skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I think one issue is that there is no way to express disagreement with the worthiness of the original story. No downvote on stories, no bury etc.
So instead some people most likely express that by downmodding any comments that agree with the storys worthiness.

I'd really like a downvote on articles, although it's a tricky decision I guess.
I'd like to know more about how they are integating GPUs. I've been looking at CODA (nVidia library to use the GPU) and it looks mighty interesting.
Agreed. Melbourne is the Australian archetype of the cosmopolitan city, but in terms of startup production on a global scale, I doubt it rates much farther ahead of other Australian capital cities.

I reside in Adelaide and the business environment is barren. I could count on my hand the number of angels who have real insight into the technology sector. We have access to Government grants schemes - COMET for emerging startups and Commercial Ready for SMEs - but they rarely consider ventures without a traditional business model.

There are startups to be found - I'm the programming half of one that's gaining major traction in the education market - and successful businesses have originated from Adelaide (such as News Corporation). On the whole though, Australia currently doesn't have the mentorship, the networking, or the intellectual and financial capital to sustain a vibrant startup community.

Given time, however, I believe the situation can change, with sufficient exposure.
Python MVC web framework - web2py
Fraudulent clicks don't bring Google more money in the long run. They reduce the amount of actions per clickthrough the advertiser sees, causing the advertiser to value each click less and therefore bid less.

So if it increases your clickthrough rate by 5x (without increasing signups at all) you'll simply pay 1/5th the cpc. Long run of course.

They also cause small guys to quit using AdSense. Therefore Google has significant incentive to combat it.
How many of your MMOG’s monthly users can you get to pay?
Funambol To Offer An Open-Source Competitor To MobileMe . . . As An iPhone App
Matches up quite nicely with what I've heard actually.

Nice site too - great UI and, of course, interesting content.
Apple Plans Office Invasion With Snow Leopard
Scheme Parser Combinators
Linuxcare Australia, which had a seriously impressive list of hackers, was based in Canberra, perhaps due to the proximity to the university? It didn't sound like a very exciting place, but then again, neither is silicon valley.
The Aardappel Programming Language
Ten Tips for Starting and Running a Successful Small Business - Small Business
Because inevitably someone wants a breakdown report of shipments by state, and no matter how many times you try to explain to them that international shipping doesn't have a concept of "states", they refuse to listen, so the company eventually retools and just offers domestic shipping and/or a bad interface. Guh.

I've been told, as part of requirements gathering for collecting retail demographics and order information, that many users don't know what zipcode they are in, what their phone number is, or what US state they are in, and that somehow hand holding the information gathering into separate fields somehow fixes this ignorance of one's own physical presence.
This is just awfully depressing. I'm Belgian working for a British company, so my wage is about half, and with much higher taxes so my real wage is more like a third.
Omnisio (YC startup) is founded by Aussies and based here in the valley.
I've used Funambol for some time on WinMo. I'm not quite sure how it would work on the iPhone without being able to run as a background process. Anyone know?
I don't see why we should consider the evolution of DNA to be unlikely. We have increadible statistical evidence it isn't.

Chance you evolved in a universe you observe: 100%
Chance you evolved in a universe you dont: 0%

Given: I exist.

Therefore, from clear first principles, I should judge as 100% the chance of DNA evolving. I dont get how any conscious being could even concieve that percentage as less then 100.
Waiting to see a crash test of this vs a SUV street tank.
You only have a downvote button if you've a certain amount of karma: I think 20.
I'm also from Adelaide, and I agree it's not likely to be a startup hub anytime soon. I think a large part of the problem is a lack of startup culture - as an example I was involved in a startup company after finishing my undergrad degree, and the founder was absolutely against giving up any control and his idea of giving equity to the first employees was a %0.0001 profit sharing arrangement. He was offered something like $50k to get a prototype together but wouldnt relinquish any equity.

I think the history of News Corp is a little more complicated, the Advertiser was just the first paper Rupert was given control over, hence its importance to him.
This is quite beautiful. It's sad, however, to see that the really cool concept cars never see the light of day (erm, mass production).

Also, I don't want to be the one to declare the end of the 1-car-per-person era... but in 20 years, will anyone be using cars anymore?
I agree. I'm 28 with a very understanding girlfriend, but certainly sometimes she's a bit peeved at how much I "work". Of course, I don't see it as working - I see it as doing what I really want to do (you'd never have seen me get out of bed in the middle of the night and do a quick hour of "work" before going back to sleep in the job I had before!).

That's put a strain on our relationship time and time again. We've pulled through, but I can't imagine it would work too well if we were actually married with children.

I wouldn't recommend you start a startup unless you're willing to sacrifice pretty much every shred of social life for it. Think of it like starting a family, in fact - it will suck out all your social energy and focus it on a single thing. Which is why starting a startup and a family together is probably not a good idea.
Thanks. I've done this so its only pure Google searches now. I think its one or two of our competitors ensuring that we pay more on a daily basis. On IP clicked on us in one day 15 times. It doesn't sound like much, but it cost approximately $50 just for this one day.
Thanks. I didn't know that we could block some IPs. That will really help
EDIT: Just done this. They allow up to 20 IPs to be blocked (just if anyone is interested)
Take a look at the link I posted below - OpenCL can be accomplished by using a thread scheduler that's "aware" of asymmetric processing capabilities across the different cores (and treating the GPU as a usable processing core in non-OpenGL code). I suspect they'll be using ULE or something similar to it to pull this off.
Trading Places with Indian Outsourcers
3 mil?! For a shitty site like this? My little cousin could build and maintain this during after-school hours!

Bubbly bubbly bubbly....

Can't wait for this bubble of big-nothings to burst and things to get back to (more or less) normal...
The cost of living here eats up a lot of the difference.
If you knew about my life, understood the problems I face and offered realistic and achievable solutions, and were someone I had respect for (even if I don't know you personally), then yes, I probably would. :)
Collection Agencies for US: Nationwide List of Collection Agencies
A list of all collection agencies in the US - National Asset Management is one of the leading Collections Agency offering debt Collection services, Debt Recovery, Medical Collections, Legal Services, Recovery Services thougout the nation
BPO Services, Outsourcing Call Center Services, Inbound Call Center Services - Virtual BPO
Virtual BPO services support call center services, virtual call center services, inbound call center, outbound call center, telemarketing services, Voice Broadcasting Services, Lead Generation, Market Research Services, Appointment Setting, website response, order taking services, message answering services, and customer support services for outsourcing business worldwide.
I think this is what you need. I cut it out of some working code and simplifed a little, didn't check if the modification works thou, but the concept should.

<form>
<select id="dropdown" multiple="multiple" onfocus="expandselect('dropdown');return false" onblur="depressselect('dropdown');return false">
<option disabled="disabled">Browser does not support dynamic option</option>
</select>
</form>

function el(id) {
return document.getElementById(id);
}

function expandselect(selections){
if(dynaopt){
selections=selections.split(',');
for(var i in selections){
var select=selections[i]
if(el(select)){
el(select).size=16;
el(select).multiple=true;
el(select).options[0].selected=false;//quirk with switching multiple=true/false
}
}
}
}//expandselected

function depressselect(selections){
if(dynaopt){
selections=selections.split(',');
for(var i in selections){
var select=selections[i]
if(el(select)){
el(select).size=1;
el(select).multiple=false;
el(select).options[0].selected=true;//select title
}
}//end for
}//if(dynaopt
}//depressselect

function setup(){
dynaopt=true;
el('dropdown').options[el('dropdown').options.length-1]=null;
if(el('dropdown').options[el('dropdown').options.length])dynaopt=false;//test if dynamic option available on browser
if(dynaopt){
el('dropdown').options.length=0;//clear all available
el('dropdown').options[0]=new Option('Dropdown box title',null);
el('dropdown').options[0].disabled=true;
var i=1;
for(var option in options){
el('dropdown').options[i++]=new Option(option,option);
}
}//dynaopt
}//end of setup

options=['test1','test2','test3'];
This might help you: http://individed.com/code/select-improvement/

I wrote it for a specific instance so it isn't super robust, but it could at least get you started.

Edit: Actually, it sounds like you're talking about using this for navigation and not a form. In that case you should be using an unordered list as your starting point, not a select.

You can turn ULs into dropdowns with just css and there are plenty of examples around. Here's one I found after a quick Google: http://www.cssplay.co.uk/menus/final_drop.html
I guess it's most reasonable to design for a minimum of 1000px width. Few apps/websites really need more minimum width.

P.S. yes, peple have larger screens, but it does not mean they maximize the browser window. It's especially true of Mac users.
web2py rocks anytime, anyday
On the other hand, I was getting about (please, don't laugh) US$10 a month out of AdSense in my blog (which is not really a blog, but I gave up naming it anything else) when Google said there were fraudulent clicks coming from my site and that they would not tell anything more about it because that would compromise their detection techniques, but, still, I was banned from AdSense for life.

In the end, it worked out: I changed banner providers (I started rotating between two international networks and two local web merchants, adjusting probability of each source according to origin and revenue stats) and have a much better ad revenue (which is not to say it is anything great, but just about anything is better than US$10/month)

I wonder how many people have similar experiences.
A single up-down arrow system is fracked. Are you agreeing or disagreeing? Are you recommending or dis-recommending? Can you tell the difference? Are you acting petty or noble? Do you like or dislike the poster? Did he/she take you to the cleaners the last time you disagreed online?

These systems do not promote healthy, honest, respectful discussion. They promote lock-step agreement with wherever the majority is going. Most people vote their emotions, not their head. With that in mind, the karma system is a system to enforce that overall you're going to say things people mostly agree with -- not that they find interesting or new.

This leads to a "me too" board, where there are pre-decided opinions on everything and posters struggle to pat each other on the back in new and interesting ways.

I exaggerate, but only to a point. As you can see on other boards, this is a real and deleterious condition. (Please insert John Stuart Mill's argument for the utility of listening to minority opinions here)
Not if he lives in London.
True. But the point isn't that he's well off; it's that a valley employee pulling down $90k/year isn't particularly wealthy.
Your points are brilliant, and I love how they make me think more about "truth," or the illusion of it. To me, this is basically an essay about why we live our lives the way we do. You almost have to think back to the things we were told by our parents in order to realize why we do the things we do now. It's always interesting to analyze your own self. I love the essay about "Stuff" as well.
Techies to Vista: We're Just Not That Into You
Mars Lander successfully soils itself
Sergey Brin Books a Flight on Russian Soyuz Space Shot
It doesn't work for me either.
(just in case: Windows XP SP2; Opera 9.24)
Any stats on browser usage for Hacker News? I'd expect firefox to be maybe 80%+ here?
Simple idea and an apparently nice implementation. It's interesting that they plan to sell to HR folks when their site will undoubtedly make some HR folks lives much harder. This feels like a total "why did this take so long?" site. Nice job.
Ask YC: P = NP ?
What's your idea?
maybe, it may be even higher than that figure. Even non-techies now use firefox.
Great. I hope to be in SV maybe this fall to visit friends doing things there. It would be nice to meet you.

Just starting to use friendfeed/twitter/etc myself (in an effort to lead a more transparent life and connect the dots), so will add you in shortly.

Thanks. Take care :)
I was wondering about this too... Can't see where those 3 millions go except maybe for marketing (and even then, it seems to be a bit high.... )
Sure, although Safari seems a good choice, and what with the iPhone and abundance of macbooks I'd expect Safari to be used quite a bit here.
yes, that may be true, but firefox is quite huge now, especially firefox 3.0
Patterns of Reputation Representation
The whole having a motor... "thing" is rather nice, though.
Sidenote: most women I know can follow several conversations at the same time. In a restaurant, they always know what people on adjacent tables are talking about.
"... And the big question - for how long could you seriously expect to fund multiple quality ideas twice a year? If Big Brother ran out of talent in 3 seasons, I'd be surprised for a tech-start-up-focussed company to still be finding suitable applicants 3-4 years down the track. ..."

I don't know. There's a lot of software, engineering and hackers in the major capitals (Bris, Syd, Mel, Adl, Per) but not many startup "product" companies (sans enterprisy software companies). So it tends to limit the opportunity for people who want to work for Startups who might just think I could do better than this rather than work for consultancies, design and marketing companies or the multi-nationals.

There is no lack of talent and risk takers. There is definitely a lack of Angels, mentors and the other fuzzy bits that provide the stepping stones from taking an idea to Startup to exit ~ http://benbarren.blogspot.com/2008/05/why-is-it-so.html
Colemak: the best keyboard layout? (faster to learn thank DVORAK)
IPhone Mathematics: Consumers Will Pay and Pay and Pay
that's not how chance works. The chance that a given child becomes a boy is about 50% even though I am a boy.

As the article explains: rerunning everything in a near-identical situation does not mean the same events happen. So based on the fact that something has happened once doesn't let you say anything about the chance of it happening.
O2 3G iPhone: Apple cracks down on unlocking
Well, there's one factor that is not listed and that is a really important time-sucker: learning a new (human) language. I'm relocating to Berlin and I don't speak German. I wonder how much that'll hinder my productivity!
A somewhat better Overhear.us, except Glassdoor clearly targets recruitment agencies and HR, while Overhear.us was mostly for fun, as I understand it.

Which means, there is a niche for leaking "confidential" information. Internet just ideally suits this kind of anonymous social networks.

Just tried Overhear - why is the site down? (Assuming it's a YC startup, someone can answer maybe)
"... are there any good web resources regarding the melbourne "scene?" ..."

Hey menlo try here:

- http://melbourne.twitterusergroup.com (Melbourne Twitter Underground Brigade: less technical but more entrepreneurial types)

- http://www.luv.asn.au (Linux Users of Victoria: more engineers)

- http://www.osdc.com.au/osdclub (Open Source Developers' Club: hackers)

Let us know if your in Melb ~ http://twitter.com/bootload
Unfortunately, they don't seem to have time for the little guy any more. However, I've had excellent results with Yahoo and (believe it or not) Ask.com.
So why do they bill 30 times for a click from the same ip?

This is one of the simplest fraud patterns to detect. (And I bet they have some kind of mechanism to find out if an ip is a gateway for more computers or just a single user pc)

I simply think that they don't care, as long as the money comes in. 5 years ago I met a guy who was running an empty website just with a banner on it. He was running some kind of click generating software and was making about 1000$ a month with it,even though on the website was nothing more than the banner of the ad provider. They didn't kick him, probably because noone complained and they were making money as well!
I do the same; a while back there was a discussion on HN (approximately): "what do you do when you see someone being downmodded unfairly?"

Up/down votes on comments should be, in my view, for whether you thought the comment was worth reading or not, irrespective of viewpoint. Likewise for upvotes on stories.
The Firefox religion
"... I guess what gets me about his articles, is they are usually about something I'd like to know more about, and he presents this veneer of of authority, but always skims over the point of his argument where one might reasonably expect him to defend his position beyond simply stating it as a solemn truth. ..."

The question I keep thinking of is why? He is the founding editor of GameDev and Software developer mags. So you would assume he has some idea of writing. I'll keep that in mind next time I (think) of posting one.
I think you might be over-thinking this a bit! (uh-oh--here comes the Karma hit....)
Online Research Doesn't Necessarily Translate Into Purchase 
"While the Internet can help consumers sort through product choices, it doesn’t always influence buying decisions as much as other sources of information. The influence of online research in web purchases varies by product."
I've also learned from this. But sometimes it's hard because you are left guessing "why" someone downmodded you. For instance, I've recently been left thinking that I can be too brief with comments...but I'm not sure that is true. An intelligent and knowledgeable crowd needs and wants less wordiness.

I have learned to stay away from political discussions. Ouch!
Netbooks pre-loaded with Ubuntu
I don't agree to be honest. Its not that we will quit, its just that we need to pay more money for each customer we ultimately receive. We can't not advertise on there unless/until we have another means of driving qualified traffic in, so we have to just take it in some respects. We have another product, SourceGuardian, where we were paying considerable sums each month. We switched off the network adsense sites and our sales didn't drop at all. We haven't monitored this site for fraudulent clicks, but we're spending around $300/day on this other site so we thought we should check everything
The article is quite over-simplified. Yes, those are some reasons, but I would bet it has as much to do as what you were exposed when younger. A kid whose dad played quarterback in college has an easier time playing quarterback in youth football because the dad has "been there:" knows what it takes, how to approach it, etc.

For someone with parents doing shift-work or working in a bureaucracy, who grew up with no exposure to what it takes to run a business, there is a huge intellectual/emotional hurdle that is hard to see over, making it difficult to jump.
I'm sure some of it is still in the bank, but of the part that's been spent, a big share is people's salaries. They've been around over a year, and have 12 salaries to pay, including a management team full of former Microsoft and Expedia execs.
Firefox has Firebug. It is such a timesaver for me, I want to hug the developers on a daily basis (well, maybe just shake their hands). But for most of my actual browsing, Safari it is. It just feels faster on my machine...
Going to the Moon in a bubble
Somehow in the hoopla (or was it that I was actually working while the world stopped for Steve?), I missed the in-store activation requirement. One of the best things about my phone was peeling it open at home, sitting with my mac, and getting it all setup. Having to open the package and wait for someone to do it for me, is a HUGE step backwards. I understand that this is how AT&T makes sure they're getting their cut, but still am disappointed by this step back. But, on the bright side, used iPhones may hold a little value after all. I can dream can't I?

BTW: Much of my surfing of HN is done on the iPhone. Brilliant device when you need your fix and aren't at the keyboard (though I do make a good bit more typos when commenting from it).
My only misgiving about this is the so-called "Awesome Bar" in Firefox 3, which introduces a lot of visual clutter for only marginal benefits. Fine. Maybe you do know best. But I'd like to be able to switch it off (because I just don't like it) without resorting to installing an extension. Focussing on usability really should mean you let people decide for themselves what's "awesome" and what's just clutter.
This comment reminds me of the time I read an article about some triviality of women. The article was accompanied by a photo, with the caption "A woman shopping in grocery store". The article had nothing to do with shopping or groceries.
Nature is one of the most interesting complex systems we know.
A kid in high school? Try getting things done with a 3 week old! I think the swing should get Founder status with the amount of time the little one spends swinging side to side cooing while I'm sitting next to him hacking.

And while I agree with many or Aaron's and James' points, the largest reason most folks don't start startups - guts. They don't have the guts to come up with an idea, they don't have the guts to build it, they don't have the guts to follow through. And at the core, they don't have the guts to forsake all others for their startup. Not that a lack of these "guts" is any way a deficiency, as really, different strokes for different folks, but it really comes down to guts.
I'm a spelling nutter, too. I'll file this one for later use. I think it may be the first time I've ever seen it written or attempted to write the word. Thanks!
Google Co-Founder Books a Space Flight
Markov and You
Search box in top right corner like http://www.ycombinator.search.xirium.com/cgi-bin/browse.cgi with user selectable back-end.
Can Silicon Valley Deal Makers Take the Credit For Obama’s Success?
As a stopgap measure, try http://www.ycombinator.search.xirium.com/cgi-bin/search.cgi?...
Google Gears Updated for Firefox 3
I'm not seeing a place for location when it comes to the salary reported. Location (cost of living) is a big deal when it comes to market rate salaries. I'm sure a Software Engineer at Google makes more money working in CA or NY compared to the market rate for the same job here in Boston.

Am I just not seeing these details since I haven't signed up?
Safari 4 to Include Site-Specific Browsers and Fastest-Yet JS