skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Lifespans aren't static, nor can the retirement age be. Continual adjustments have to be expected. The whole point of the program was to provide income for old people the last few years of their lives, not to allow them to live for 30 years after retirement.

On your last point, you're simply making that up. Assuming you live long enough to reach retirement age, you will get benefits. The idea that you won't get benefits is based on absurd projections that wrongly assume the retirement age will never change. That's simply not going to happen, benefits/age will simply be adjusted to compensate and keep the program for those within a few years of the average lifespan, as it was intended.

You've fallen for political scare tactics of those opposed to the very idea of social security because they're opposed to all government assistance and anything even slightly socialist. Benefits simply have to be adjusted so payouts don't exceed payins and we're not using debt to support people. For the boomer generation, that sucks, because they're huge and gen X isn't. For gen X, that's great, because they're small and gen Y is huge.
I read the book in the late 1990s, after having heard about it for years, and was deeply unimpressed. No doubt it was deeply original when it was written, but a hard to read waste of time now. As for it not being reprinted, from all I have read Nelson is a royal jerk, and one who seems to actually hate the web, because it put the coup de grace to his Xanadu project.
Bored? Never! I spend all my time either talking with fellow hackers or non-hacker friends, or working on at least _something_. There's always stuff on the To Do List. Create a "Someday" category and just look into what's there when you don't feel like real work.

For example, today messed around with a new startup's home page design and advertised on Reddit. Also, booked flights.
Ooops. Yeah, I went looking for a FAQ - but I figured it must automatically add the "Ask HN" when there was no URL. Sorry!
Ask HN: Share dilution
Hi fellers,

I'm actually a business graduate but I'm not very familiar with share dilution and corporate structure in terms of screwing someone over. I understand that the basic premise behind share dilution is when the compnay issues new shares; thus lowering the value of previously issued shares.

In The Social Network, Eduardo was apparently screwed over through dilution of his share ownership, but no one else was affected. Why was this? Did he have a separate, special class of common stock different from everyone else? Early angel investors/VCs do things to protect themselves from future dilution; what do they do, and how?

Thanks
With my spare time:

- I work on app that I want to launch as a startup.

- Hack on open source code.

- Read some of Donald Knuth's The Art of Computer Programming, which I purchased last month.

There is always something one could be doing. If I am bored, it is because I am being lazy.
Advanced Linear Algebra, Roman; Linear Algebra, Hoffman & Kunze; Matrix Analysis, Horn & Johnson; Principles of Mathematical Analysis, Rudin; Real Analysis, Royden.

Miscellaneous comments:

- Reading pure abstract algebra (e.g. Dummit & Foote) isn't a good use of time if you intend to go into statistics, since it only shows up in a few very special subareas. If you decide to go into one of these areas, you can learn this later.

- More advanced books on linear algebra usually emphasize the abstract study of vector spaces and linear transformations. This is fine, but you also need to learn about matrix algebra (some of which is in that Horn & Johnson book) and basic matrix calculus, since in statistics, you'll frequently be manipulating matrix equations. The vector space stuff generally does not help with this, and this material isn't in standard linear algebra books. (Similarly, you should learn the basics of numerical linear algebra and optimization -- convex optimization in particular shows up a lot in statistics.)

- People have different opinions on books like Rudin, but you need to learn to read material like this if you're going into an area like probability. It's also more or less a de facto standard, so it is worth reading partly for that reason as well. So read Rudin/Royden (or equivalent, there are a small handful of others), but supplement them with other books if you need (e.g. 'The Way of Analysis' is the complete opposite of Rudin in writing style). It helps to read a few different books on the same topic simultaneously, anyway.

- Two books on measure-theoretic probability theory that are more readable than many of the usual suspects are "Probability with Martingales" by Williams and "A User's Guide to Measure-Theoretic Probability" by Pollard. There is also a nice book called "Probability through Problems" that develops the theory through a series of exercises.
Pray tell, how does this lower the "barrier to entry"? Are we presuming that terrorists are stone deaf, nearly blind, and incapable of memorizing daily aircraft routes?

If so, I agree with you, and further suggest banning iPhone-holders for Stinger missiles.
Uhh what does TechCrunch have to do with this?

Did you read past the first paragraph of the piece?

Come on fess up, you didn't did you? ;-)
Aerial Footage: Portrait of a Housing Bust
Hacking. QED
Verizon Wireless to Pay Up to $90 Million in Refunds
Never really bored... But to answer your question - mountain biking whenever I can (yesterday went to a dirt jumping park! in fact, I think I'll go there right now!), and assembling little air plane replicas (currently working on MiG 21). Oh, and hacking (should be writing a shell right now...) :-)
We're doing a hackathon at NYU and if it's like last year's it will be replay of the kind of hackathon they do at TechCrunch. I'm saying our students should be encouraged to do projects that aren't just subsets of whatever was hot with the VCs and angel investors 8 months ago. I thought I was pretty clear about that in the piece, but then you'd have to actually read it to figure that out.
I wonder what the curriculum will be like. Are they going to teach computer programming basics and methodoligies or is that school going to be a "corporate coder" machine which spews out .Net or Java developers suited for a cubicle job for IBM?
There will be a mixture of outcomes. And some of the early-exits and fizzles will in fact set the ground for future mega-successes. Sean Parker's near-misses in Napster and Plaxo helped him help Facebook avoid early exits. @Ev's sale of Blogger to Google enabled Twitter.
Right, because it would be so difficult to find aircraft without this nifty software.

I mean, a terrorist with a rocket launcher just gets in the damn car and drives to an airport, points it, and blows up a plane. Clearly, cars need to be outlawed. Or roads.

I hate terrorism pieces. The stupid just plain burns.
I've been living abroad since 2007, living in Italy, Spain, Argentina, Brazil, India, Colombia and Mexico. I'm a US citizen. For US citizens interested in working on their business, you should know this: if you live outside of the US for 330 days in any 365-day period, you can deduct 100% of the taxes on your income, up to $91,400...

So I lived in India and Italy and Mexico/Colombia for the last year, earning in dollars, spending in rupees and pesos. For americans who have their own web business, it's something to think about....
I understand the argument against government insurance of banking and the problems with telling people they can withdraw their money any time. But don't I understand why the phrase "fractional reserve banking" is used to describe the problem.

The term "fractional reserve" refers to what percent of total deposits the bank is required by the government to keep on hand. 0% reserve banking is not less risky than fractional reserve. And 100% reserve banking is clearly just putting paper in a vault so you're renting vault space in such a system.

So maybe people should stop using this term when they complain about banking. Their real problem is with government insurance and demand deposits.

The speaker asserts that this system could not exist without the FDIC but clearly it did exist before the FDIC.

I'm against government insurance too, but these kinds of unsubstantiated statements provide people with reasons to dismiss the sound things being said.
US banks are so far in the past security-wise that it'll take aeons for them to adopt something like OAuth; most of them haven't even managed things like using email or telephone calls responsibly.
Exactly. I only get bored when I -choose- to get bored. Which is a huge change from when I was young, I can tell you.

Now, I have so many hobbies that I have to put some aside for others. And even without them, I have so many personal projects I like to work on, and so much to learn, that I would never have free time just from that alone.

I often find myself stressed out about my hobbies, and have to take a break from them!

And someone mentioned Minecraft... -sigh- Why is that game so addictive? I just keep going back.
Yep - usually I read, but today I was cheering my home team as they became division champions. I'm not really into sports but every year I dare to hope this might be year the pennant finally comes to San Francisco.
Spending time with my girlfriend. Usually trips around the Bay Area (it's amazing what's there within an hour's driving distance), dining, cooking (it's actually more expensive then dining out, but well worth it in terms of using exactly the ingredients that you want), movies.

Coding. Right now I am an airport (waiting for a flight) implementing something (a CS concept) I've implemented at work in Java, in OCaml just to refresh my knowledge of OCaml (and my understanding of what I actually did). I'll write toys just for fun of it, for myself. It's okay to re-invent the wheel if you have to, do it for enjoyment.

Reading. Can be technical, can be non-fiction, can be fiction. Presently I am reading Richard Rhodes' Dark Sun and Benjamin Pierce's Types and Programming Languages.

Keep in mind that your brain is a lot like a heap of a run-time with generational garbage collection or a log-structured file system / database. Occasionally, the throughput at which you can write and read information from it goes down as it moves the bytes around and deletes the un-needed stuff. If you never let it do that, you'll run out of space / your knowledge will become incredibly fragmented.

It's important that if if you don't feel like being productive (read: your NewGen is full) you shouldn't force yourself to be. Go for a walk, watch a movie, work out, go out and eat (even if by yourself). I wonder how much money companies lose due to the rule or convention that one should work in a single contiguous chunk during the day (sitting comatose at their screen, when they should be taking a nap or going on a walk).
Bump (S09) Teams with Pulse to Share News Feeds Across Devices
Laundry and http://www.heroesofnewerth.com/
http://www.flightradar24.com/ <-- how is it much easier than a laptop with an internet connection?

Found by: Google Search.
Search phrase: "ADS-B online" (without quotes)
6th link.
This is why I like libev, which has bindings to several languages (including python). It picks the best backend for watching FDs on a given system (epoll, select, ...). The support for timers, idle callbacks and so on is also very handy.
I suppose I don't like the 'wave' analogy here, because it implies there's a general lull in "Web" right now -- a pause between waves, or low tide, or some such cyclical slowdown.

In fact, despite troubles in the general economy, there's no such slowdown. The Web sector is booming -- and focusing on a few 'weary' companies and people of a certain generation isn't a general sectoral indicator, at all.

The wave is still going right now with plenty of energy, and reporting to the contrary is a disservice.
The weekend is actually one of the most productive times in my week — blogs/Twitter update less, people tend to be offline and therefore not pinging me with questions, and somehow they feel more relaxing so I tend to use that time for working on my project.

That said, if I'm truly bored, I'll spend my time exercising, cooking, or some other non-computer hobby to refresh my brain a bit.
Tunisia (Few facts from wikipedia)

Northernmost country of Africa
Official Language: Arab
Second Language: French
Population(1st july 2009) : 10.3 million (appox)

Tunisia has an authoritarian regime in the guise of a procedural democracy led by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who has governed as President since 1987 and has systematically diminished freedom of press and political pluralism while keeping appearances of democracy.

It also has one of Africa and the Middle East's highest per-capita GDPs (PPP)
At first glance, I thought you had simply copy-pasted the article. Posting here in hopes of calling attention to your subtle parody.
I think the line that rings truest for me here is "here are a lot of variables to consider beyond a simple time measurement"

Interestingly enough, one of the reasons i enjoy startups, is because it enables one to make decisions that are less constrained by big company style black or white parameters. I.e. When share options are discussed in a big company, the deal is often seen as a zero-sum one. If A gets more shares then B gets less. A gets wealthier and B does not.

In an ideal situation (that is far more visible at small companies and startups), giving A more shares could well result in increased value for B too (since the company value without A drops dramatically).

In an attempt to answer the question somewhat better though, i would suggest you ask yourself not "what have i done till now", but instead, "how critical to our future success is the new guy".
I agree -- FBR is a much deeper book.
"to communicate with a camera directly in JavaScript."

"error: Flash movie not yet registered!"

Some people seem to have a different definition for "directly" than I do.

This works -through- Flash. Without Flash, you get nothing. It's not "directly" with Javascript at all.
this is good tax saving tips :) staying in home country (may be india in your case) with us citizenship still enjoying the monetary benefit of USA.
I have setup a server for HN users, #startups regulars and friends. Leave a comment here with your Minecraft username and make sure that your profile has contact information and I will give you access.
Which means no phone cameras, though that could conceivably work on Android some day.
Sadly, I saw this view first hand when flying into Phoenix from Salt Lake. I grew up in Arizona and had heard about these ghost neighborhoods and empty streets, but had no idea how bad it really was.
There is no rule for how to divide equity. You would divide the shares based on whatever you feel is most appropriate, generally considering time and effort invested by the current founder(s), and the value that the new employee(s) bring into the mix.

If you think about it in the grand scheme of things 'a few months work' is basically a rounding error in terms of all the time and effort that will go into building a company.
Was pretty hilarious listening to their evasive answers to every question in the Reddit IE9 Devs AMA.

It basically equated to: we're not making this for XP because of new technology we're using that's only preset in Vista/7's OS. When asked why they didn't just selectively make use of the features if they were present instead of crippling the entire browser's backwards-capability, they never responded. It was pretty obvious that they're only doing it to try and force people to upgrade from XP (which is hilarious in and of itself, spend $400 on a new OS for an inferior browser that other competitors offer for free).

Oh, and Chrome/Firefox will both work on XP, will both have equivalent if not better hardware accelerate graphics, and will both probably go stable before IE9 releases.
http://play.eveonline.com/en/home.aspx
Tablets. What are they good for?
How does this app work? I really don't see how it's possible.
Sign me up, yo.
The executives determine the entire direction of the company. The people at the bottom are generally there to make a livelihood, not to endorse the political ideas of those at the top. A decision by those executives should not be considered the will of that entire company, for political purposes.
Ask HN: Tracking VC-funding and IPOs in real-time?
I remember a few HNites working on apps that show VC-funding, IPO etc. stats. Anyone remember? Thanks!
As interesting as it is that he concludes that he "can’t deny that testosterone has changed [his] behavior," I can't help but wonder how much of that personality change was due to his own gender stereotypes, societal expectations and generally just feeling like a man.

I've heard very similar things from pre-op transsexuals who aren't on hormones and are just dressing the part. Dressing like a man makes you feel like a man in much the same way wearing a suit instead of sweatpants reflects on your behavior, poise and how other people interpret you.
Wow....bored. I remember that phenomena. Used to happen to me ever so occasionally before I had kids. Now, the little time I get to myself when I am not hacking is called 'peace and quiet'.

I honestly can't remember the last time I was bored.
I live and work in Grosse Pointe. There are at least 2 of us here on the East Side that consider ourselves hackers. We have informal meetings at the local coffee shops. We're both working on various projects. Most of the tech scene is concentrated more in the AA area, but if there are any more metro-Detroiters, let's meetup and start something.
nandemo, I have no idea how you got to know this lingo, but I am very impressed.
I agree that other people here are making this more complicated than it has to be. Just go from one place to another on a tourist visa for the country you are visiting. Continue to pay takes in your home country and keep your work on the down low in the country you are visiting. You would probably be walking (if not crossing) some thin lines in regards to laws against working while on a tourist visa but I doubt you would have to worry about getting caught.

The only thing I have really found difficult is dealing with payment issues. Moving money in its many forms can be a pain. This is a big subject which is highly personalized for each person, so I won't get into it here. Just make sure you have a plan a, b and c for getting access to money and contacting your family when problems appear.
Although I expect this will be downvoted for being insensitive (unless the reverse psychology of saying so prevents it), I'm going to call bs on this person's experiences. In fact, it sounds more like what a woman planning to "transition" or who has transitioned toward being a man would fantasize things are like. I'm an all-American looking US male, approachable and probably in the 90th percentile with regard to looks, and woman (especially flirtatious, pouty ones) do not ask me for mechanical or technical advice unless they specifically know that I'm a programmer. Neither do men.

The people that DO know me know not to ask for mechanical help or advice because they know that I'm not mechanically inclined. If it were true that people who knew him as a woman started asking him for mechanical help because he became a man, even though they knew he wasn't mechanically inclined, then people who know me would behave the same, regardless of past information, and that doesn't happen.
For me:

Movies

Backgammon

Cycling (if the weather's good)

Learning new Cocktail Recipes

Cooking for people

Baking Bread

Amateur Digital Photography

I find Baking Bread to be the best de-stresser of all, and it always makes the house smell great!
IE9 can't run on XP because it has 'hardware acceleration', that can be turned off. XP is good enough for the insane amount of 3D games, that use 'hardware acceleration' you know like Star Craft 2, but hey it's not good enough for a web browser. Well what else should I expect from Microsoft?

Note: I know that the hw acceleration uses some API, that XP lacks, but if there is one thing Microsoft is good at it's emulation/backward compatibility, they just don't want to do it so that you have to go and spend your money on a new PC and a shiny new Windows.
I am never bored.

In fact, I have the opposite problem: I often have trouble enjoying things that are not on my To Do List because there are too many things on my To Do List that aren't getting done.
مسلسل العشق الممنوع الحلقة 77
I always worry about posting 'repeated' links (as you can tell I'm a bit new to HN). Is there an accepted way to lessen this?
USA has 'none' ... which seems right, as I can't recall the Constitution authorising the Federal Government to mandate employment leave.
I make electronic music: http://soundcloud.com/gau5/spotlight, and the usual stuff like hang out with friends, I love watching movies, doing mathematics and watching videos on creating music and other forms of art.
Also: http://www.flightstats.com/go/FlightTracker/flightTracker.do
The fast-tracking angle is interesting: this is essentially high school plus community college rolled into one, but with an apparent hope that it'll be closer to a 4-year-college degree in quality due to greater preparation in the high-school years and coordination between the high-school and college curricula (it's one six-year curriculum, not a 4-year HS followed by 2-year college). Plus some employability boost from IBM's preferential hiring.

I do worry a bit about lock-in at an early age, though. A 14-year-old is young enough that a decent proportion may turn out not to really want a career in computer science after all, especially because I suspect decisions on whether to go here or not will in many cases be either made by or strongly pressured by parents. Will the curriculum be broad enough that a 20-year-old who's successfully completed it could plausibly get a job doing something other than working for IBM or a similar company? Or could they even leave at 18 with a normal HS degree and go to a 4-year college in a different major? The article is unclear about whether the 6-year-to-associates-degree part is mandatory, or if there's a possibility of opting to earn a normal high-school diploma after 4.
I really couldn't understand fully what are you asking about but if you're not sure if the final product should be a web or desktop application maybe you can try developing using Flash environment. If you start as a webapp but then decide to switch to desktop you can just take the code from the swf file and put in into an Adobe Air application.
I size other guys up, thinking, Yeah, I could take him.

As a lifelong nerdy ectomorph, I have never felt this way.

With me its been more like, "Yeah, I could launch that MVP faster than him."
There's something to be said about purposely inflating one's title to sound cooler (there's certainly bad people graduating with CS degrees), but let's set that point aside for a moment.

Sounds to me like you saying that implementing a design pattern != good code?

An example of my bias is more towards something like this:

(1) someone with a CS background is more likely to notice and inefficient algorithm and know how to optimize it

(2) someone who just knows how to code in a language may not be aware of the presence of a suboptimal algorithm, much less know how to optimize it

How do you explain to a non-technical person the difference and importance between (1) and (2)? I guess it's going to be difficult, but I was curious if anyone was able to easily convey (1) or (2) in a quick short introductory pitch.
The percent split is up to you guys. I think you should choose what the two of you think is fair to both sides. If this were my company and I were bringing someone onboard 1 year later, I would be thinking about the vesting schedule and possibly using cliff vesting.

http://startuplawyer.com/incorporation/why-your-startups-fou...
Sounds fun. My username is vyrotek.
http://www.litigationandtrial.com/2010/09/articles/litigatio...
If it turns out that you enjoy graphic novels, I'd recommend Alan Moore's "Promothea" as well.