skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
It's also amazing leadgen for YC. That's partially because of PG's direct ability to get things like "apps are open" to the top spot, but also just because if you use HN regularly, you get a good impression of YC and are constantly reminded that it exists.
I think you're right on. People complained that CALEA was technically infeasible, but those people just didn't understand it; ISPs are obligated to make CALEA work and they complied even if it meant redesigning their networks. If ISPs have to update their OSS systems to support the "kill switch", they will do it.
Actually, the best number depends. Basically, you want to have as few operations as possible, but you also want them easy.

Having base b for number n, you need log_b n digits where each digit is an element of (0..b-1). So working on those representations takes something like f(log_b n, b) operations. Where the function f depends on the operation you are looking at.

A good base should keep f small in relation to all n.

One very natural choice for f, I can't remember which at the moment, leads to e being the best base in theory---so 3 being good in practice.

If you are working with something like trees on disk (yes, data structures are very intimately related to numbering systems---read Okasaki's Purely Functional Data Structures for more information) a very big b, i.e. branching factor in this case, like 1024 is useful: Loading a new digit/node from disk into memory takes a long time, but once it's in memory, your operations will be fast.
I'm baffled by the # of comments suggesting human intervention in search results.

20-25% of searches in a day have never been seen before. It can be easy to under-estimate the complexity of organizing the world's information when it's already done so well.
Productivity War: Europe vs. The US (Graphic)
FaceCash (http://www.facecash.com) solves this.
Not in gray code.
PhotoEQ is "lightroom" for non-photographers.
I agree with your statements, but I have a question.

If I am getting a groupon that gives me 50% off $100, and I actually spent the $50 of which groupon takes ~50%... at what point don't retailers start offering "groupon like rates" directly to me, cutting out groupon?

Sure, many retailers will be too lazy due to the distribution groupon has - but won't there surely be this group of retailers?
Looks nice. The first thing I looked for is how your application's PoV is different from Basecamp's. Leading with a comparison would quickly let me know whether I'm interested without having to figure it out myself. I did sign up and it looks solid. Best of luck!
Your kids will have an account, if they don't already. No special software is needed, just a browser and the ability to remember a password. School, library, friend's house...in this war it isn't you vs. them, it's the smartest, most motivated kid they know vs. the dumbest, most apathetic adult they know.
I made it clear that it's both a burden-of-proof question and a liability question. If Google refuses to accept liability for the downstream, then Oracle may feel forced to go after the downstream directly. Any better idea for how to interpret Oracle's claim that Google 'wants to throw its licensees and users under the bus'?
Quick SEC disclaimer... I'm not an investment professional; I'm just sharing my personal experience.

It depends. Munis come in all flavors and sizes; the best ones IMHO are state-level "general obligation" (i.e. backed by state taxpayers) that do NOT fund revenue projects (this will make them taxable anyways). The second best ones, again in my IMHO, are classified as UTX ("Unlimited Taxation"), which gives the local government the power to raise local taxes in order to pay bonds. The ones I would be most worried about defaulting are the ones classified as LTX ("Limited Taxation") that fund revenue projects like local stadiums or toll roads; these bonds are paid back by the money collected by the underlying asset. Obviously, these would be the easiest to issue, as they do not require a referendum vote like UTX bonds, or state legislature approval like GO bonds.

Some states like California are constitutionally required to pay bondholders before any state-funded programs. Some states (like California) are also legally required to maintain a sinking fund, i.e. they can't make interest-only payments, but must also set aside money to pay back the principle owed to bondholders ever year. The "budget crisis" in California is because after paying back the 2 constitutionally mandated budget items, the state doesn't have enough money to keep the same level of spending as before.

In California, The interest on bond payments is an automatically budgeted line item every year; lawmakers can not change this without making changes to the state constitution.
Progress Crawls in Securing Critical Infrastructure
Raymond Chen has some neat posts on language:

"If somebody speaks a language I'm not expecting, sometimes I don't understand it, even though I should" Jul 6, 2009
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2009/07/06/98183... (the last paragraph is particularly interesting)

"More musings on the peculiar linguistic status of languages acquired in childhood" Jul 7, 2009
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2009/07/07/98209...
When I woke up and thought about this problem again, I realized that I didn't explain one detail. Why should (pi(n) - li(n))/sqrt(li(n)) follow a standard normal distribution?

Here is why. pi(n) is the sum of a bunch of many independent random variables, each of which looks like a flip of a biased coin. If you pick the right version of the central limit theorem (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyapunov_condition for the right version), it is clearly going to be approximately normal.

Its average will be the sum of the averages, which is 1/log(2) + 1/(log(3) + ... + 1/log(n) which is going to be li(n) plus O(1). If n is large the li(n) term dominates.

Its variance will be the sum of the variances of the individual random variables. The variance of a coin with probability x of turning up 1 is x(1-x). Therefore the sum of the variances is (1/log(2) - (1/log(2)2) + (1/log(3) - (1/log(3)2) + ... + (1/log(n) - (1/log(n)2) which is (modulo a O(1) error) the integral from 2 to n of 1/log(x) - (1/log(x))2 which is li(x) - O(n/log(n)2), which is dominated by the li(x) term.

Therefore the average and variance of pi(n) are approximately li(x). So (pi(n) - li(n))/sqrt(li(n)) should have approximately a standard normal distribution.
Great article, but it might be more complete with a mention of the rising acidity of the oceans and how as the ph drops, many of the shelled animals at the bottom of the ocean food chain who depend on their shells for protection will not be able to form shells (the acidity eats away at the calcium carbonate) making a whole category of the food chain susceptible to extinction.

I appreciate the optimism in this article that humans are "on the right path", but the bottom line is humans have already caused a major disruption to the biosphere via carbon emissions, and the carbon emissions are still increasing which will have an effect of ocean life, thus humans.

I'd like to see more thought going into "helping people live better lives while living in balance with nature", rather than "We can expand the human species to 20 billion - let's do it!"
Instead of a Kill Switch, I think it would be possible to make a Flood Switch. When enough shit would hit the fan, to make the president issue the Kill order, all bets would be off.

Let's say Americans are using Twitter or a foreign website to organize riots in a civil war, I don't think once the order is given and such a bill is in place, that the government has to ask nicely and force compliance. It will put all government computers and some very big tubes into DDOS'ing whoever is publishing something they don't want published at that very moment.
YouTube - Steve Jobs early TV appearance
What's your favorite OS feature of all time?
While it may be out of scope, it would be nice to see how he would address the increasing level of automation and its factors on classes, labor, wealth, and population.
The thing about the article is that it points that it would be very hard to determine how to "limit traffic to critical infrastructure". But "conveniently", when a state has a mandate that "must be done" while being hard to do surgically, that state has mandate to muck-about as it sees fit (that's why search warrants are supposed to specific, etc).

So "conveniently", it may turn out that to implement the bill, ISPes would be required to install flexible remote controlled switches of various sorts. Meaning that the real impact of the bill would be the configuration of a remote-controlled censoring system. IE, a Great-Firewall-of-America "by accident" (yeah).
I like the size and form factor, just wish they'd made the keyboard a kickslide like the X10 Mini Pro.
This video affirmed to me that even Steve Jobs had a period in his life where he wasn't as confident on stage as he is now. Great public speaking is no natural or innate trait, but something that can be learned by anyone that has the perseverance to stick with it.
<...Users don't care about portability or ease of multiplatform development.

CONSUMERS dont care about this - enterprise and medical applications should.

When you access an app/session from one device and seamlessly transition to another device and the same session, then the beauty of such a system will have impact on efficacy of certain tasks.

The consumer use of the iphone and android mobile devices will be strong and lasting - but to make significant impacts on how things are done in other verticals will not only be important - but also highly profitable for some.
Credit card sized from the standpoint of a Flatlander, perhaps...

I find it interesting, though. On my last visit to SF, I visited a small sushi restaurant and found it interesting that virtually everyone had an iPhoone-like device out on the table. They didn't seem to be interacting with them, so I assumed it was because you can't comfortably sit with an iPhone-sized device in your pocket.
21901 hits since 1995 - little over 1000 hits a year. Let's see the HN effect now. [One hour later - 22797, a little way off 900 in an hour.]

---

Reocities link for the rebuttal linked at the bottom of the article.

http://www.reocities.com/RainForest/Canopy/2265/no_prog.htm
I agree HN is super-valuable for YC right now. But it's effectively part-time product of a pretty small team. Could a small full-time team do good things in terms of user joy, loyalty, acquisition, and even monetization? With PG as an advisor/owner, I can't imagine why not.
On my Mac, Safari & Firefox, the "Shop" links on the front page do nothing. Also not sure why the links there aren't seasonal -- the Christmas Cards link is useless, but a Valentine's Day link would be useful.
Got it installed but when I try to access the getting started guide I get format not supported? I have no problem viewing web pdf's, even have Acrobat Pro installed. So what's going on?
This is actually mine, accidentally posted it from my girlfriend's account!

Clickable link: https://github.com/ptrsghr/FileWatcher
That's actually the example [CALEA] I had in mind as well.

I don't see a huge technical hurdle here, other than maybe a script to disable all peering interfaces for every ISP in the US. This could be done by hand just as easily should Uncle Sam come knocking.

The real issue, to me, is the why behind this. The only real motivator is to prevent people from organizing to overtake a government they perceive as corrupt. Is it really worth exploring crippling our economy and stifling free speech at the same time? Forget the technical hurdle, what about the constitutional one?

Interesting that we also claim to have a way to "force" internet on a country who kills it, but at the same time are looking for a legal basis to kill it ourselves.
Thanks - really appreciate you taking a look at it. I've always been reluctant to draw direct comparisons with other products. As a consumer when I see that happen it always feels like a completely biased point of view.

Definitely something to think about. Perhaps in a "Why SharedStatus" section.
You're actually helping to make his point. You're a new user; you help determine what hits the front page by voting in the "New" section.

barrkel is extrapolating his own behavior as an older member: he tends to only consider front page items for upvotes.

Thus, new users determine what makes the front page, all users help determine the front page ordering, and "classic" view reflects how old users would order the front page.

The question is whether barrkel's voting patterns are an appropriate model for older members. Personally (as another older member), I visit "New" perhaps once a week, but when I do I'm much more likely to vote up a story that I find to have even a little bit of value. I only vote up front page stories that I find extraordinarily useful or interesting.

There is no reason to assume that the interaction model used by barrkel and me are representative of all older members, so while his argument is interesting, it's not very well supported.
Worth noting that Twitter isn't seeing any of that $80m, since it's on the secondary market (i.e. shares that have already been issued and paid for).
Our Y Combinator Video? - Kornar Experiements
So, that's like http://moonpig.com then? What do they do differently?

Edit: Nevermind, answered it myself. Chirply does all paper goods, whereas moonpig only does cards, flowers, gifts, and bottles.
sorry about that! The shop isn't active so those links are empty links. Right now it's all voting and submissions :)
Nice app! I'm not a designer, but I think some of the buttons look disabled. In particular, the "Mark group as read" has gray text on gray background with very little contrast.
Why focusing on a few products is hard
What platform are you on? I found the emulator unusable on modern OSX and Windows 7 desktops and, to my surprise, perfectly usable on my two year old laptop running Ubuntu.
In the tradition of the late Julian Simon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Simon This will make John McCarthy reviled in some fashionable circles. I wonder if he speaks with Stanford Prof. Paul Ehrlich.
I didn't take Marks comments to be so much screaming 'BUBBLE' as they questioned the staying power of group buying.

There wasn't a 'rollerskating' bubble, it had it's time and then people moved to other interests. I think that is what Mark was saying
Slashdot Book Review: PostgreSQL 9.0 High Performance
I'm pretty pleased with the Droid Incredible. It's quite fast, so it makes a good dev handset. I'm not necessarily sold on the HTC Sense UI. I don't think it's necessary. Especially since I suspect it increases the amount of time it takes them to port new Android releases.
I don't think the few gee-whiz features will set it apart from the upcoming iPad 2, Blackberry Playbook or the legions of Android tablets unless it is competitive on price, availability and battery life. and sadly nothing was said about price or battery life and availability was "summer" for wifi and "later" for 3G. Not promising.
Anyone know if the actual broadcast is available? It'd be cool to watch it, especially after seeing this.
One may also send a comment through openmedia.ca:
http://openmedia.ca/crtc
it throws me an error upon connecting with Facebook connect
I'm confused - are you writing a cover letter or actually doing an interview? Might help us give better answers.

A couple thoughts off the top of my head: in general, I think your experiences as an entrepreneur will be really valuable to working at a VC firm. You might want to emphasize your ability to evaluate and advise the founders early stage companies (because you've been there). Also, there's nothing wrong with a mother-oriented site - women spend lots of time and money on the internet and that domain knowledge will help you and the firm pick good companies and make money.

Good luck!
Actually, one of the reasons I like Sparrow so much is that Google Chat isn't supported. I know I can just leave it turned off in the gmail interface, but if I'm ever bored and feel like seeing who's around it's too tempting to switch it on. With Sparrow I'm much more likely to get back to whatever I'm supposed to be doing after handling some email.
sometimes focus (on one vertical - as opposed to four) can mean all the difference.
1) Is this a job interview or a pitch opportunity? Unclear from OP. Obviously this effects things a lot.

2) In general VCs will not be impressed by numbers that are good for a bootstrapper. They're used to people spending a million dollars to get a million dollars worth of sales.

VCs over-emphasize dealmaking as a business skill, since it's what they do all day. So use statements hings like "I was responsible for negotiating affiliate deal X with partner Y".

VCs value raw growth, even on a low base. So say things like "I've been driving traffic numbers up 50%/month for the last several months".
Rants like this come from two kinds of people

A) People who don't invest

B) People who bailed at the bottom of a downswing

Everyone who rode out the recession without panicking has made their money back. I've made a good deal of money over the last 5 years with nothing more than 2 ETFs and automatic contributions each week (dollar cost averaging), and percent based rebalacing. So I do maybe 2 or 3 things a year above and beyond the automatic deductions.

It's really not difficult, and its not all that risky. Check out the Truth About Money by Ric Edelman, or just listen to some of his free podcasts.
This is the best advice I got about this subject when I was a wee programming padawan:

Your skills are worth what you're getting paid. No more, no less.

As much as we'd like to say we create more value than other branches of the company, we don't. Value is determined by the buyer, not the creator. It's simple-much of the working world values the work of managers and analysts more than the work of the programmers. Therefore, they are paid more.

Value is malleable so as you increase your perceived value, your pay will increase accordingly.
Keyboard navigation is too often overlooked in desktop apps. It should be in the very first release. A high percentage of early adopter-types are power users who want that kind of functionality. I can't tell you how many OS X Twitter clients I installed, only to promptly uninstall them (and never try them again) because I couldn't navigate them with the keyboard. The well thought out keyboard navigation was what sold me on Sparrow the moment I installed it.
Granted the software looks very cool and highlights some of the weaknesses of iOS and the iPad. But it's worrisome that there was no talk of price or battery life and availability was listed as "summer" for wifi and "later" for 3G. I fear the Touchpad will be lapped by the upcoming iPad refresh before it even hits. And how much air went out of the Xoom balloon as soon as the $800 price tag leaked? The iPad definitely needs some strong competition but I am afraid this may not be it.
White blood cells pitted against each other in ‘Blood Wars’
and it's crowd-sourced design, so the designs are better. Whereas moonpig is mostly about customized text.
This will be a winner because:

1) Targets women, so leverages 50% of patio11's awesome advice.

2) Unlike the similar product I'm working on, solves the huge problem of content creation.
Recipes for Mining Twitter (Python)
I find the emulator rather slow on Ubuntu... Best just to develop on a handset!
Measuring password re-use empirically
There is a 'Priority' label in the labels tab. I haven't personally used it so I can't confirm that it works as expected (my new email count is at 0), but it's there.

EDIT: Got a priority email after posting this. It didn't appear in the 'Priority' label window. womp womp.
Whenever someone tells me that Jobs was a natural public speaker I tell them that he too had to overcome stage fright and worked hard to be what he is.
There's an Android app that provides the barcode, but it has an optional feature to secure it with a PIN. The Android app isn't an official app from Starbucks either.
A method to do something to a biometric scanner, using a belt sander?

Somehow I don't think that would really be relevant for the "they're checking my fingerprints at the passport office" situation.
Anarchy has many definitions. For me, the most important one is the absence of state-wide law. Whether the law is enforced by government, warlords (I don't think you can call them "government" by any stretch) or the people is secondary to the definition of anarchy in my opinion.

Now as far as I know there's absolutely no state-wide rule of law in Somalia - Somaliland might have something, some parts practice Sharia to some extent, but most of the country is ruled by arbitrary enforcement of will of whatever warlord happens to control that part of the country at any point.

oh BTW, actually I found out about Somaliland just recently, in January I think, but thanks for reminding me anyway.
FYI DDG just uses the bing API and then does some fancy stuff on top of it, so technically they're not a "better search engine" they're just a prettier bing.
For the sake of completeness, Richard P. Gabriel's account is here: http://www.dreamsongs.com/DiBona-OReillyLetter.html

And Jamie Zawinski's account of this is here: http://www.jwz.org/doc/lemacs.html
Lucknow Gangster Shot Down In Uttar Pradesh
#superbowl
Yeah, they're investing in Twitter stock, not Twitter itself.
When I was living in Spain I definitely started dreaming in Spanish (it's weird to describe... ) and I know foreign friends of mine have shared similar experiences where they started dreaming in English in the US.

Haven't flipped the switch on my Portuguese yet, but I'm trying..
How The FCC Plans To Destroy GPS – A Simple Explanation
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Oracle's argument essentially "Google is throwing its partners under a bus because we're going to sue them if we don't get what we want"? How is Google throwing people that Oracle is suing under a bus? Is anyone else reminded of the RIAA's decision to sue people who pirate music? Either:

1) Oracle is bluffing or

2) Oracle really is stupid enough to sue Google's users.

If Oracle really does decide to sue the users of Android, it isn't Google that's going to end up looking bad. People are going to blame the company that's suing them. It would be about the dumbest PR move they could possibly make and would destroy any goodwill they have left in the developer and open source communities. Either way, I think Google should call Oracle's bluff.
8.5W Core i3-based desktop computer
The best place to find one is via your network, if you do not have someone in your network that you know personally then your networks network is the best place, find someone who knows someone at that point in my experience if you have to go to a 3rd degree then it is a wash and you can probably do just as well to hire some random Joe. As for pricing, iPhone is a hot commodity expect to pay above $100 an hour for a truly experienced iPhone dev, you can take you chances with a college kid or off-shoring but to me it sounds like you need a dev that can get you from A to B you need a dev that is going to be in the > $100 range (most are $150+).

A few tips I gan give you, is no matter how crappy, draw a picture of every screen, the developer may totally change the way the screens look but this will at least give them an idea of "what" you are trying to build. Also every item on the screen explain what it does and what should happen if it does not do it. If you have that level of detail, then you can get a pretty detailed estimate on what it will take to build. If you want to contact me, my email is in my profile. I am way to busy to take any more work but I can help you head in the right direction.
Nokia drops MeeGo phone before launch