skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Has anyone here had any experience using newlisp? There are things I don't love about it, like the lack of backquote syntax, but the community seems a lot friendlier than what palish has had to deal with. That being said, my experience with comp.lang.lisp hasn't been bad. I posted a simple question about destructive functions there a while ago and got a helpful response pretty quickly.
Well said. It's time the "zero sum game" myth was laid to rest.
Shifd - Hack Day London Winner, Shift between your computer and mobile seamlessly
That feeling you get that it's "dirty" I understand well. I found the financial industry to be pretty disgusting in lots of ways, some subtle. Compared with creating new things for real people there's just no question which I prefer. Getting out pretty early was one of the smartest things I've ever done.

The financial industry is a huge prestige trap. It's hard for a young guy to give up a BMW M3 and million-dollar condo to work on an unpredictable startup. You can ask my friend and former partner :-)
It's not just "yes," it's "yes and!" Accept opportunities, but not simply as they're suggested. You plus the work, you look for the opportunity within the opportunity, you create something on top of what you're given, and you find a way to make it work better for you.

Yes And.
http://greenlightwiki.com/improv/Yes_And
I referenced that point out of context.

Someone asked, "Is there any demand for Arc?", After people were joking about the 'Invisible Arc.' I said, "If it is more clear and consistent, I demand it." I was merely stating my demand, not arguing with them that Arc is better. I don't know if Arc is better, but I know that if the Community of Arc is better than #lisp that would be a great start.
You know, even if a business of mine completely failed, I would never, ever let godaddy park its spam there:

http://webcollaborator.com/

Oh, well. He should have used an anonymous account like the rest of us jerks.
Sorry, it just seemed a mite too easy. :) Its pretty hard to find a community worse than lisp, but a big part of that is that lisp is at a very different stage of its lifetime than almost any other language out there.

Python/Ruby/Perl/TclTk et al are very young, and tend to be much more friendly (interestingly many feel that the Ruby crowd is getting a bit antsy these days, an acceptable lisp afterall? never). I'm hard pressed to explain why C is still relatively friendly, but I suspect it is in large part because there are many more C programmers, many more new C programmers, and that C finds people, whereas people find Lisp.
Congrats YC and Zenters!
That's really exciting. Congrats to the team.
And woot!, you just raised all our valuations a little bit!
So, in other words, perfect robots make perfect robots.
I'm referring specifically to secondary stock markets. The buy-side generally deals in securities that have already been issued: the seller is another buy-side firm, not a firm that'll turn that capital into useful products. (There are exceptions, otherwise investment bankers wouldn't exist, but that's the bulk of the trading that goes on.) And the secondary market is zero sum - it doesn't produce anything, it just sets prices.

I suppose you could argue that more accurate secondary-market prices help allocate capital more effectively when firms make primary security offerings. That's how I sleep at night. ;-) But as far as I can see, the market is plenty efficient already. That's why index funds are so popular.

I also really dislike the moral-hazard problem inherent in the 2/20 compensation structure for most hedge funds. When hedge funds make money, they take 20% of the profits, a huge windfall for the fund. However, when they lose money, it comes out of the capital put up by the original investors. It's very much a "heads I win tails you lose" structure. The incentive isn't toward better overall performance, it's towards higher variability of returns.

A hedge fund that makes 25% and loses 20% on alternate years ends up being a wash for investors (minus fees), but it nets its manager an average fee of 2.5% for their 20% of profits (ignoring the 2% of assets). A fund that makes 10% every year, steadily, will end up being worth twice as much for investors after 7 years, but will only make its manager 2% yearly in profit fees. The incentive isn't towards higher performance, it's towards higher risk-taking.
Just to play devil's advocate here:

I'm a frequent contributor on The GWT newsgroups and it's very easy to get annoyed. Specifically, java suffers from a lot of wannabe programmers. For those of you liking the ambiance amongst Ruby and Python groups, you should do yourself a favour and stop advocating the use of Ruby/Python in colleges.

The influx of those idiots will kill your newsgroups and your IRC channels -very- quickly.

Now, as to the LISP community, they aren't usually bothered too much, I'd gather, with wannabees. However, where they do waltz I'm, I can imagine they'll be mentioning Paul Graham's essays. Result: short fused posters take the piss out of you.

And, you have to admit, Paul Graham's ramblings on LISP are a bit out of left field. The problem with promising magical performance with any one programming tool is that you create expectations. I'm fairly sure the expectations created by PG are waaay out of proportion of what you can reasonably expect a functional programming newbie to do in the span of a couple of months.

This isn't an excuse or anything. The chat logs are certainly horrible. Just trying to figure out if I can explain why this is happening.
I guess I really explained this poorly. I don't mean that capitalism is a zero-sum game. I mean that the financial industry, and more specifically the buy-side firms dealing in secondary securities markets, is a zero-sum game.

The DJIA has gone from 89 to 15k because of the labor and ingenuity of American employees and entrepreneurs. New companies come out with new products, these products meet consumer needs, this creates value, this value is reflected in the company's earnings, and corporate earnings are reflected in the stock price. None of this happens because some quant sits at a computer and programs in mathematical models of prices. If Coca-Cola was still trading at 50 cents with its current earnings, everyone - financial professional or not - would be jumping on it. It wouldn't stay at 50 cents a share for long.

Some sort of stock market, with decent liquidity and abundant information, is necessary for proper functioning of the economy. But the stock market we have, where hedge funds colocate boxes on the exchange so that they can execute trades within milliseconds of new information coming in, is overkill. I think it's really sad that so many of the best and brightest minds are drawn into competing with each other instead of creating value for others.

I feel the same way about law, which is another necessary-but-zero-sum profession. It also tends to attract really smart people, perhaps because really smart people are used to being smarter than everyone else. The link to tournament economics that someone posted on another article here is quite appropriate.
Yeah, I've seen the pattern. Part of the problem is, I guess, that Lisp has long history and stable user base so that the newbie/expert ratio is much lower than other languages; and (a) experts tend to forget how they were like when they were newbies, or (b) even they remember, there weren't such a thing like irc back then and they figured out most by themselves, so they expect a newbie nowadays can do the same thing.

However, another part of the problem, which I think is larger, is that the way of functional thinking is so different than the way of procedural thinking, and it is simply impossible to tell concisely "this is the functional way" (except very abstract statement like "avoid side effects"). If the asking one only has procedural background, his very question often doesn't make sense when viewed from the functional world; and we cannot answer a question which is not really a question.

Take one example: You asked about stack and heap. Probably you assumed a specific storage model, used mainly in C, C++, etc. However, in many functional languages, the extent of objects are just infinite by default, conceptually---and you just let the compiler to figure out which objects can be stack allocated and which should be heap allocated. Or, even a compiler can allocate everything on stack first, and when stack is popped or becomes full it moves live objects into heap, effectively using stack as a nursery of objects. It all depends on implementations, not the language. See, just asking "how to put an object on the stack instead of a heap" doesn't really make sense, except you are talking about a specific optimization technique on a specific implementation (in which case you should've already known the language and quite deeply about the implementation.)

This is just an example. Treating states, when to use mutation, how to model I/O, ... all require very different views.

I program in Lisp/Scheme both for work and hobby, and I feel sorry about your experience. If you still think giving a try to the functional way, another path may be to taste a few other functional languages (Haskell seems to get quite attention recently, and ML claims very fast); then you'll get the perspective of procedural vs functional ways, instead of (all other languages) vs Lisp.
NewLisp is dynamically scoped. That's a showstopper for many people who have any experience with dynamically-scoped languages (eg. Emacs Lisp, Maclisp).
Any ideas to prevent cross-site hacks that use IE's MHTML redirection bug?
I've just been tightening up our upcoming microPledge website -- http://micropledge.com -- to prevent cross-site request forgery (CSRF). I added a random SHA as a form key to each form.

But! Then I discovered this lovely IE security hole. An attacker can use cross-domain JavaScript and an mhtml: redirect to grab the page, get the form key, and then do the POST. Brilliant! Anyone have any experience in getting around this?

(To test the vulnerability in your browser, go to http://secunia.com/Internet_Explorer_Arbitrary_Content_Disclosure_Vulnerability_Test/ -- my copy of IE6 was vulnerable, IE7 wasn't, and Fx doesn't support mhtml so it's not.)
A page showing just the latest news.yc comments
how about showing what the top-level article is for each comment? like reddit does:

http://reddit.com/user/joshwa/comments
Easy. Don't use IE6.

Really.. Stuff like this isn't about 'not supporting IE6'. It's about the time spent not being worth it. :)
rails + kitten wars + reddit clone + politics = redbluesmackdown.com, my would-be startup
I haven't shown this to many people, so I'd really appreciate any comments or suggestions!
don't make me find and click a button.. just let me click the picture to vote.
What To Do When Projects Are Behind Schedule?
On an unrelated note, I think there is an inherent conflict from having submissions count for karma. On one hand, it (supposedly) motivates user contributions. On the other hand, it's much harder for end users to identify others who consistently post insightful comments.
Thanks- I've added the ability to click on the picture to vote. Is it useful at all to have the buttons there as well?
M.S.G.W.
In other YC news, the edit comment links seem to have disappeared. Edit: For older comments anyway!
They're actually quite different. Different layout (reddit's is denser); different initial focus (Digg was initially about technology, reddit general news); very different frontpage ranking algorithm (why Digg has problems with censorship and reddit doesn't); and different comment threads (until Digg copied reddit yesterday).

The reason they're so different is that they have different origins. Digg started as Slashdot with voting instead of editors, and reddit started as Del.icio.us with voting instead of saving.
Yes. But I bet a lot of the consternation around the LISP literati circles about PG's essays is because they like LISP the way it is: obscure.

If LISP became popular, they wouldn't be as special anymore. It's like the punk rock syndrome - as soon as a band is popular, the original listeners pretend they don't like it anymore (and look down on anyone who isn't "old school")
What technology did Zenter use to build their service? Python? Java? I'm just wondering if Google has a preference for certain technologies.
Winners? It looks like some semi-random list of sites some semi-random crowd assembled.

I mean, Silverlight for creating Web content?

This is pure WTF? 2.0
Can you give me an example of a specific paragraph of rambling you consider to be out of left field?
So why does Reddit have a very different feel than Digg?
It's always disappeared for comments of a certain age.
The article gets a lot funnier after you finish reading it and realize it's from 2005. :-)

(And yes, I know it says so at the top)
YC's recipe is: make people make something people want.

Seriously, making something people want was exactly what the Zenters did. Everyone could see at Demo Day that they'd made something users would like.
I was lurking on #lisp for most of today and it seems to me you're being a bit oversensitive. You asked about packages at 14:23. Several people tried to figure out exactly what you were asking, including gigamonkey (the author of PCL!). At 14:26 rahul mentioned "asdf" which is probably what you are looking for. If you had at that point Googled 'asdf lisp' and felt lucky, you would have gone straight to this page: http://www.cliki.net/asdf , which contains a script to automatically generate packages as well as some other Windows-specific information that you were asking about. Otherwise, at 14:39 in the complete log, jamesjb pointed you to a tarball containing an example system. Not too shabby IMHO.

Incidentally, http://www.cliki.net/IRC mentions #cl-gardeners and #lispcafe as more novice-friendly than #lisp, though I've never been too troubled by my own experiences there as a newcomer to Lisp.

Lastly, you might want to check out http://www.google.com/coop/cse?cx=012679172708151972086%3Aeg1jtvm_dlk (hopefully the link did not break) -- it's a custom Google search that searches a set of 20 Common Lisp resources. It's pretty useful.

Good luck.
It sure used to, but since the HD-DVD fiasco, Reddit seems to have picked up a large number of ex-Digg users.
I watched Linus's google talk, and he says that mercurial is the only other scm that he finds respectable. For obvious reasons, he still prefers git.

I'd say any system that allows easy branching and merging will make experimenting with your code much more fun.
Great call, Alex. That's one of my favorite books ever. I blogged this here: http://herdrick.blogspot.com/2006/03/what-all-books-ought-to-be.html
Change philosophy to "when it's done".
And what if one has many dreams in life? In fact, what would a life look like if one stopped creating and pursuing dreams?

I'm married, I still have dreams and still work to achieve them. Ideally, your marriage would incorporate the pursuit of both partners' dreams - a balanced approach.

Convincing your wife should be simple: tell her why you must pursue your dream. Ask her what her fears are and then explain your perception of each of those fears and how you plan to address them. It pretty much comes down to dispelling any fears she has.
Good post. The only other Socratic book I own is "What is Calculus about" by W.W. Sawyer. It's more loosely Socratic though. There are paragraphs of text interspersed with questions that either ask you to look for a pattern, or else follow a statement to its logical conclusion.

Not as good as The Little Schemer, but it's still cool that you can learn traditional (non-lambda) calc knowing only addition and subtraction.
Google stares down Microsoft and wins
I have to disagree: Hedge Funds usually take 20% of the profit above the High Water Mark, and above it only. Disclaimer: I'm working in a Hedge Fund with a 2/20 compensation structure, and I am leaving this very well paid job to start my own company, very far from finance, the Street, NYC, and actually very far from the United States...

Here is a little explanation (ignoring the 2% management fees, irrelevant for this discussion):

The fund starts at let say $100 per share. It makes 25% (before fees) the first year, so a share is worth $125. The manager takes 20% of incentive fees ($5/share) so each share is actually worth $120. Hence: the net performance for the first year is %20, and the new High Water Mark is $120 per share.

The second year the fund loses 16.6%, so now a share is worth $100. No incentive fees are taken. The high water mark remains at $120/share.

The third year the fund does 25% again (before fees). So now a share is worth $125. The fund charges 20% of incentive fees on $125-$120 = 5$, that is to .say $1. Hence the fund is now worth $124/share and that's the new high water mark, and the net performance for this year is 24%.

Conclusion:
Year, Net Performance, Hedge Fund Fees.

1, +20%, $5/share.

2, -16.7%, $0.

3, +24%, $1/share.

I think that should be enough as an explanation to understand that the incentive is definitely towards higher performances.

Now in the real world, since investors get in and get out (and are trying to time this), it can be good to lose a bit to get some new investors on board... but that's psychology, not finance.
A blueprint for the perfect phone
No, it makes me think that I need to click the button to make my vote count. I'd replace it with some explanatory text that says to "click the picture of the candidate you think kicks more ass". Folks will naturally figure out what to do.
What if I want to vote for someone who isn't displayed on the front page? Do I just have to wait for a new smackdown to come up?
WordCamp 2007 registration now open (WordPress conference, nearly free, San Francisco, July)
Anyone interested in going to this?
I'd personally prefer a flip form factor and a qwerty keypad but I'd still buy the outlined phone if I could.

Remember that Y Combinator is waiting for a team to make a functional, usable phone, you should apply if you think you can do it.
Explanatory text is probably bad for something this simple.

I'd set it up like this: If you click the button you vote, if you click the picture you go to the candidate description. But - if you go to the candidate description page you should still be able to vote for that candidate against any other candidate.
What if the fund makes 25% year after year for 5 years, loses 20% year after year for 5 years, and then all the investors pull their money out?

I chose alternating 25/-20% returns because they make the math simple. Very few markets actually behave like this: instead, you're likely to get 5-10 years of excellent performance, followed by 3-5 years of incredibly depressing performance. The numbers become harder to figure with this, but qualitatively, the conclusion remains the same.

In practice, hedge funds often do well while whatever they invest in is rising, and then "blow up" entirely when they start to underperform and investors run for the exits. Think LTCM or Amaranth, and it happens regularly on a smaller scale. The managers make hefty fees in the good times, and the investors are left holding the bag when the fund blows up.
Aha, answered my own question. :-) Trust Google to have the solution. IE parses the first part of an MHTML document as HTTP-style headers, so if you have an HTML comment at the start of your pages with "Content-Type: Something crazy" followed by a blank line, that fixes it.

Google Reader has this (just after the doctype):
<!--
Content-type: Preventing XSRF in IE.

-->

Do a view source on http://www.google.com/reader/m/view/ and try it (you have to be logged in).

I found this out at these links:
http://sla.ckers.org/forum/read.php?4,1975,2037
http://sla.ckers.org/forum/read.php?4,9628,10259
My wife and I read together most of "Hackers and Painters" by PG. I was surprised -- she really enjoyed it. I think this was partly what got her enthused about microPledge. (Some of the chapters were too techie and not readable-out-loud, like "A Plan for Spam". We skipped those.)
Somebody asked Chris Sacca (one of Google's main acquisition guys) this at the first Startup School. His answer was "Build it in whatever language will let you get to market and start getting users fastest. Usually when Google buys a company, we have to rewrite all the code anyway to take advantage of Google's infrastructure and scale to millions of users."

This doesn't answer your question about Zenter, but it should about Google...
And not just the prospect of -- get funding now. I don't mean a huge amount, just angel funding. We did this and it really helped my wife get on board.

Also, don't let the startup take over. Maybe if you're single you can work 14 hour days ... but I've got a family, and it comes before startup (mostly :-). I'd rather be happy than rich.
I too wonder how founders who own 30-40% of a company (who want to work 80 hours a week) can expect the same of an employee who owns only .5% or less.
You could just google them, ask them personally via e-mail. You don't need someone to ask you "who's your favorite coders and tell the author about his works". That's like asking you to do his job :)
That's so cool! Something that solves a problem--how do you leave your computer behind without losing track of what you were trying to do? And since it's based on HTML, it can support any type of data, be it medical tables, articles, notes, addresses, maps, contacts, phone numbers, etc.
Projects are never finished...
Non-existent? Then what are you using right now? Invisible news.yc?
I like it! Just remove the extra buttons and let people just click the picture.

Maybe even have a different page where people just vote between two candidates and just link to the main page that has more info.
A keypad is important because so many girls are into texting.
Congrats guys! happy to hear about your success!
I like texting just as much as the next member of Generation Y but the keypad makes email a lot easier too and I compulsively check my email on my phone.
Clicking on the logo/banner (on top) should bring users back to the home page.

Otherwise - neat!
Is MySpace worth 12 billion?
Way to go, Zenters!
Sure, as long as I don't have to pay it.
Lots of hedge funds (the good ones at least) get out of this by requiring minimum investment periods. This prevents a focus of the LP's on short term gains/losses, but also prevents the run for the door.
Whoever downmodded, care to explain? I'm not smartassing or critiquing the writing; I was really doubtful about what the poster meant.

If I wanted to ask what everyone is replying, I'd say "any advice on convincing your wife to let you become an entrepreneur?" All that indirection about 'wives' and 'husbands' makes it look like someone is worried that the wive(s) of their prospect cofounder(s) will prevent them from taking the leap.
Guess that would be adding likebetter to the equation.
Congratulations to the Zenter team!
Why venture capital is not necessary for a successful start in the software business
Seven ways to gather market intelligence on your competitors | Venture Itch
raganwald's Day-to-Day Programming Environment
Uh, so you have his password? Or do we have to guess? "lisprox"?

Am I missing your joke?
those folks at nuclearphynance are unbelievably arrogant
Printing business card out of your pocket | Venture Itch
Blade server for small business | Venture Itch
Js-kit.com rolls out new widgets | Venture Itch
Making Data Work for Your Customers | Venture Itch
mindless, neat, cool. thumbs up!
First Linux, now git | Venture Itch
It's predominantly JavaScript.

I believe the back end is Java.
Maybe I'm way out in left field on this one, but why would anyone want to develop applications for Facebook? I'm in college and I don't see the point.
thanks. Someone really needs to take politics off of reddit's hands...
More importantly, maybe rejection also prevented the creation of a 100x greater number of world changing companies:)
Veoh.tv radically changes how people watch video online | Venture Itch
or better yet, create a politics channel on likebetter.com? :-)