skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I have a US govt. contract to develop an ultra-low-cost biometric digital ID system with strong privacy features. As I've mentioned before, my work is patent free, groundbreaking, and could easily spawn half a dozen companies.

We'll be looking for commercial partners to take the prototype and turn it into a production system in about three months and - because we're working patent free - odds are I could help you get started on this if you're interested in being able to bid as a vendor when the time comes.

Identity is a basic human necessity - if nobody knows who you are, you can't get credit, service, you can't vote - and the RFID approach has vast problems, mainly it's reliance on massive centralized databases because the cheap ID tag only holds 128 bits or whatever. We've seen a compromise of the US identity system produce both identity theft and the 50,000 or so black people who were misidentified as felons in the 2000 election in Florida, so it's not like there's not a reason (and a market) for solving these problems.

Distributed systems with appropriate cryptography offer a good balance between liberty, security and privacy. That's the approach we're taking.

I see this work very much as a continuation of my work on the hexayurt refugee shelter system: http://appropedia.org/Hexayurt_Project/

Eventual deployment platform is LiveCD-based Linux and mobile phones. hexayurt@gmail.com

Odds-are that for conflict of interest reasons, I'd be able to brief you and point you in the right direction, but not be a partner or get paid on this. I'd be on the other side of the fence, on the .gov end of the deal.
I agree that it is hard to find interesting things in Second Life, especially as the internal search functionality seems to be quite crappy (like so many other aspects of the interface). That doesn't say anything about the creativity going on, though - it only means that the search engine is broken. I tend to read about interesting places in Second Life in blogs. Several web pages try to address the search problem for Second Life, too.

At the times when I was just trying my luck with the internal search engine, I found interesting places, too. Many of them were abandoned, that is true, but that doesn't imply that they were boring.

What would you do as a first time user of the World Wide Web? Would you be able to find interesting web pages right away?
Hey a good way to promote your startup is post it on http://demomyapp.com

Thats why we built it!
Vote up if you think topics like this are just a way for people to get cheap karma
Okay, so you shouldn't actually vote this up. I'm curious if there's any way to avoid the phenomenon I have seen a lot lately (at least once a day) where someone creates a topic like this and it gets voted up a lot. I know karma isn't that important, but for someone to get 50 points just for making a topic like this while someone else has to make about 10 thoughtful comments or 5 good submissions somehow seems unfair.

Comments? Suggestions? Am I the only one who feels this way?
'... Stability is not important, you can run on .com domain, or buy domain at the same company as google for $20 and host anywhere in stable country in case, we are talking about on-line business ...'

The way I interpreted the question asked was 'would you start a startup "in" Russia?' [0]. So having some local knowledge would you recommend locating a startup somewhere in Russia? Taking advantage of the local environment (programming & scientific talent, closeness to the east, differences in RUB/USD, etc.)

I take your point. As for the market, yes the numbers (0.5 a US) is pretty compelling. One thing I would recommend is a middle man or someone who is a native or has been native.

I remember an instance where a product was to be launched into Japan and the translations done where very straight boring and while good Japanese not exactly the hip type language the local market would expect. Having a cultural understanding will avoid potential disasters.

Reference

[0] But reading it again maybe that's wrong.
You haven't gotten too many rejection letters then:

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

This falls in the not-very-good category of "mass printed letter".
Only For "STARTUPreneurs" in Altanta.
If you are working on a startup and you live in Atlanta, we should all get together, talk about our ventures and help each other. Three entrepreneurs so far.
The morning after a rejection. Now what's next?
'... I know karma isn't that important, but for someone to get 50 points just for making a topic like this while someone else has to make about 10 thoughtful comments or 5 good submissions somehow seems unfair ...'

Artifacts in the system are influencing the way people behave. I'll be searching or writing up an article on communities, karma and how the hunt for karma [0] can have unintended side effects. The solution(s) are not simple and time consuming. I think by observation [1], [2], [3] the problems revolve more around the structure of the allocation and assignment of karma.

Reference

[0] Remember when karma in /. was numerical, then they changed to a broad description that defined karma?

[1] reddit, 'The "Point" of Reddit? Sharing not Karma, the average quality of links submitted has declined.'

http://reddit.com/info/95zg/comments/c96u0

[2] reddit, 'The "Point" of Reddit? Sharing not Karma, They're also working on making the recommendation algorithm better ...'

http://reddit.com/info/95zg/comments/c96un

[3] reddit, 'The "Point" of Reddit? Sharing not Karma , but what I submit--the links, to have it simply dissappear in a sea of, well, a sea of whatever kind of makes my effort useless'

http://reddit.com/info/95zg/comments/c96sf
Hi. What are going to do now? What was your idea? Ours was a DIY mobile content aggregation & distribution platform. Grab your favorite content on the web. Mix it, mash it, make it mobile, distribute it.
Hopefully it's more than just his essays bound in paperback this time...
It's not as direct. Also, visitors of the site may not know that clicking on a name might lead to a prototype link.
One problem with demomyapp is that it uses youtube, which does not allow high resolution videos.

It would be better to use flash for demos.
It would also be good to include name and prototype links in the rss feed. Some angels/VCs may not even visit the site at all but simply use the rss feed as a source of startup news.
That's why you don't date while trying to amass capital. ;-)
"Paul Graham makes people want something he's made."

Ugh. Gonna have to work on this.
When my site has substantial word-of-mouth momentum, then I'll try to accelerate it with other forms of marketing. But it might turn out that word of mouth is the only thing that works.
Anyone starting something in Belgium ?
I believe this behavior, as well as a dozen others, are unavoidable given the current architecture of this news system, and in fact, pretty much every news system in existence. It's a side effect of how information aggregators with score work; the ones without score have a slew of other problems.

This actually took up a good portion of my app.
By spamming the URL here, of course.
Whats Next?

Take a step back for a day and look at your idea/application. Did you explain clearly what the idea was? Will it create value for users? How will you get people to adopt it?

Once you've figured out what went wrong, fix it then get on with creating your app. Creating a startup is filled with setbacks, the trick is to keep going.
Try here:

http://geekz.co.uk/schneierfacts/fact/129
How long have you been working on the site?
yep, I am ... ping me
If you do anything on this site to get more karma, you should reconsider your goals:)
Easiest coverage to get is in your local paper. That's a start. Remember, all you need is ONE small break. For us, ONE line of Mashable mention at launch got us on Digg, TechCrunch and hundreds of other blogs. But then again, chances are against you that the same will happen to your site or to my next site so having a parallel marketing plan is always a good idea.
I've got an idea similar to this, concentrating on aggregating your own content.

One of the implications of choosing this model is that you are limiting your audience and potential market. Is it what users want, NOW? For me this is a need as I have lots of distributed stuff over 10 years but for newer users most of their stuff is in a database, CMS etc.

The market is short sited in this respect. From what I can tell there is a distinct lack of demand. All the top level blogs are platform focused (blogger, wordpress, typepad, mt). These services are so good they don't seem to go down, thus where's the need?

It's a good idea btw, because if you own your own data you become the definitive source. BTW how are you solving the following problems?

- extracting data from services with no API?

- extracting data from services with API's (have to do coding for each service)

- problem of input? Service side input & extraction via API v's Client side input and exporting via API's (if the content is yours)

- How do you visualise the mixing of data?

- Which (key) services do you concentrate on extracting data? Or is it any service?

They key things I got out of thinking making a biz out of this particular idea is that you can get into problems ...

- focus on individual users and miss out any network effects (user foo connects to user bar).

- not creating a new market

- restricting sales by creating a secondary market because users use other services to create and yours (if needed or others) to backup.

So while I'm still building this tool, I'll be looking at areas in this space that I can extract the best/better value (something that people want, faster, savings in time & effort etc) and looking for new ideas associated (and new) while solving this particular problem space for me. Remember Joshua Scharacter took about 4-5 ideas before he refined delicious & created a useful site.

My gut instinct is that manipulating, saving and creating data (in its various forms) is a growing space and finding the edge niche is a potential starting point.

Reference

[0] Ycombinator-StartupSchool, 'Joshua_Schacter, MP3, 28Mb'

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Ycombinator-StartupSchool/~3/106570501/Joshua_Schacter.mp3
There is an available office at 679 Harrison Street (I used to lease it, and its been empty now since August last year). The rent was $950/month - 650 s.f. including a bathroom - 2nd floor with its own entry door from the street - with wall to wall windows looking towards downtown (north light) - a great deal. It is also fully wired for dsl.
Hard to say, I think the reason we were rejected is that we flat out aren't ready and the application made it pretty obvious.

I greatly appreciate Y-Combinator taking the time to review our app, because if I'd accepted "we're not ready" as a reason to not apply at all, then there's a good chance I'd have abandoned the idea of starting a business altogether.
As far as I know there isn't any particular cap on how many teams are picked. Idea I got from one of pg's post is they pick all interviewed companies that they think can succeed from what they've seen and heard.
hi BL, like your input. send me an email so we can discuss off site.
Kodak embraces transparency and viral video...
'... Hopefully it's more than just his essays bound in paperback this time... '

Disagree. Each essay [0] looks at a particular set of essential truths or principles for creating and operating startups. A lot the ideas have the same validity five years ago as they do today. Putting together revised essays in print, allows one to read off-line, a more polished version of the on-line principles.

Reference

[0] From this I really mean the best. Not all.
Sure, good idea. My email address is in my profile here.
"He still lives in a rented apartment, with a mattress on the floor and only two chairs and a table for furniture" and running a Billion Dollar Company. I Call Bulshit.
But how do you build that initial Word-Of-Mouth Momentum? Can't be easy to do.
Get a screencast and post it on demomyapp.com ;) thats why we built it...
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/shark

Shark2 def 1
Somewhere within this plan, lies more hidden costs:)
Use it yourself. Get people you know to use it. Make it better until they start talking to their friends about it. (My project is not a social networking site.)
Embrace failure.

Think about it as a test. They didn't reject you, its a test. A mission, a quest that will give you 5g, 6000xp, and faction with YCombinator, but remember its an elite quest, bring others.

Do not fail, well fail, but do not fail at failing!
Manhattan Startup Meeting This Saturday
cool - we'll add higher resolution demo support later down the line. I don't know if google video might be more appropriate, be interested in your thoughts...
My partner and I are looking to meet up with other startups and form a regular meetup in the area. My email is in my profile.
I would hope that you would continue working! yCombinator isn't the end all be all, it's not really even what matters. Just make something that you feel has value and hopefully other people will too. I think Paul is a very intelligent guy and I love reading his views on stuff but if you stop working on a startup just because you didn't get his blessing into yComb then you're giving him WAY too much credit.
San Francisco (SOMA) Weekly Startup Lunches
What I Learned From Friendster: Jonathan Abrams' New Startup
Is anyone interested in having a weekly startup lunch in SF? Our office has a large conference room where we could host the meetings (Bring your own lunch). We're at 240 2nd street on the 2nd floor directly across the street from cnet.com.
Count me in. :) My email address is also in my profile.
http://newtech.meetup.com/21/

http://www.nextny.org/wiki/show/Events

we're also in nyc...
btw you have to put your email in the about section -- the email field isn't public.
Thanks, I'll definitely be going to the next meetings.
I'd second that vote for Rimu. I used them when I started Furl and I continue to use them for my new projects. They are truly fantastic when it comes to support.
pencil, paper or software, words or images?

Pen, pencil and paper are fluid, cheap and unconstrained. What do I mean by unconstrained? Well it has to do with brain structure. Drawing visually uses very primitive parts of the brain that efficiently processes information with little interpretation overhead. So your ability to transfer ideas using pencil to paper work with diagrams (images) better than words. [0] Your ability to create your ideas is superior [1] with pen and paper than some software tool.

My personal preferences are to use pen/paper, then white-board and marker, camera and lego. [2] Then text (electronic) and only then to some form of constrained tools like a diagramming tool, methodology.

Reference

[0] Curt McNamara, 'Applied Systems Thinking '

http://www.tc.umn.edu/~ahler002/TFTCON.HTM

[1] WIth limitations most of them relate to the proximity of your team.

[2] Notice they are all tactile stuff. They don't work with things that require numbers or complicated structures very well.
I knew I was a long shot. I had two strikes against me in that I'm a single founder and I'm more interested in building a company I want to work for than in becoming rich at it -- so my interests and investors' interests don't line up.

Of course I'm still proceeding -- Y Combinator money was a means to an end, and not an end in itself.
Well, slow growth while I work at my day job.

$10-$15K is the difference between being able to quit my day job and get the company going in 3 months and having to keep my day job and get the company going in 9 months to a year.

And if I need to keep the day job, slow sustainable growth -- meaning I can project income, and project reasonably accurately when I can quit my day job -- is much better than a spike that I need to deal with in crisis mode.
Have you looked at this tool?

http://www.debugmode.com/wink/
Depends on the site. A site offering customized Christmas cards won't do well immediately if you launch in January; a site offering something useful for preparing for college won't do well immediately if you launch in November.

Launch the site as soon as it's ready to be launched. You'll drive yourself crazy trying to micro-optimize and asking yourself if you'll get more traffic if you launch on Tuesday or Saturday.
What's up Nandan. I can't see it. Email me at globalrep@tmo.blackberry.net. We can set something up.
We use slicehost too for our web app. Even if most of their customers appear to use RoR, we didn't have any issue in setting up Apache and MySql and getting our Java/Tomcat/Struts/Hibernate web application up & running even on a VPS with 256MB of Ram.
I'm in as well but you know there is a meetup group in Atlanta called Atlanta Web Entrepreneurs?
http://web.meetup.com/32/
hopefully that link works, if not just search it on meetup.com. I think the meetings do have some fee though, like $10 or something (maybe that was a special meeting, not sure).

It would be nice to just have a very casual time and place to hang out and discuss wisdom of crowds, python vs. ruby, turbogears vs. rails, Mochikit, etc... and see what each other is working on, no fee, no requirements, just meet at Carribou at Perimeter Mall (Abernathy) on Thursday evenings? you will be recognized by your Mac book and a Rage Against the Machine t-shirt :)
I didn't bother with the winter round because I live in Massachusetts and have family and friends mostly in New England, and it seemed silly to move across the country rather than waiting six months and moving across the state.
I totally agree. Nothing complicated. I don't know about anything that makes me pay to chat. I am not too far from perimeter. Send me an email and we can set up something for all of us. Globalrep@tmo.blackberry.net
PS. John. C cool que tu parles francais. On devrait vraiment se rencontrer ASAP.
Public Relations -- A catalyst for success
Are there any other places like YCombinator that do rounds of funding?
That they think can succeed in YC's particular approach to startup building, you mean.

pg has a fairly clear set of factors that he thinks indicate success -- being physically in a startup hub, for instance; having multiple founders; the sort of thing he recommends in his essays. Rejection from YC can mean that they don't think the project can succeed; it can also mean that they don't think the project, even if it succeeds, will give them the kind of return on investment they want.

So (to make the math easy) suppose they have a company that they own 10% of, that they've invested $15K in. This means that for them to break even, the company has to eventually have a value of $150,000. A rule of thumb for business valuation is that the sale price of the business is 3 to 5 times its annual earnings -- which means that the business has to earn $30,000 a year to $50,000 a year in profit for that to be worthwhile.

Now, a micro-ISV, for instance, that treats its founders' salaries (appropriately) as expenses may be a terrifically successful business from the point of view of the founders, especially if they pay themselves acceptably well and like the working conditions. But unless it makes $30,000 to $50,000 in profits a year, it's a losing proposition for Y Combinator.

There are other ways it can be a winning proposition without those profits -- if it's just before the tipping point of a big trend, or if the founders are especially skillful. A company that isn't making any profits at the moment but has the potential to make really big profits, or the potential to be sold for a lot of money, might be a worthwhile investment.
Answering Questions - Karma Rewards
If YC users make a habit of voting up those who answer their questions (assuming you don't already do this and a reasonable answer), it will encourage people to give good answers. Just a thought to use Karma cash to increase the value here - a karma for value trade.
Je parle français un peu :) There is a French language meetup group that hopefully is going to move their normal meetup location to the Le Madelaine on Abernathy soon, their fee is only a $1 donation and it's pretty difficult to find people interested in speaking French in these parts so probably worth it. Soon everything will be attainable on Abernathy! C'est vrai!
Ok it looks like this ycombinator thing doesn't handle French characters very well, or maybe I'm doing something wrong
I'm a designer, so I always have mocked stuff up in CSS/XHTML in Dreamweaver, plus Photoshop where graphics are necessary.
Add me to the list. I'd also be curious to know where in the metro area everyone lives. That might suggest the most convenient meetup location.

http://www.blursoft.com/devFarm/gmeetup/index.php?m=33
Is Meebo what's wrong with Web2.0?
Techstars does and a few others are "sort of" similar. They have been discussed here before.
For simplicity and affordability, you can't go wrong with GoDaddy.
Hackers and Painters had many essays that weren't in print when it was released.
Eric Schmidts 70/20/10 Model - Startup Edition
Watch out PG. here comes the Acombinator.
YC News. Users IM plugin
Hey, Hackers and Painters was hardcover.

Seriously, though, would you rather I kept chapters off the web to force people to buy the book to read them? If I don't do that, people will always be able to say that the book is just a bound collection of web essays.
You may consider posting your application on the web, and asking people here to read it. I have never applied for investor funding, but I believe that I could give constructive feedback.

You will expose yourself to the risk of theft. On the other hand, ideas are only half the battle.

Good luck.
How to be a Good Product Manager
can some 1 create a dedicatd browser IM plugin so YCNews usrs can chat EZly using their usrnm?
Spock's New People Engine
Master Sex Energy, Find Your Long Tail, And Meet Other Entrepreneurs
When Better is Worse -- Thoughts on the Facebook Redesign
I scribble a very rough sketch on a notepad. Once I have a reasonable idea of the layout and functionality of a page, I just move right into rails and iterate from there. You get realism and real code that way. Moderate proficiency with XHTML/CSS makes iterating not that much more difficult than pen and paper.

I remember reading that 37signals does all their mockups directly in XHTML/CSS.
I started a blog this morning. :-)

Still working on figuring out how to edit the CSS template so I can make the margins a readable width...
I just don't understand why everyone is so concerned about MS vs Google vs Apple. MS sells software, Google sells ads, and Apple sells hardware. Anything else they do is just to sell their core business.

Each company is extremely successful, and in no danger of going away anytime soon.

Paul saying that he's surprised to see someone running Windows is proof that this is a very big planet, and there's lots of room for all kinds of love.
www.samepace.com matches runners and cyclists with training partners based on a shared workout pace, i.e. 2 people who both run 9:00 min./mile and live close by. Beta site and seed funding are in place, need a brilliant hacker to develop v1.0 of the service.

I'm in SLC, UT, but willing to consider cofounder in other locations. Email billallred at Google mail etc.
"The browser is a fantastic platform. You never have to install web apps. You never have to patch web apps."

Fantastic for the developer maybe - not so for the user.

"Remember, dumb terminals were around long before PCs."

Right. How was that for the user ?
Because if you're doing a startup, you're a PM.