skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
While it's an exciting thought, I don't think apple will implement that until its more reliable ("just works").

I doubt others will get a chance to implement it because it would require low level access to the wireless hardware, but I really am not qualified to comment here.

I think apple probably wanted GPS but had to axe it for battery life and/or form factor (both spec's probably sitting at hard requirements from the early stages of the phone's design). So then I'd expect GPS to be on future models.
That is one successfully abusive PR masterpiece - The key being that its so over the top that it turns into humour - so you get primitive entertainment while getting some actual information as well. I had no idea about that phone either - and it does look pretty good - especially the cool keyboard and the fact that the screen res is comparable. But, the Iphone UI is a force unto itself.
Marc Andreesen Answers: Why the p in pmarca?
That bad. :)
P apparently stands for 'private'

He just posted this on his blog:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/pmarca/~3/134738902/ask-pmarc...
A Surprising & Amusing Question: What are you trying to find out about us?
Hi,

This is the last question in the Y-Combinator application:
"Please tell us something surprising or amusing that one of you has discovered. (The answer need not be related to your project.)"

I like the question, but find it a bit ambiguous as to what you're looking for. Luckily I can ask for an elaboration on this forum.

It seems the generality might lead to corny responses. A super-specific anecdote from a sub-genre of geek lore might not be appropriate.

I almost want to just tell my favorite Zombie/Pirate/Robot joke.

Any thoughts from past applicants? Any thoughts from those that wrote the questions?
Getting Indexed by Google can Suck (when pages bite back)
but how will that bring them more sms revenue???
I forget where I heard about it, but one PG liked a lot was this guy who wrote that he'd devised something algorithmic for wiping after dropping the kids off at the pool. It involved lotion and toilet paper, maybe someone else remembers better.

The conclusion I drew was that it really didn't matter what you put, it's not a loaded question. Just tell them something surprising or amusing to YOU, simple as that.
Congrats to the Loopt guys!
It wasn't one that I liked, just one that was especially memorable.
Zlio: French e-commerce startup funded by Skype VCs
I didn't write it, I just posted this link.
The Case for case sensitivity
Bay Partners Announces Facebook AppFactory Seed Program
From a 'C' to an 'A' - Can Your Managers Do What This Professor Did?
They want you to increase the IPO price of Facebook.
I'm not reading the apps, but if I were then this would be the rough hierarchy of answer goodness:

1."What is the most useful new idea you've contributed to humanity?"

2. "What is the most useful and counter-intuitive insight you've come across that I'm not already aware of?"

3. "What is something especially useful and insightful that I'm not already aware of, even if it's not counter-intuitive?"

4. "What piece of new information would most challenge my preconceptions?"

5. "What one fact tells me something useful about yourself?"

6. "What's an interesting fact?"

7. "What's some random thing you pulled out of a science fiction novel or magazine?"

8. "What's something about yourself that I'd rather not have known, possibly leading me to throw up in my mouth a little?"
National Instruments (Austin, TX) used to do that alot and it worked great. They start with some code critique and then slowly, starting with "how would you re-write this from scratch?" they get you to write some, following by popular "optimize for speed/memory" and so on.

I just recently had somewhat similar idea: to reverse tables and ask them to interview me. Not the typical "how do you like it here?" kind, but I want to ask people to ask me technical questions and see what they can come up with.
Million-dollar prize offered for soldier 'power pack'
Regarding the poorest 5B people: google for BOP (bottom of the pyramid). You'll find people already selling things (or at least thinking of selling things) to the poor.
The Future of Facebook
I'm surprised this hasn't been modded out.
...and mentions of your competition.
...and mentions of your space//industry as well
Evolvist.com, NY startup looking for some great Hackers
We have received some small amount of funding to pay some hackers for the rest of the summer to help us build evolvist.com. Evolvist.com wants to be the one stop for green businesses, services, and products. If all goes well co-founder status will be bestowed upon thee. We are looking for someone with great technical skills ( language irrelevant, as many as possible) with an entrepreneurial spirit. Email me at marvin.hidalgo@gmail.com if interested. I can answer questions below.
I love all the sites on this post. There is a diffrence between websites built for art and websites built for commmerce. There is no reason these sites need to be indexed well or valid CSS, they are not trying to monetize the user, or get top placement in google. Most are just experiments in new ways to visualize and display information. As flash and other methods become more advanced we will be able to use more navigation techniques like these while giving up less as far as SEO. New ideas like this help us rethink how people interact with the internet and ultimatley lead to innovation. Art is about breaking the rules. These sites are art.
VA is the most promising startup of all YC companies I've heard of, if you ask me. Under-hyped and over-delivering.
there someting in arcitecture called form vs.funtion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_follows_function

I live by this in interface design. First decide what funtion needs to happen, then decide on the best visual representation or form to achieve this. Basically this means the technology should not dictate what the interface or idea is. If you come up with a great idea, then you can explore what technology you need to execute it at the highest level, be it Flash, or another method.
Open letter to Ning: help establish open standards for social networking
I didn't know Reddit switched away from web.py. Do you know what they switched to?
How some facebook apps are enabling more "performance" type behavior for social network users
Also the e70 has python.

Also I'm still waiting on the way overdue maddox take on web 2.0 which will make uncov look like gigaom.
YC's Inkling Markets Powering Crowd Wisdom and the Future of Newsgathering in ABC7's "Futures Market"
zazuk.com it is!
Peepflow looks like it's what Linkedin should have been - something that connects professionals in meaningful ways, instead of just being an online resume gallery...
Reminds me of the rants people make against Apple's software
Flektor Case Study: $15 Million+ Exit in Less Than One Year
Users want control of their data, but businesses want to retain that control as well. All businesses (web or otherwise) love to lock in their customers. Why would Ning want to make it easy for users to leave their service?

Just like Microsoft has historically made it difficult for users of Office to migrate to other applications. Only when the users' frustration reached a tipping point was Microsoft forced to open its file format with OOXML.

We're not at the point yet where most users are frustrated with the lack of portability of their networks across services like Facebook/Ning/etc. Maybe we'll be there in a couple of years.
It's spyware with an altruistic motive. In Founders at Work the guy touched briefly on the ethics behind it and drawing the line.
How to Handle Thousands of Users with Your Blog
You can vote down?
Yes. I have dozens of monitors setup. We have a lot of competitors, though I only really pay attention to the top two. But I don't mention any of what I learn to my co-founder (who does most of the core development), because I don't want our product to be driven too much by what competitors do. We have hundreds of customers ourselves...and they probably know what they want as well as anybody.

Anyway, it's easy to get side-tracked by outside stuff...so pay attention to your market, but not too much.
Liverail.com - video advertising platform
It's not so obvious. My (naive?) take on that is that if control over data is something people want, you give it to them. You make it hard for them to leave your service by excelling over the alternatives. That's the sane default anyway; I understand there may be cases where it makes business sense to sell your soul.

But note that barriers to exit are barriers to entry too. Data lock-in is the main reason why I don't consider desktop or web apps for things such as calendar and to-do lists. I use plain text (or YAML) files, which I maintain with a combination of hand editing and Python scripts. This also makes it easy to keep this data under version control, and back it up.

Since Facebook et al are not targeted for a technical audience, maybe they don't get enough requests for data export tools.
Media Jobs Site Mediabistro Sold To Jupitermedia For $23 Million
After a long auction process and going through multiple suitors, almost giving up on the process, and coming close to selling to at least one of them, the media jobs, events and info site Mediabistro has been sold to Jupitermedia for $23 million--$20 million is in cash and an additional $3 million over two years.
I set it up after my site was mentioned on Mashable, I really like it.
Coders at Work - List of Potential Coders
I'm surprised this post hasn't been deleted yet.
The only reason I ever rip streams is so I can have a nice assortment of music in a playlist that fits together.
Name Memorization Lesson from Flight of the Conchords
I was watching this Flight of the Conchords clip where a guy named Brian bumps into a girl named Jenny, but can't remember her name (or anything about her) for the entire song. Never has nervous laughter been put to music more awkwardly or hilariously.
To demonstrate how absurd this concept really is, consider a similar idea: being able to transfer all user data between any multiplayer video game. How much of this data would really be useful in any given game? Just about none.

What the heck is the point! Without concrete examples, this argument is pretty empty.
Debate useless without actual numbers.
Yeah, I signed up for one of those sites where you pay them $50 to choose a name for you. Soon after, I discovered that those #$@#$ where just feeding me names from this! I refunded.
Hungry entrepreneurs eat up Y Combinator's help
Open Library Demo Site - Project Leader Aaron Swartz
I was working on writing a very similar blog post. But rather than paraphrase myself, I'll just post a link when I'm done. :-)

update: http://alexkrupp.typepad.com/sensemaking/2007/07/possession-...
6 People Search Engines Tested: Can They Find Me?
No but there are moderators who can kill stories.
Estatebuddy: Real estate, buy and sell your assets and free property posting & search.
And the source code is fun too:

http://www.dotomator.com/web20.js
You can partially compensate the lack of GPS using cell id and user generated data to bind it to objects of interest in proximity. You can even add real GPS coordinates from phones that have the capability. It is a startup idea I chose not to pursue.
Google: Sort of Evil
Europe's Top Young Entrepreneurs 2007
"Google has apparently convinced FCC Chairman Kevin Martin to go along with at least some restrictions on buyers at a forthcoming federal spectrum auction. Meanwhile, its ally Skype, eBay's voice calling affiliate, has petitioned for revival of the 1968 "Carterfone" policy, which stopped the old Ma Bell monopoly from deciding which phones and other devices subscribers could use on its network.

Why bother -- except to tilt the playing field at a crucial moment in wireless's development to please one very deep-pocketed company?"

I agree to a certain extent, Google has interests to protect and pursue here, but at the same time, from a consumer perspective (and the cell phones are a consumer-oriented business, after all) it's absolutely ridiculous that wireless Carterfone hasn't been implemented yet.

To use Google as an analogy, the wireless world is now what the Internet (or more specifically, search) was before Google. How could anyone (other than those with vested interests) not want to see more innovation?
You may not like the author and his style but i think the article is worth reading.

It's been four years since i have a Nokia 6820, the keyboard is robust and the usability is great.

I've always been surprised few people know about those phones and i think the message was worth relaying.

If i ever need to upgrade my phone, it will be a E70.

Far33d, i think you are too blinded by your feelings for maddox to find any of is stuff worth it.

I also have this kind of dilemma when i like a song from an artist i can't stand. I end up listening to the song because i like it and i can recognise the talent where it is.
Don't Wait For Things to Get Easier, Just Build V1
Speaking of which, PG, can we open up the job postings to folks other than YC companies, so long as they embody the spirit?
This seems too small and specific to matter.
Sure, it is important to manage what is going on inside a loop iterating a million times. But without a good profiling system to know where to work, this could be wasted effort. And good design of a large system will matter more than any single function or loop.

That said, you could do a high level system design and get down into a few details.
Though I think we've argued this enough, I'll at least reply to say that neither delete nor edit are actually undos. They allow me to repair, but they don't (necessarily) return me/the server to the previous state.
I have no friends (and neither does FOAF (Friend of a Friend))
On a similar note, in my experience (and this is mainly in C++), reading someone else's code means dealing with hundreds of files and tens of thousands of lines. Getting the system in your head is important, but this is difficult to test in an interview -- because it might take days, not minutes.

My favorite interview question is asking about projects done in spare time. This yields a great deal of information about how inherently interested the person is in hacking.
This is sort of on the fringe of what constitutes an on-topic story, but it's a valid counter-argument to the iPhone, which has been discussed on the forum before.
Loopt launches on major U.S. carrier
Possession of Social Capital With Intent to Distribute
I think this depends on what you are looking for in a candidate. Being able to read code is good, but if you want to hire someone who is really good now and will be 10x better in 6-12 months, you don't want someone who is opinionated and arrogant about what constitutes good code. You'll want someone who recognizes something doesn't look right and then asks why it wasn't done a better way.
Business networking that doesn't suck? Really?
I have a similar technique for phone screens. Candidates are told to do the interview where they can receive email. To avoid cheating, we send them a couple of code snippets right as we call them. Then, we talk about the code.

We found that phone screeners have a bias toward those who speak well, so we often brought in terrible programmers for a half day of interviews. What a waste, especially when flying people in. The in-person failures we experienced were of the FizzBuzz variety, not the "I don't exactly under stand concurrency" sort.

So, we started asking people to read some code and comment on it. Really basic Java stuff: Will this code compile? Trace the flow of execution through this method if the BlahException was thrown. String comparisons with ==. The idea was to see if (1) the person was at all clueful, and (2) if they had actually written Java code.

As the linked blogger noted, the disparity in responses is shocking. We found that about half the people we interviewed thought that execution of a Java method ceased once a catch block had been entered. Half! How could they ever have written robust production code? These were often people with years of Java experience on their resumes. I just don't understand how someone could write a bunch of Java code and not understand the basics of how exceptions work.

Some other parts of the code review were more nuanced. Most candidates knew that one should not compare strings using double equals, but they usually couldn't explain why. Nor did they understand why == sometimes seems to work when comparing a referenced String object to a literal.

We were happy to hire smart candidates that hadn't done a lot of Java work, but we wanted to avoid people who had supposedly spent years with a language and didn't even comprehend the basics.
"This makes her socially obligated to reciprocate."

Apparently you haven't used online dating services very much ;-)
Pitch Your Company to  Everyone (It goes further than you think)
That is a very nice implementation. You also have a great list of coders there, let's hope you can get them for the book. Good luck.
I actually asked my gf out on her Facebook wall. Of course I knew her in person first. :-)
Flock back from the dead?
Looking for a Co-Founder (Boston area)
Hi,

I am developing a travel related Web2.0 web site and looking for a co-founder with programming skills in Java[Spring MVC, Hibernate, AJAX(*), etc] and/or Ruby On Rails. I am also interested in advisers with experience in travel industry.

Any pointers to networking in Boston area especially for tech startups would be greatly appreciated.

If you're interested please send me an email to pbnaidu@gmail.com.

Thanks.
There are consequences of being too much of a tease
What kind of numbers would you be refering too?
What CEOs really do with their time
Does the Google policy of allowing dogs at work offend Muslims?  Does Google have dog-free zones?
I'm curious about this. It seems that such a policy would not create a friendly work environment for Muslims.

While I'm not Muslim, I would not like to work around dogs or most other pets for that matter (although I would be ok with a fish tank).
MIT has an entrepreneur club: http://web.mit.edu/e-club/

You can also meet people through the MIT 100K competition: http://www.mit100k.org/

They both will get going more in the fall.
Zero-Cash Plan
This is maybe useful to figure out what city you are in, which might save a click or two here and there, or might save some time loading up a high level map. It's not that exciting, and like I said earlier apple would need to be fairly convinced it will "just work" to deploy it.
I don't think they're all horrible, though in some cases their usability drawbacks are probably recognized and ignored because of who the customers are. Take the origami page, for example. That is remarkably clean and easy to understand. Using the page is a little cumbersome: pages load slowly and the text isn't all that easy to read, but everything looks very impressive, expensive, and fashionable. Looking impressive, expensive, and fashionable is probably worth more than getting straight to the point.
Calacanis' Mahalo.com: Hacker to make a Mahalo IE toolbar
Just in case anyone needs some work.
Why Design Matters....
The Equity Equation
What I Will Do To Be a Better Developer in the Next Six Months - Scott Bellware [MVP]
A List Apart: Articles: Human-to-Human Design
70 Expert Ideas For Better CSS Coding
CSS isn't always easy to deal with. Depending on your skills and your experience, CSS coding can sometimes become a nightmare, particularly if you aren't sure which selectors are actually being applied to document elements.
Congrats!

I'm not a fan of apps like that and would never use it but I can see why someoene else might.
Generally, I believe people have the right to be offended by anything and voice their opinions about it. Because it can be for anything, people shouldn't have the right to force change. This should be as much company policy as the law allows.

Also, I love dogs. They're so cute!
http://mfrost.typepad.com/cute_overload/pups/index.html

There is a funny story related to this. My company has a tiny branch on the other side of the country. Essentially an elite group of engineers wanted more sun, and started a skunk-works. After paying tens of thousands of dollars for a video-conference system, it wasn't used often. This is because a golden retriever would be the only one on the small office side. He'd come after hearing the system start and would sit in front of the camera. The owner was off doing real work.
I hated the origami page. I couldn't figure out what the company did (the whole purpose of the website) for a while while I was awaiting for the about us page to load. And this was on my work's connection. Also I never did figure out how far I had to pull those things and it would take me a few times. I agree, the text was hard to read on some pages.

There are domains where look impressing, expensive and fashionable is reasonable, such as a design studio, band or something like that. Anyway, all that said, I though these sights were beautiful works of art. Just not terribly practical.
Why not to get funded. Markus Frind speaks.
Yeah definitely, it would be much help.
Extremely useful handset and mobile web stats (UK, Feb 07)
How is this different from allowing people to bring guns to work that they may point at you occasionally?
A Recipe for OpenID-Enabling Your Site
Waving a gun at someone is a direct threat, which is totally different. In some states, you can bring guns to the office.

If a dog is poorly trained, only a fool would bring it to the office.

I suppose allergies make this more complicated, but that wasn't really the question.
I should note that this can conflict with what should also be a major goal: keeping employees as happy as possible. This is one reason why managers and HR folks have annoying jobs.
Was this article written in response to Seth Levines comment? What Seth Levine doesn't know or doesn't want to tell is that a lot of YC alums could raise the 5K/founder on their own, so money is NOT the primary reason they are there.
I think people have better judgment than dogs. In a way, someone pointing a gun at you is less dangerous than a dog -- no matter how well trained it may be.
Choose your opponent
Who are you battling? YC-style!
You're right about the barriers to entry part. But barriers to entry are low enough for relative first movers like Facebook/Ning. When the market matures and there are several clones of these services, Facebook/Ning will have to rely on the lock-in to stay ahead of the competition.

There is a general trend in users' demanding openness in data, and maybe this will have to be a core feature of any new web-service/desktop-app to succeed in the future. But the general rule is that a business won't open the data if it doesn't have to.
No, I'd been working on it for a while.

I'd been thinking of taking that footnote out, since it seemed like everyone now finally understood us. But when I saw that old dumb argument again in the USA Today article, I decided to leave it in.
Possibly not the sole reason, but the first footnote leads on to this.
linkjacked. original: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30536
Programming language choices for entrepreneurs
5 questions you should ask yourself before committing to a platform.
Saving server costs with Javascript

...because most of the execution happens inside the browser and uses our visitors CPU and memory, I don't have to worry about my servers having to provide that CPU and memory...
Europeans embrace Firefox in record numbers
I'd take this a step further and say that syntactically-significant case, a la Haskell, is a good idea. You already use case to disambiguate to human readers, so why should the compiler be oblivious to the distinction?