height, screen position. In my experience most chairs are too low, especially if you are 6' or over. Many notebook keyboards are too cramped if you have largish fingers for extended typing. Get a full size high quality keyboard for the bulk work.

4. Take breaks :-)
New _externals API in CouchDB
Color of ink on a book != color you perceive, when compared to a monitor.

The most pleasing books to read are on a cream stock (The Elements of Typographic Style comes to mind), and thus have a bit less contrast than #fff vs. #000.
Six More Themes From TechCrunch Disrupt
Ask PG: Who looks at the demo sites listed in the YC application form?
In the next few days, I would like to list prospective features of the site/idea, details about me, etc on the demo url included in the application.

There are some that I would like to list which I would like to keep confidential and would not like potential competitors ( or investors in potential competitors other than PG, Jessica Livingston, Trevor Blackwell and Robert Morris, because I believe you would not pass on the ideas) to know.

Could you tell if you four would be the only ones who would be going through the demo sites and is there a chance that others (advisors, friends, staff, partners, etc) could also have a look at the demo site as part of an informal decsion making process?

(obviously the scope of this question does not include accidental discovery of the hopefully obscure enough demo site by anybody else)

Thanks in advance.
That is my speculation as well. I posted about it here a bit ago (whoa.. 26 days.. time flies!): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1657709
Assange's hypocracy is very much pertinent, if we are to accept his reasoning for what he and his organization does.
Quant Hedge Fund D.E. Shaw Fires 150; 10% of staff
I don't have a down vote button. Do you have to post a lot before the button appears?
The naive way will just load the highest-numbered version you have installed:

require 'rack'

When you have rubygems loaded, this is equivalent to:

gem 'rack', '>=0'

You can specify exact and relative dependencies easily. There are a fuckton of frameworks to handle this for you, many of them oriented around copying the depended-upon gems into your app when it's deployed, as is common in the Java world.
Up to 37% chance of 9+ earthquake on entire west coast within 50 years
Well in this instance, with the new TV, the high price is just there to balance the research costs and low amount of production. As they start to leverage the new technology and churn out more of these, the Bose TV (and others using these new techs) pricing should come down.
10 signs the us is losing its influence in the western hemisphere
Trying to find a good business model
Well... in the process of investigating and punishing people, the justice system pretty much inherently must negate many otherwise recognized rights.

You do have the right to be free of wiretaps - except in the course of a court-ordered investigation. You have a right to not be a slave - except when you violate the law and the state forces you to work, etc..

This is why its important to limit the purview of government, why even if we allow prosecutors to spy on people, we might not want them to easily spy on people, etc.
You probably need time to create that value... Halfway agreed.
National Research Council report on biometrics raises hard questions, ire
Check that: Someone already has the AppleTV software running on a Jailbroken iPod Touch [1]. Pretty neat.

[1] http://www.tuaw.com/2010/09/28/apple-tv-lowtide-front-row-ru...
Some additional questions: How long have you been working there? If you were there during TW, how have things changed at a mission level? Day to day level? Does employees generally feel like AOL is becoming more and more successful again?

[edit- formatting]
I still think my point at http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1735344 is important. If Debian didn't throw away unit tests, a lot of these integration errors could get caught automatically.
As discussed in techzing daily 13 mins in: http://techzinglive.com/?p=450
The unfortunate truth about humans is that nobody looks down unless it serves to further raise their own status, even if only in a subconscious, primal sort of way (consider how working with the poor is likely to increase respect towards you, and how you may unknowingly seek this praise). It's hardly something unique to feminists.

But that wasn't really pertinent to my point in any case -- I was just trying to save you from categorically stating that an entire movement consisting of many millions of people was somehow arguing for a total bias reversal. Or at least they're not lobbying for it visibly. Maybe they really believe that, but you'd have a hard time getting them to admit to it. That said, I haven't seen any evidence that this is the case.
I think we have a QED here. :)
Great article! (it surprised me that I read the whole article in one shot without evening noticing it was that long!)

One question (maybe a bit sensitive): all the glory of successful YC startups aside, what are the "failure rate" for YC funded startups? What situation would you consider a "total fail", if that ever happened?

And another related question is based on which criterion would you consider a YC graduate successful? user base? the amount of money raise? financially break even? profitability?

thanks.
How to Install Java JRE in UbuntU using PPA
I did send an email yesterday, the title is "Your approach to web development. I realize now that the title might look like SPAM :) Anyway those questions were answered, I'll send you another one.
Maybe Windows 7 is better than OS X. But to get there, I'm sure the Windows team used OS X extensively to see what it does well, what it does poorly.

Someone who hasn't even tried the best has no way to build something better.
Thank you so much for that one. My grandfather and I laughed for hours.
When it comes to Android you can choose to synchronize only those Twitter/Facebook profiles that have an existing address book entry. Thanks to that the list is not littered with useless contacts and you have all kinds of information, like the recent status update or profile photo, integrated under a single address book. Very handy.
MS Product (read-Marketing) Group responds to Reddits questions to IE9
Germany ends WWI reparations after 92 years with £59m final payment
Unlike drugs, crypto is something you can make in your own home with freely available materials... at least until they outlaw debuggers... (inserting obligatory right-to-read reference).
I wonder what Mike Arrington will be doing after this?
1) Go for pilgrimage
2) Run for public office
3) Start another tech blog
4) open a law firm
This is awesome! Too bad I'm the only one in the office at the moment...I guess I'll just go blow up Stackoverflow until somebody comes back.
Awesome time frame :)
Now, this is an ad-blocker with style.
Is it also easy to get into the US for 3 months, and work legally? What kind of visa (or visa-less thingy) would you use?
"How much of it is down to a simple selection effect: women that are intelligent, ambitious and career-minded are more likely to be single and childless in their twenties?"

I don't remember the percentages offhand, but a lot of the reason unmarried women do better is because marriage creates a monopsony for women. Basically employers have to pay less to hire women because their BATNAs are only local instead of national or global.
The end of software ownership
"User experience is everything. It always has been, but it's still undervalued and under-invested in. If you don't know user-centered design, study it. Hire people who know it. Obsess over it. Live and breathe it. Get your whole company on board." - Evan Williams CEO of Twitter

http://evhead.com/2005/11/ten-rules-for-web-startups.asp
FWIW, the only flight that Buran performed was 100% automatic from launch to landing, with no crew on board, in 1988. It could have been an awesome machine.
I agree it's a fascinating field. I've been doing nothing for the past few months but intensive study of the fundamentals. I've had to review a lot of math but I've really been enjoying it. It also seems reasonable to me to expect that demand for those skills will grow.

My impression of the current job market, however, is that it's tough for somebody without formal academic qualifications to crack.
I love the Culture books, but don't count out The Algebraist (possibly my favorite of Banks's books) or Against a Dark Background.
What do you mean by "work legally?"

If you mean do a program like YC, it's fine. The reason it works in this situation is because you aren't making any money. The INS does not care if you are "working" if you aren't actually making any taxable income.

If you mean draw a regular salary, it's harder to do that legally but I have a friend in France who runs a 1-man consulting firm that does short term contracts in the USA and he's figured it out. I don't think it was easy in terms of "no work" but it was just filling out a bunch of paperwork.
I love how "tax the rich" types

...a position I do not hold, and which I object to being characterized with.

seem to presume that leaving the taxes where they are now is "drastically cutting revenue". Actually it would be maintaining the status quo.

No, because the status quo includes a sunset for the tax cuts in question, that was put there by the Congress that passed EGGTRA and JGGTRA in the name of fiscal responsibility. The legislation which implemented those tax cuts was crafted as a temporary measure, designed to promote more economic activity and pay for themselves after economic growth had returned to earlier levels.

Making the tax cuts permanent equates to a drastic cut in revenue because for the entire life of the tax cut, budget and debt projections were calculated and presented to the public on the basis that the cuts would be allowed to expire, as they were designed to do by law. Anyone who questioned the deficits being run up by the previous administration was told to stop worrying, and presented with figures showing that it would all come back into balance...later.

And yet, when those expiration dates arrived starting in 2006, and the economy had grown so much that a classic asset bubble was inflating, and borrowing had significantly increased during the life of the tax cuts, the very same people insisted that we had to extend the tax cuts because to do otherwise would slow economic growth. They weren't even willing to contemplate increasing the tax rate on short-term capital gains.

As of now, they (and seemingly you) are insisting those tax cuts should be made permanent, while completely ignoring the fact that they came with a sell-by date. Answer me this: if higher taxes are such a terrible idea, and Congress was able to cut them as they did during the previous administration, why didn't they reduce spending at the same time? Why is it that the same people who cut taxes chose to actually increase spending significantly, and borrow to pay for it?
You mean at university? Ok, probably true, but that likely says more about the limited role of women in "real professions" in prior generations than it does about anything else, no?

Not to get too irate about it but I can't stand when people whine about the success of women or claim men have the deck stacked against them somehow. If you're going to extol the virtues of being a man, the least you can do is act like one.
I am serious.

You're assuming that the Chinese will be benevolent if we don't default and aggressively malevolent if we do. That's naive. If they're willing to be aggressively malevolent, they'll be so without an excuse so it's absurd to worry about excuses.

If they're unwilling, their worst is actually good for us - it will force us to live within our means.

BTW - A US-class blue water navy is really hard to build. So, the likely malevolence is nuclear.
Depends on how you define the market. I think ML is still too much a pie in the sky research topic for a job, but it's in huge "demand" as a startup founder

i.e. If you can actually do ML, you're much more valuable as a startup founder than looking for a 9-5 job, unless it happens to be at say, Google.

My guess is it'll be another decade before ML and statistics become seriously sought after in "normal" corporate programming.
I was part of the TechStars 2010 Boulder class with Vacation Rental Partner. I've heard great things about YC, but do consider the fact that with the small size (~10) of each TechStars class your company gets a ton of one-on-one time with awesome mentors, including the director of the program. Your mentors really get to know you, your company, your space and can help with problems specific to your company.
This is the correct answer. Also, the sequel to Fire is coming out in February. :)
And yet he doesn't kill and eat my family the moment I turn my back. He doesn't need philosophy as a source of morality, and he doesn't need faith... he only needs socialization.
this is probably the most likely culprit.

think about it for high paying professions such as top law firm work, or an investment bank -- getting ahead to make partner means working tons of hours which is not a viable option if you have a kid (unless there is a stay at home father).
Heavy-lifting balloons: Flying saucers
Two black helicopters, one tinfoil hat, at that point, really.