skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Can I put in a request for service #3? Bring back the old calendar, re-brand for the enterprise, then sell for big $$$ to my parent institution as a push button lecture cast solution.
Tell HN: There is a Scammer Amongst Us
On January 29th a HN user, 'jiganti', posted this: "Ask HN: I think I've been scammed - what now?" (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157281)

Starting in the evening of January 30th, posts began to appear on complaint forums with my name. These posts claim that I am a pedophile and that I have stolen money. These posts are false and I find it unsurprising that they began to appear after I provided information about the possible identity of jiganti's scammer. My name and phone number are easily Google-able, however, I provide it here in case anyone wishes to call me: Louis Marascio, 512-964-4569.

I'm posting this because although jiganti's post fell off the front page, this story is not over. Other HN'ers and I dug up some information about the possible scammer in the original thread. Also, I believe jiganti might not be the only person who's been taken by this guy. Please read the post and thread in full. This sub-thread specifically discusses our findings: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2158590

Our most promising evidence is this: the responsible party is a single user that has at least three handles here on HN: pinksoda, sinkfloat, and BrianHolt. This has not been proven nor has it been denied, and I repeat the last sentence of my findings: I encourage the owner(s) of the HN accounts pinksoda, sinkfloat, and BrianHolt to speak up--and if I'm wrong I apologize.

I re-urge you to read the post, the subsequent conversation, and the other linked-to Hacker News posts and make up your own mind. Hacker News is a tight-knit community, and if there is an unsavory character here who's using it as a way to find and exploit young entrepreneurs, then I feel we need to all be made aware of this. If a scammer does exist amongst us, let's all hope a little light will cause him to slither back into the hole he came from.

It is important to note that 'mahmud' is mentioned in the first paragraph of the original post. mahmud IS NOT THE SCAMMER. The original poster lost his ability to edit the post before he could clear up what he meant. This is specifically discussed in this sub-thread on the post: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2157602
Spreadsheets are a fascinating blight on the face of science and business. They offer so much convenience and speed, but amplify the risk of errors quickly.

There is actually a research group devoted to studying spreadsheet risks: http://www.eusprig.org/
Sad, a caller from an hour ago said they expect to have their phones disconnected also, which would render this useless, I think:

http://twitter.com/speak2tweet/status/32197204739362816
http://inetcore.com/project/ipv4ec/index_en.html ipv4 exhausted...
Chinese to English translation is technically very hard (I've worked on an open source translation engine -> http://adsotrans.com/downloads). While there are definitely lots of easy ways that Google can improve its translation (introducing a rules-based pre-processor to stop it from screwing up names and numbers would be a good start), it's worth remembering that Google is the start-up when it comes to machine translation. They lured Franz Och (author of GIZA++) away from academia and gave him the computing power to single-handedly crush everyone working on MT in the government-academia complex and in DOD funded companies like Language Weaver. In response, NIST changed the competition rules to penalize Google for not using NIST data.

Google needs to improve its Chinese-English machine translation for the same reason it needs to keep working on Chinese -- you can't organize the world's information if you don't understand its largest language. But the underlying problem is that Google isn't engaging with China and doesn't seem capable of hiring people who actually straddle both worlds. Not that it hasn't followed Systran down the rules-based path.

Realistically, I don't see any other company out there which is making the sort of progress that they are in MT. The fact they are still wrong on occasion when tackling distant language pairs seems more a result of their being held back by a universal architecture for developing MT systems, not because they need to go back to an exclusively rules-based system. The future is hybrid anyway.
I'm sorry I didn't say it better. I'm not saying his mentoring was inconsequential; I'm saying he has even more important work ahead of him.
This is an absolutely great idea that strikes a blow to regimes who try to suppress uprisings by shutting down the internet. I can't say I am entirely optimistic about the direction Egypt will take if open elections are held, but their citizens have a right to have their voice heard.

That being said, the 'nonchalantness' in this line regarding the SayNow acquisition was quite funny, "We worked with a small team of engineers from Twitter, Google and SayNow, a company we acquired last week, to make this idea a reality."

Well done Google.
Thousands of years seemed to go by where uprisings didn't need social networking.

The Babylonians didn't need Twitter when they rose up against the Assyrian Empire. The Inaros' didn't need Facebook when they confronted the Persians in Egypt (although they did have the help of the Greeks). Julius Caesar didn't tweet 'hey watch out Pompey' when he marched on Roma. Did the Sicilian Vespers need Twitter to alter the balance of European power under King Charles 1st. Maybe the great Peasant revolt in Medieval England would have been more successful had they used Twitter - although they did manage to keep the term poll tax out of the tax lexicon for 600 years. Then, of course, the period of history after Elizabeth 1st where pretty much everyone revolted at some point (even here in America) those all seemed to happen without need for social networking.

I think humans are perfectly well equipped to revolt without social media. The currency of revolt has always been large numbers and big sticks.

Maybe our (the HN community) sees the world through a lens that makes it impossible to accomplish what is an everyday occurrence (on the historical scale) without the internet.
I agree that the developer experience with Salesforce is poor. But this means that Heroku now has the opportunity to make that developer experience _much_ better.
Heh, I got the impression that he tried harder to get Lua working, partly because he felt is was a more pragmatic choice, but I take your point.
> does anyone know how to create those nice, thin, grey scrollbars on the docs page

http://beautifulpixels.com/goodies/create-custom-webkit-scro...
Cyan (Petaluma, CA)

http://www.cyanoptics.com/company/careers

email: jobs@cyanoptics.com

We have openings for software developers in Petaluma, Vancouver, Dallas, and options for remote work.

You’ll have the opportunity to work with Python, Django, Cassandra, RabbitMQ, Google Web Toolkit (GWT), HTML5, and WebGL on small team in a fast-paced environment.
I included this point on a "reasons it's already the future" list I made the other day (http://www.thingist.com/t/pageview/1674/).

We all more-or-less own internationally syndicated newspapers now. Twitter is just the most common one.
Direct Nickel
Rand Paul wants to eliminate the Department of Energy, among others.
Note that Akamai and Level 3 have already given in and paid Comcast. The precedent has been set.
Bump Now Lets You Swap App Recommendations With A Tap
I think Microsoft is pretty involved in the Toronto community. I see them sponsoring events and sometimes holding events, providing content, and the BizSpark program. The BizSpark program is the best way I’ve seen them help startups. I feel like people involved with BizSpark are really concerned with helping startups succeed.

blah, blah, blah microsoft ad.
Some amazing stuff on there. This message brings a tear to my eye.

http://www.saynow.com/playMsg.html?ak=TkxFNENGTHVQQzdTdVE4N0...
Quinstreet: Hiring Java Engineers/Senior Unix Admins
Founded in 1999, QuinStreet, Inc. is the leader in vertical marketing and media online, consistently delivering the right leads at the right volume to thousands of industry-leading clients and business brands.
We went public in February 2010 and are continuing to grow. This makes it a perfect time to join our team and grow your career with us.

Below are a couple of links with additional information about the company:

http://www.quinstreet.com/what_we_do/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quinstreet

Here are some of the roles that we are hiring for:

Front End Web Developer (HTML, CSS, JavaScript)
Java Web Developer
Senior Java Developer
Java Developer
Senior Unix Systems Administrator
seconded: login proliferation is a real problem that i face all the time. i've been on the web for very nearly 15 years at this point, and there's no numbering the accounts i've created in that time, let alone all the ones i actually still use. OpenID isn't be perfect, but most of the really egregious issues i've seen with it have revolved around sites not being willing to commit to it.
Translation between European languages works great for me. Nothing I would ever dare to call “beyond terrible.”
.../html/home/home.shtml ...there's a certain symmetry, don't you think?
There is a lot of justice to the points made in this article. That said, I also believe that scraper sites duplicating other content are a lot more pernicious than low quality original content. Also, algorithmically recognizing mediocre content is almost impossible, and actively discriminating against specific media companies is a dangerously slippery slope.
Most of the people on /b/ who would be a problem have facebook trolling accounts, anyway.
OpenID isn't "done" yet. There very much is a market for 3rd party identification and I think that people will really want some level of neutrality from their identification provider.

Unfortunately, it seems that facebook is filling that market-- albeit without the neutrality. I don't like that. It just feels "icky" when I sign-on anywhere other than facebook using my facebook identity. I might NOT want my facebook picture to be seen on the sidebar of random websites by my friends. I don't particularly feel good about facebook monetizing my preferences even if it is done in an anonymous statistical fashion. Nor do I like that sometimes I have to worry about what exactly facebook is going to broadcast about me to the rest of the world or to my friends.

This might be nothing deeper than a superficial perception, but I simply don't trust facebook with my identity as much as I do OpenID participants.
And I do take yours. The fact than Node is actually using Javascript, which is more similar to Lua than to Haskell, makes your impression very sensible ;-)
Sure you can link to a response:

http://www.quora.com/What-s-wrong-with-OpenID#ans24870
Our species existed for millions of years without cooking food. Our species existed for millions of years without any sort of sterilization.

Thousands of wars have been fought without guns.

Millions of businesses have been built, grown, and died without the use of the internet.
Thousands of years seemed to go by where companies didn't need computers.

It doesn't mean that computers add no value to companies.
The Babylonians weren't up against armored tanks or teargas.

To be certain: The Egyptians don't need social media to get their freedom. Just the same, communication is essential to any group activity, and social media is an advanced, instantaneous form of communication. It's a force multiplier for anyone seeking to maximize the effectiveness of the revolution. If the Egyptian security forces have access to modern tools, it's in the interest of the revolution to have modern tools as well. Even if social media only gets 10% more people to show up for a given demonstration, at the numbers we're seeing now, that's tens or hundreds of thousands of people.

If communicating via the internet didn't help, why would Mubarak shut it down?
I feel like this will also degenerate into another cesspool. What value is this to society?
Web developer, Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, MN; not remote)

Looking for a creative and committed problem solver to help develop our new website and maintain multiple existing sites.

Django/Python, Linux administration, Apache, MySQL, HTML5, jQuery, etc...

jobs@walkerart.org
We never needed [x] before! [Y] was plenty good enough.

No offense intended, but... if that's your attitude, why bother reading anything on this site?
Ah yes. But how many people had to die in your examples provided. There are much better peaceful and diplomatic means now. they can have a bigger voice now by ramping up support around the world with their sympathizers. people shouldn't have to die to be heard and that is the joy of living now instead of 1000 years ago.
Just approach it like you would any other conversation. Ask questions about their lives - everyone likes to talk about themselves. Make jokes. Try not to be nervous. Be yourself. There is no need to act differently just because you're talking to liberal arts alumni.
With the pervasiveness of Open Graph (nee Connect) I'm not sure it'll necessarily have to be "better" than Disqus in order to win its marketshare
Very cool. I assumed it would be filled up with Spam right away, but it's not - they must be doing some kind of filtering to make sure only Egyptian callers can leave a message.
Most of the messages are not in english (duh) but here are a couple english messages. I'm surprised google isn't doing speech recognition and translating these for us too.

http://www.saynow.com/playMsg.html?ak=TkxFNENGTHVQQzdTdVE4N0...

http://www.saynow.com/playMsg.html?ak=ajRkanRVekNqSGdwZWw4ZX...

http://www.saynow.com/playMsg.html?ak=dkxLMm1KTER2cG5jWkd2Z2...

http://www.saynow.com/playMsg.html?ak=b1FveVRBQ2tyRlpWNjFMam...
This won't fix the issue of networking with BGP and isp's
Assume you are below average: http://sivers.org/below-average
The reason for the URL as username is that OpenID originated on Livejournal, where users have their own URL (i.e. mine is andrewducker.livejournal.com)

It therefore made sense to use URL endpoints as identifiers, as you could bounce people to their authorising server incredibly easily. Doing it via email address would be much harder (where would my email, andrew@ducker.org.uk, be authorised by?).

It's caught on amongst people who have URLs (bloggers, journallers, etc.. It hasn't caught on amongst people who don't (everyone else).
Before stamps, there were two options: pay someone to deliver the letter or pay when you receive the letter.
Communication barriers between HCI consultant and developers
No, and I don't need pants. But when it's -30 out and I have to shovel snow, they're sure a nice luxury.
They just shut off the cell networks too:

http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/01/31/5962180-egyp...
I know you want to hear different but it's illegal to use copyrighted music without paying the owners. Those YouTube users who do not opt to set their video to private are doing it illegally.

Fair use fro educators depends on several factors which I don't think are in your favor. One, fair use limits the percentage of material that can be used, and two, fair use must not hurt sales of the music. With your users likely uploading whole songs, and having the option to obtain paid licenses just like those for dance teachers and studios, either pre-condition is questionable.

BMI, ASCAP, and SESAC are the 3 orgs for the publishers, composers, and lyricists in the United States and they do expect choreographers and dance instructors to have licensing to use the music (Grand Rights). So do recording companies if you plan on using pre-recorded music. You could contact them and see what they offer.

Otherwise, you could make the choreos available to logged in users only. Private exchange of videos may be ok, plus it's much less likely the publishing companies will find out.
Egypt Shutting Down Noor, Its Last ISP
Thousands of years seemed to go by where uprisings didn't need social networking.

The Babylonians, Persians and so on had much smaller populations back then. It makes a difference. The scale of population we are dealing with currently is, as far as I know, unprecedented in the history of humankind. That means that things which worked historically will be insufficient to the current situation.
The nice thing about being a startup in Vancouver is you have really motivated staff

We keep an office in Toronto to send all the failures to - that really motivates people to succeed!
Thanks. Care to explain how you did that?

I just hovered over everything on that comment, and found out that the date (of all things!) is permalink-ish.
Machine Learning can tell what you're typing just by listening
Try http://nyc.gov/residents

Then click the top left logo.

That's 174 characters long
As I stated in a comment on another thread yesterday, and in support of a sibling comment, my experience is that Netflix is often twice as much traffic as running BitTorrent all day.
What if your Web startup attracts users without computers?
Don't see the obvious (4) profit part yet either, so (3) must be extra mysterious.
Isn't this very different to the way twitter works?

I follow this account and get links that I have to click on and then click on the "play" button again in order to listen to some(or any)one's broken english?
It's probably less of being valuable to society and more of finally monetizing the culture he helped create.
Apparently the creator, Alex Chen, works at Google Creative Labs. http://twitter.com/#!/cwiggins/status/32178375015530496
i fixed the error message and asked google to raise my daily api quota, tomorrow i'll see
They should crash and shatter, like lightcycles.
that's a pattern started by twitter by the way.
I looked at the page using Safari's Web Inspector to find an id that looked like it represented an answer.
The worlds longest commute... no, seriously!
I would go along with this if there was some provision that required the companies to use the extra $/gigabyte for expanding their infrastructure.
I started my post-collegiate career in 1997, joining a startup. You know why? I love technology and it was a great job. In 2000, I joined another startup. You know why? I love technology and it was a great job too. In 2009, I joined yet another startup. You know why? I love technology and it's still a great job.

Will this startup crash and burn? Maybe. If it does, I'll roll the dice and try again.

Over fifteen years, I've worked with lots of great people, on mostly exciting work, solving new problems, often with technology that didn't exist last year. Sometimes it takes long hours, and sometimes I can scale back a bit.

Some of us do what we do because we have fun doing it.

In the mean time, my work has enabled me to support a family and contribute meaningfully to society, even if I'm not changing the world 100% of the time.

$0.02.
thanks for the clickable link, you're right about the colors i definitely have to change them. I'll also add a small disclaimer to reassure people that i don't save anything submitted in the search input
Climate science is not something you can philosophize away. There are no arguments.

There used to be more pessimistic models that predicted some linear progression of current warming. So the new mainstream models fit measurements better, mainly because more scientific resources were thrown at the problem. They also predict slower change.

Magnetic fields, shifting magnetic poles, gravity, shifting orbits, solar intensity were all considered, by thousands of scientists writing thousands of papers. If you have something to add then do your own science. Arguments without math, data, models, simulations won't be taken seriously. Extraordinary claims require more evidence.

There might be group think, too many people working on the problem, etc.. but you can't discredit the findings with that argument.
Ugh, the reason OpenID exists isn't to make it easier on the user, it's to solve the problem that most developers are dumber than rocks.
Frankly this double-dipping whining coming from ISPs--which is nothing new--annoys the hell out of me.

Customers pay for a net connection and some amount of bandwidth. What they do with that bandwidth is up to them.

The idea that the servers that customer uses must pay for that bandwidth again is ludicrous.
1. How many revolts have succeeded as a proportion of those that have failed?

2. Think about how the organisation, weaponry, instruments of control and scale of governments has changed over the last several decades from anything ever seen before. Decentralised communications now mean a people can communicate perhaps even faster than their military, for example.

3. Perhaps you've missed that communication allows the voice of the people to reach the outside world in a more personal and representative way than traditional media, and inspires more people to bring pressure onto those governments and remind them the world is watching their actions. If you think that's unimportant, it's precisely what Amnesty International uses on a relatively small scale to great effect.
This reasoning fails to take into account the oppressors' possession of technology. Slower forms of communication may have sufficed in the situations you've cited (wherein the oppressor had faster-but-still-slow means of communicating), but when the oppressor has access to instantaneous communication and you do not you are at a severe disadvantage. This is precisely why public access to instantaneous communication is being revoked at this time.
Yes sure, and in fact this tool is just to check the competition in order to see how your idea has been differently developed by others and take inspiration.
For some reason, Letslunch isn't recognizing my HN username when I go to add it.
How does this help people who just raised capital? Will the govt. match what we raised 1:1?
very bad :( asked google to raise the app daily quota
You can use your mouse to grab this spinning "cube" and stop it or spin it faster, etc..
"Where do games begin? In the anarchy of paidia, we play without rules and without limits. It is amusing, creative and chaotic, but it is also short lived, as when the natural play of a toy becomes formalised, it becomes a game." http://onlyagame.typepad.com/only_a_game/2005/12/the_anarchy...

"...games range along a continuum between two modes: ludus, 'the taste for gratuitous difficulty,' and paidia, 'the power of improvisation and joy.'" http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/20/101220fa_fact_...
Has this article been excluded somehow from appearing in the main Hacker News feed? It is buried very far down compared to other stories that have received less votes within the same time period. It seems to me to be a very careful analysis of an issue that has attracted a lot of discussion. Is there some sort of HN policy against meta-discussion of the site's role within the tech ecosystem?
What about London-based HN users? Can we have lunch with London VIPs, whoever that might be?
The problem is that a sugary diet will lead to insulin resistance, which will lead to the need for more sugar ...
Thanks so much for the pointers. For now, I'm thinking that one option might be to just cut the audio out of videos, and expect viewers to figure out how the choreography lies. If the title says "Livin' La Vida Loca", but the video contains no audio, surely there wouldn't be legality issues there, would there?
I can certainly appreciate that. Just seems like he's a pretty talented guy who could be developing something of value. Just my humble opinion! :P
Now THAT'S customer service ... all I can say to Jason is congratulations as he's proven to be both compassionate and resourceful. It doesn't really matter where his entrepreneurship takes him. He's already made it as a human!
I know someone with an informational website that sells a dead tree version online, without the updates. It is kind of a snapshot in time of what was on the site at some point. (Or did at one time. I have just taken a quick look at the site and I am not currently finding a means to buy the book version.)