skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I can't find a link but a while back on TWIT Leo Laporte said something along the lines of: "Multiple advertisers have declined to spend money with us because our audience is 'too smart'".

The advertisers definition of 'too smart' being: unlikely to be persuaded by advertising, would comparison shop on the internet, and lacked strong brand loyalty.

I think Reddit is in much the same category, add to this that all ads can be 'Reddited' (commented and voted on by the community) and I imagine many brands are terrified of advertising on their as they'd at a minimum have to assign someone to respond to comments and worst case it would turn into a debacle ala Microsoft's IE9 advertising on Reddit (where the PR team answering questions was openly derided as being flaks and doing nothing but answering technical questions with blathering marketing speak).
I'm guessing that the removal of Files, Pages, and Welcome Messages are all for a single reason: spam. Spammers love Google Groups, because it'll host their landing pages (complete with graphics!) on a trusted domain. I'd be willing to bet that someone at Google got fed up playing whack-a-mole with Viagra ads.
I love listening to Steve Reich while I'm working -- minimalist music but with sexy harmonies. I'm a musician so I can't put anything too aurally interesting on, but Reich puts me in the right place. Try it sometime. Music for 18 Musicians is a good place to start.
Microsoft did this for windows 7, you could purchase online, download, run a small program which would setup the usb stick with the required files + make it bootable. Worked flawlessly for me.
It's certainly not a domain amenable to saying email addresses out loud. "At what dot com?"
This entire thing reminded me of Idiocracy. I am convinced we're living in one. Christine O'Donnell has significantly more twitter and facebook followers than her opponent, Chris Coons.
You might be interested in _What Kind of Genius Are You?_ http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.07/genius.html

I found it pretty interesting, and superficially it seems correct. (It was on HN a while ago)
Ticking pomodoro clock and/or Ke$ha on repeat.
It's about time. With Steam, iTunes, Netflix, and Amazon VOD all major reasons to use optical drives have become weaker. Even for backing up, it makes far more sense to use a hard drive than cd-r's.

You don't need the appstore even if you go driveless, you need an internet connection.
You can simply map the menu item "Zoom" under "Window" to your preferred keyboard shortcut. I use Cmd-Enter. It'll even toggle between "fullscreen" and normal screen. It's not true fullscreen, but close enough.
Let me know when you have the rfhd&cs done. I'm designing a house that will use radiant floor heating and I'd be interested to see your system. My email is in my profile.
I bought the first generation macbook air (with SSD) when it first hit the stores and it was almost worth it just for the "wow" factor at conferences. I put it on the table at a meeting and an EA exec yelled "hey, why don't you just slam your huge elephant dick on the table?". That was worth $10 right there.

Anyhow I always found it to be unbearably slow - particularly when browsing to a new web server in a session. As if the dns lookup was.... thrashing somehow. I figured I was too dimwitted to figure out the problem after doing a bit of research, so it's rotting on the shelf.

Also, Marco is right - it's way too big to use in coach when the person in front leans back. Thankfully.... Ipad for air travel. Be curious to see what the 11" is like.
How I'd never heard of this site before is beyond me. Thanks for sharing.
What I see as relevant is that you worked at Apple and are not enthusiastic about the work you would be doing.

Discounting "brand value" you list neither a pro for Apple nor a con for Amazon.

Good Luck.
Interesting post. Perhaps you and the guys from Intrade could work something out. I know their CEO and he is always looking out for cool ideas and joinh ventures. Why not mail him. His eamil is john.delaney @ intrade.com

Say Billy Flynn suggested you make contact with him.
I'm smarter having read this post – I wish you'd led with it, instead of the other one. :)

Thanks for talking it out with me – I definitely see your point.

Especially with regard to my being hyperbolic. I should have said it's unsolved to the degree of my preference – in that there's no one-click purchase that lubricates things as there is on iOS. I mean, I'm biased because the App Store's market power really, really worked for me, so I want to believe it can work for many others.

PayPal, in the end, isn't bad, but it is frictiony by comparison. And while it solves the monetization problem, it does nothing for distribution, which is even harder.

For me, I view Steam as the finest digital distribution mechanism yet devised. I've been eager for it to go beyond games, and Apple's App Store is doing that, so I'm excited. Everything else looks like ass by comparison, regardless of the tradeoffs in Apple's devil's agreement.
I imagine there's plenty, since they've been running ads on Hulu, and possibly TV as well. They also have ads for it on the google homepage and youtube ('watch in a better browser' or something like that)
I am working on some BT sensor-like hardware with applications tied to a smartphone.

One thing about Bluetooth is that to get useful data sent back and forth you have to be paired and connected with the device.
Essentially this means if you are talking to a bunch of different devices around a mall, all of the devices and also the mobile phone are going to have to be in constant Discovery mode to find/pair/connect with the new devices as you walk around.
This is a more significant battery drain than just the 20/40mA of a regular connection for the devices and constant discovery on the phone is definitely super battery intensive.
There may be ways around this, though, if you know the MAC address and/or are already paired with all of the devices you are attempting to connect to.

Pricing of just the BT modules themselves (CSR, etc.) is currently somewhere in the $7-10 range in quantity (10k), and that doesn't include the battery (Li ~ $3), and other PCB expenses.

Bluetooth Low Energy with auto-pairing, however, is going to make this process alot easier and cheaper, but we're probably 2+ years before its integrated into most smartphones.
In 1998, Apple removed the floppy drive from the iMac and extended to all their products.

In 2008, Apple removed optical drives from the MacBook Air. People concede this will extend to all their products.

The optical death will be faster than the floppy, that's for sure. I'm curious, what's next?
That's a really fascinating post. Definitely worth the time to read. Thanks.

One of the things I don't understand is how the ACID properties carry over. InnoDB is fully transactional and ACID-compliant, but how does it manage this without the SQL locking that was slowing it down? Said another way, if the table/row locking overhead from SQL queries was such a problem, why is it in MySQL at all?

Also, the problems he identified don't seem like they should be problems. Shouldn't you be able to all but eliminate SQL parse costs with prepared statements? Why are his PK inserts and reads causing table locks (since Google tells me you can turn this off)? This strikes me as weird.
Mac App Store and Indie Software
Thanks for the reply -- I think your comment about Palo Alto being a "finished painting" has some ring of truth to it.

There are some "tricks" to getting things done more efficiently in Palo Alto. For example if you ask every stakeholder their opinion ahead of proposing a change, you tend to get far less reviews, protest, etc. after the fact. There are folks here who really want to be included, but many more people who are satisfied knowing their concerns have been heard.
Do you care a lot about having free time every week (as opposed to be willing to work a lot)? If so do you have any idea on how many hours a week you're going to work in each company?

If you work at either team at Amazon, are you going to be on-call for support?
There is some merit to the claim that LEED doesn't save energy because it is based on analysis of the building's design and specifications rather than the energy performance of the building after occupancy.

In other words, certification is based on what was done before the building was used. If the occupants are uncomfortable and adjust the thermostats or the photovoltiac systems don't adequately power the lights or the motorized solar shades fail after two years the rating is unaffected.
FYI: nit-pic.ky is available (courtesy of the Caiman Islands) :-)
US man guilty of urging attack on South Park writers
A US man has pleaded guilty to supporting a Somali Islamist militant group and encouraging attacks on the writers of cartoon show South Park.
I think it is dangerous to differentiate yourselves with this pricing model alone. You plant an immediate doubt as to whether or not the service is even going to work.

Financial advisors, for example, would be very afraid of advertising "pay for performance" -- and it's not because of the SEC. It's because commission sales lead to suspicion and dissatisfaction.

Sell relationships, quality, and reliability. Price is the icing.
I replaced my optical with a 2nd hard drive a year ago and never looked back. The only problem it's caused me was having to jump through absurd hoops to get Boot Camp working, since the Windows installer only wants to talk to an actual disc on the internal ATA bus.
Not so much. Tables for layout + page that's wider than the content (the footer is wider than the rest of the page). Font tags. Inline styles.

1995.
We'll find out in 2018 apparently.
The first couple years I used to participate in a lot of the startups' angel rounds. Now I hardly ever do. I didn't invest in any of the startups from the most recent batch, for example.
Another one: "Y Combinator--a computer term for a program that runs other programs."

Heh, sure.
The syncing problem should go away once all of our files will move to the cloud.
I feel like I got a good impression from the picture he posted (which had the added bonus of letting me know that I charge more for a portrait shoot than Michael Vincent...which is odd because he's a much better photographer than I am)

;)
A Broader View on Apple’s “Back to the Mac” Event
Great idea, please do this. It should also record the choices encountered at each step and tabulate the paths not taken, which would be very useful if something doesn't work and you need to backtrack.
Couldn't you just as well say they announced the end of the hard drive, at least for portable computers?

Hard drive capacity has so far outstripped the needs of a portable computer user I'm surprised it didn't happen earlier.
They said I had to. They also supplied the shirt.
And with respect, you seem to have overlooked that average users (ie. not people who read HN) still buy millions of dollars of boxed software/games/movies yearly.

Sure downloading software was/is the inevitable future, getting rid of the optical drive just gives the average Joe the little push he needs to get with it quicker.
To be fair I have not used a CD or DVD since 2006! I use Windows which I installed from a USB flash memory drive which I made after downloading the Windows 7 (and before that Vista) ISO from MSDN. All software I need I download (Office, Visual Studio, etc.). I have not even burnt a disc since back then either. Like the floppy it just sort of became unneeded as there were easier ways to access the data (faster, greater capactity, easier to reuse). I used to backup to DVD every week but I bought two external HDD to backup too now. I keep one in a small fireproof safe and the other next to my computer. Easier than burning a DVD and gives about the same level of protection. My backups only ever get bigger as I add to them (holiday pictures, video, etc.) and HDD increase in size quicker than optical media, it may cost more actual cash (I have never worked it out) but it costs a lot less in time. Optical media has been dead to me for a long time.
"Don't get me wrong as art this is fantastic, but I'll keep the record of my life fully intact even if it includes Coke logos at my son's birthday party."

Of course, I will too, but I also want the option of viewing things through different filters. The original will exist, as will copies and variations.
My mistake - I thought that the limited liability aspect was defining of corporations.
Will have to try that, it'd be useful for me. I still think the boxes should have a USB drive in them instead of a disk, though. Those things are huge.
Facebook Game Makers Kabam, Zynga Turn to China for Development
Quickr - a quick reminder extension for chrome
Tech Companies See Dearth of Mobile-Software Developers
From what reddit’s admins have stated, Condé Nast has been unwilling to let reddit undercut its other properties on ad rates—they want reddit to be a “premium brand,” like the New Yorker or Vogue. Anyone who’s waded through the typical morass of racism, sexism, and other cluelessness and juvenilia on reddit knows how hopeless this vision is. Compounding the problem, redditors also like to fancy themselves a premium audience—no joke—so even if Condé were willing to let reddit run the caliber of ads that keep sites like 4chan afloat, reddit would face a massive user revolt. It’s an unenviable situation, but that’s what happens when you attract an audience as socially, intellectually, and demographically unappealing as reddit’s.
At the risk of stating the obvious, equity gets diluted. A great amount at the start may be trivial after several funding rounds. You might run the numbers for high, low, and middle scenarios.

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2010/10/employee-equity-dilution.htm...

Good Luck.
India to build observatory to study neutrino particles
Wow, I've never read such a thorough review of a phone OS. So far the reviews have been surprisingly positive. I think it's not at iPhone 4 with this release, but I think they came out very much in the hunt.

Here's what MS needs to do quickly:

1. They really need to hurry and get on Verizon and Sprint.

2. Add multitasking. They are going to get a lot more grief for not having it than the grief they'd get from some users who experience poorer battery life due to rogue background apps.

This one is really not that hard for them to do technically. If anything its probably just removing code paths where they fire events and shutdown processes.

3. Improve the Silverlight perf. 3rd party apps need to hum like 1st party apps.

4. Get IE9 out the door and the IE9 engine in the phone.

If they can deliver this early in 2011, then I think we'll see some sparks begin to fly.
I'm voting for keyboard.

Just because I don't see how they could do it while still keeping it nice to type on. And of all companies, Apple seems likely to do so successfully if anyone is even capable of doing so.

And if it is possible, I want to see what the heck it would be, and who would see it coming? I mean, heck, they already went to the opposite of what people kept saying they needed on their mice / trackpads - now there's no button.
Free Pc Games Download
IngZ Releases New Austin-Focused App for Mobile Guided Tours
This move is consistent with Apple's corporate strategy; a transition away from desktop computing and physical media, to a range of thin devices accessing online media via the cloud. The elimination of the optical drive facilitates smaller devices, and further establishes the importance of connectivity and online media, where Apple is well positioned with its growing collection of cloud services: iTunes, the App Store, the new OS X App Store, and so on.

On a side note, this is further bad news for Sony and Blu-ray. The shift from physical to online video is happening much more quickly than most expected. Sony invested billions of dollars into Blu-ray to win the battle against HD DVD, anticipating at least a decade of future royalties. I am certain the expected returns on this investment will never be realized.
I expect this to also mark the beginning of what will in the future be seen as a hole in history: a time when software was downloaded on demand, and consequently lost to time, because companies were too ephemeral, and the software bits too centralized, to survive through redundant copies.
Oh, that is one of the most PKD things I've read in a long time!
No, I think we found out today; it's hard drives. Hard drives are the new tape decks.

After that it's unclear.
There is a Mixergy interview with this guy:
http://mixergy.com/andrew-fashion/
NumPy is not available on the Google App Engine: http://code.google.com/p/googleappengine/issues/detail?id=19... Apparently they don't want to vet C libraries?

Some searches suggested: http://www.picloud.com/
Learning Python – day three.
Advertisers might not have warmed to it yet but I much prefer advertising that is a 2 way street. The good products and services rise to the top whereas the empty marketing speak approaches fail.
I was actually referring to making a phone, not buying one; but I thanks for the link. It could come in handy if I need a phone for development.
How about a single plug for monitor/power/data and the death of all other ports? (Or maybe everything wireless for laptops and other mobile devices?)

The death of consumer-level computing where the user can actually get root? (Everything will be on a app store?)
I also find all that hard to believe. To me it sounds like a dude trying to make money on the internet by going viral. Hell I bet he just finished reading Crush It (not in a a negative way... I thoroughly enjoyed Crush It, Gary did a good job there)
Twitter Improves Search Technology
The company recently announced via their blog that they were rolling out new enhancements that would improve the service's excellent query serving capacity and its search engine.
Not sure I agree with the stackoverflow test. Good knowledge & practices picked up before and during stackoverflow's existence aren't invalidated by not following certain online communities or the Atwood train. The test is probably more applicable if they are younger and/or work in a popular space.
> only 0.4 pounds heavier

That's 18% heavier

> and 0.13 inches thicker

And 20% thicker at the Air's thickest point (640% at the Air's thinnest point)
My impression about Qt on Symbian: it does not look native (yet) and I believe it is slightly slower than native apps. So I have not even started looking into that deeper. It is really easier to develop for Qt and I would use it for my own personal app, but for that PythonS60 is better IMHO.

As for Symbian C++ API looks reasonably good. I am investigating possibility to write one commercial application and I have all required libraries/services in my phone.

Documentation is good. Community support is reasonably good as well.

As for language itself - it is not real C++ as mentioned in other comment.

Development on Linux is possible but be ready for unpleasant surprises: no native emulator, SVG files that can't be drawn using Inkscape and etc. There is QEMU initiative but it is not ready for general usage. I have tried to build syborg but I have failed to do that.
I read this guy's story a year ago, and thought it was interesting. He worked really really hard at something, without any particular skill or talent, and made a bunch of money!

A year ago, he was launching a social network for models: http://www.andrewfashion.com/2010/08/16/whats-been-going-on-...

Now he's leveraging his antics to get in with the HN crowd.
He doesn't write great, he doesn't have any real insight to things, and yet he's on the front page of HN and will probably make some $ out of all of this. He'll probably land 2 or 3 more articles, establish himself in the community, and then launch bemodel with a HN/Reddit post that will get lots of free traffic.

I dunno? On some levels I think he's a twit, and on other levels he seems like a savant

So what's the moral?
Interesting. I'm also very discrete-biased in my math background, perhaps because it lines up neatly with problems in digital computing. I never did well with calculus, but interestingly enough, my interest is more awakened now that I'm doing coding for a software synthesizer, which has to approximate continuous functions all the time(as sample buffers), and deal with the various distortions from said approximation that are taken care of "for free" in an analog environment.
This is way off topic, but I believe we met at the Founders and Cocktails event last month that was held at the lounge across the street from Santana Row. We chatted for a while about the Reddit vs. Digg battle going on at the time.
I am unemployed yes -- I live very cheaply and spend my time maybe 1/3 hanging out with friends, 1/3 hanging out by myself (aka video games/reading this web site), and 1/3 working on whichever personal project I'm interested in for the time being.

I actually did the calculations yesterday and figured out that on my current budget, even adding in an extra 50% to cover random things I might need or want, I would only need 1.4 million dollars to live this way until I'm 100 years old...
I apologize for the downtime to anyone who has had problems accessing the site. Temporary outages have come along with my modest traffic spike. I hope you'll try back in a few minutes.
Record-breaking galaxy found at the edge of the Universe
Blessed Unity: Ars reviews Ubuntu 10.10
Red Hat CEO: Software vendor model is broken
New Finder UI in OSX Sneak Peek
The point that Joe is making is that people can't participate in the official, Google-supported, widely distributed version of the code.

They can fork the code and do whatever they want, but that fork doesn't have a lot of value if it doesn't have distribution. They can fix a bug, but they can only fix it for themselves, not their customers who get Android through retail stores.

You may of course say "Google has no obligation to let people contribute to their distribution". And you'd be right. But this is like saying "I am under no obligation to smile and say hello when you enter the elevator". You'd be right. But people do it anyway because it makes the world a better place.

Likewise, Joe is saying it would be nice if Google allowed people to contribute directly to the main distribution of Android. They're under no obligation to do so, but it sure would be cool.

I hope this clears things up.

Full disclosure: I work on Chrome at Google which has some of the features Joe is asking for in Android. I also wish Android had them, but I have no special insight into why they're missing.
None of my Mac-owning, non-programming, non-HN-reading friends buy software that comes on discs in boxes.
Don't underestimate the ability the promise of simple answers to life's problems has over people desperate for said answers. I know people who buy the Law of Attraction nonsense hook line and sinker. Of course, these people also believe in that personal sovereignty nonsense, and that every country in the world except Switzerland is run by the Rothschild family, who are also apparently multi-trillionaires...