skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Programmers aren't just cogs in a system, and this is a mistake that many managers make. (And this is insulting to potential hires, by the way.) If you only know that you need "a lot" of them, you need to clarify the nature of the work. For example...is it a web site, will there be databases involved, is this software to power some kind of machine, will it use a network, will it require a GUI, will it run on Mac or Windows or Linux, are there restrictions on what it must interact with, is it safe to open-source the project and use GPL'd libraries, etc.? These details will also help you to write job postings.

In general, you get what you pay for, only less. Code has to be maintained, and even if something is thrown together in "a couple months", you may regret that for anything except a prototype.

A single excellent programmer may very well handle your entire project, and ten horrible programmers may never get it done. If you're not experienced dealing with programmers, then set up some kind of deal where you pay only when it's finished and you see regular progress from the people you hire. Be prepared to set aside plenty of time to test what is given to you, and do both expected and unexpected things with it. You need to be in a position to reject their work if they say it's "done" and you can still see quirks and instability (because some programmers can be lazy or clueless).

The cost of living in the valley is very high, so anyone living there will need more money for that reason alone. It wouldn't surprise me if you paid nearly 50% extra. This might be worth it, especially if it means finding someone right away instead of 6 months from now, but keep it in mind.
Jobs may have a reality exaggeration field. OSX, the iPhone and the iPad are nowhere nearly as cool as he says they are.

Microsoft, on the other hand, exists in an entirely different reality. WP7 is nowhere near cool, much less than what the iPhone actually is and an entirely different thing than what Jobs thinks it is.

It's pretty. And that's all.
Generally speaking, programmers aren't poor. They can afford to live in more expensive places with little snow, less crime, more interesting companies, and VC's.
Well maybe the message went out wrong.

1. We are both programmers, but we will need more people...
2. The thing is that if we get a beginning investment of 10K we dont want to blow it off inmediately on one single guy...What I was asking is how to invest it the better way possible? (that is what I meant with cheap)
To me, the "never ages" part is the most interesting, though in terms of aerospace, this doesn't have to be literally "never". An "estimated service life of 150 years" would be half again as long as humans have had powered flight, and would basically amount to the same thing.
Yep. Marketing. People thought they had built a chat client. In reality, they were providing a protocol, and to show off this protocol, they built a UI to demo it. People assumed the UI was Wave, and stopped there. =( Such potential.

As for people not caring: that's a result of not understanding the real product and the real potential. Assuming Wave is just about real time communication is really doing it a great disservice.
Technology pieces were falling in place with the newly announced Qt support on Ovi Store apps?

Really? The Ovi Store is pathetic, and even though they have improved a bit recently it comes nowhere close to the other platforms. Casual games are very important, Ovi has less to offer than the nascent Windows Marketplace.

I am among the few who think this is better for Nokia, given the alternative. Nokia is a hardware company. They don't do great software, and they just accepted that fact.

Btw, they might have a gotten a good deal with Microsoft too, given the situation MS itself is in. WP7 is a great OS, and the collaboration with Nokia could see it appearing on cheaper devices. Nokia is famous for making affordable devices that can survive a drop or two. In fact, I know many people who WANT a Nokia with a decent OS.
It seems to me that the problem is one of focus, and branding.

To put it bluntly: who in their right mind would want to read essays by undergrads? Even when I was an undergrad, that's not where my interest was. I wanted to read insightful, thought-provoking, well-researched articles. If those happened to be written by undergrads, well, that was incidental.

So, my suggestion: rename the Journal as "The New England Journal of International Relations" (or some such), and kill the "undergraduate" angle.
Falling Off The Ladder: How Not To Succeed In Academia
Clickable link: http://www.thesjia.net

A few months ago, a site called Feedback Roulette (http://feedbackroulette.com/) was discussed here. You may want to submit your site there for some additional feedback into what can be improved on your site.
I am right there with you. I now exactly what you are talking about. Every time I hear someone dismiss it, they dismiss out of ignorance. I've never heard otherwise, even from some otherwise smart people.
Tumblr. I remember first posts around my online social circle mentioning this easy, simple blogging platform, and lots of people including me started using it right away. I'm still a big fan and use it in lots of different ways.

Posterous. Here the first thoughts were different and it didn't kick in among most of my friends. I used it for some time as an experiment and got to know it quite well, but somehow I didn't enjoy it too much, now I know I'll be using this platform for some projects soon.

Flickr. I wasn't much into photography back then, but my mates who were active photogs got crazy about it. At first I really didn't like it, partly because of the early UI/UX, partly because I wasn't really sure about the idea of hosting pics 'out there' and didn't like the ToS. After a few years, when I got into photography as a hobby, started using it right away (exploring and sharing) and I do it actively to this day.

Youtube.

Lots of local companies, which are probably irrelevant to most of the HN crowd, but I'll mention some anyway: gadu-gadu (from a simple sms gate app to being THE instant messenger in Poland completely killing ICQ here), grono.net (first leading social network), nasza-klasa (classmates social network), wykop.pl (digg clone).
From the front page, I clicked on "Discussion Points", then on the top speech bubble. I got the error message "error-id, yes."

The papers only being in PDF does not appeal to me, but you know your target market better than I.
Uhh wow, another very beautiful walled garden?

Ignore.
That looks super-useful, thanks!
All spacecraft and even regular aircraft use computers to make critical flight decisions faster than humans can. That is not artificial intelligence, and neither is what the article describes.

It actually is considered "artificial intelligence" according to a strict definition of the term. This would be a kind of weak AI called an "expert system".

The article is about extending this system beyond traditional expert systems by allowing greater environmental feedback to influence future automatic decision making. Still firmly in the weak AI sphere, but exciting nonetheless.

Many journalists are guilty of leaping right into the Hal 9000 strong AI angle and then sensationalizing the dangers of strong AI run amok. I thought this article did a good job of not going too overboard, although Hal got the obligatory mention.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strong_AI_vs._weak_AI
You are right, but I thought the article was interesting in its own right, as it gives at least some idea of the sorts of systems currently in use and development.

It's obviously not really AI, but the problem is that you can't get anything covered by the press without the huge hyperbole.
Remove the non-profit status (i.e. make 'em for-profit) of all educational institutions and the problem will sort itself out within a generation.
Motorola Xoom up for pre-order at Best Buy this Thursday... for $1,199
Seems to me there should be longer delay periods on bonus payments of that scale. Granted, I'm not living in that stratosphere, but ... yeah, as someone else said, if I could leave after 1 year (to the day) with an additional 1.8 million for no more work, or stay (and commute) for less than half that... why would you? The 1.8 could have been there for 'time on job' of, say, 3 years, or 5. Or pro-rated to the time spent on the job?

This reminds me a bit of the 'bankers' on wall street a couple years ago. "But if we don't offer sweet deals like these, this top talent won't come work for us!". Do you really want to incentivize 'top talent' to leave on day 366 (or, in wall street's case, take massive risks)?
Find an Angel Investor, Without Going Through Hell
Whoops! I fixed that error in Discussion Points. Thanks for catching it...

That's a good point, perhaps I can provide an alternative HTML+CSS option to display them in so it's kept in the browser. Journal articles are typically PDF and students are used to dealing with them, hence it was my default option. I'll investigate alternatives though...

Thanks for the feedback! :)
Quick Help for the Rent vs. Buy Decision via Trulia
Chronon "time-travelling Java debugger" beta now available for download
Perhaps an exciting first step to retrieving all of the human remains and the litter that's accumulated on the ascent over the years? Clean up the joint a bit?
It all starts with the heading:

The font makes it really hard to read. I actually have to concentrate to find out what is written in the heading.

And honestly, I wanted to stop reading after the first paragraph:

An ad hoc (ok?) perpetually (uhm...) published online journal of publication-worthy (oh dear...) essays written by a global community of (egotistical) (omg...) undergraduate International Relations students (wtf..) to act as a platform for the dissemination of and discourse on (what?!) ...

I mean, the writing is good. But not for web pages. And especially not for the first paragraph. There are so many foreign words in this, that it seems like you just tried to link as many words together as you can.

Simplify this first paragraph! Make it less "complex".

Also the paper listings all look the same. The image caught my attention at first, but then I realized that every paper has that image. Why is it so big, then, if I can't use it do distinguish the papers?

There is also nowhere mentioned what benefits I get when registering.

The site does look pretty simple, but I think this is too simple. There should be at least some structuring elements and something to make the papers more appealing.

Besides that it is an interesting idea though. After reading the topics they quite caught my attention :)
Unpacking the Lander and preparing for a hike on Mars
a government campaign to poison the elderly and chronic pain patients

the war on drugs is responsible for vastly more deaths than the holocaust

drug addiction has nothing to do with the molecule

The above are things I do not come to this site hoping to read. These statements are not only false, but false in a particularly childish, self-righteous way. To affirm them demands an incredible misreading, or misinterpretation of the facts.

I find your interpretation of Alex3917's posts remarkably generous. It's not a "strawman" if the argument is actually being stated. I do not have the psychic powers to try and make sense of someone's scientific beliefs--if he has any that are scientific--based on a link and a semantically invalid sentence. I do not have the patience to scientifically debate someone who cannot make himself understood, who has no sense of what facts are relevant. And I do not have the generosity to take such infantile writing and divine from it some hints of reason, as you have.

I understand your distaste for insult, but I think there is a place for calling out nonsense for what it is. This discussion which you so dislike would have not gotten so far were it not for upvotes and support directed at this garbage. You cannot, if you value thought, defend such noise pollution on a website that is ostensibly for discussion.
I agree that programmers have been relatively economically protected. There's still wisdom saving money.

Perhaps the crime factor makes Detroit a tough sell (or the snow for some).

There must be another city in the throes of economic upheaval to choose.

My thoughts are that affordable housing + a few brave companies will bring other companies, talent and VC's.
- The papers in PDF is an interaction killer (you are increasing friction)

- You have basically no content right now: 5 PDFs and the discussion is low quality.

Fix those two problems and you might get something. If the place feels empty (as it does now), people will never come back. There is no reason whatsoever for people to create an account right now.
What is the future of Qt?
Also, read this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2212609
ok, that's better, having some investment and you both being programmers will be easier to sell your idea to potential cofounders. I would say best is to find another co-founder that is willing to take only shares more than 10%, up to 25% would be reasonable if he's good. A sign that he is good would be that he will have good ideas on how to go on from where you are, that is how to best spend your 10k, until the next round of investment. So go out interview potential cofounders with one of the question being this one.
That's a fair point: the idea of it being a "Journal" isn't so much that it's Nature or Foreign Affairs or anything carrying such weight, more that it's a collection of well-written essays that cover topics that undergraduate students of IR typically cover so they can turn to them for inspiration, ideas and as revision material...

It's kind of like a synopsis of a lot of "insightful, thought-provoking, well-researched articles" as that's what undergraduate essays tend to be, rather than necessarily outstanding works of original thought.

It's an option to consider though and I'll definitely look into it...

Thank you for your feedback! :)
From six hours ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2212320
Ask HN: Are you applying Startup Metrics for Pirates (AARRR) today?
I'm wondering if anyone is doing this at their startup and willing to share how they are implementing, their experiences with doing so, etc. Interested to hear what others are doing here. Thanks!
As any teaching assistant could inform you, nobody wants to read essays by undergraduates. Nobody wants to read international relations essays by undergraduates. No undergraduates studying international relations want to spend their spare time writing essays that nobody will read. Nobody wants to write essays and then have them distributed as PDF files with little sense of ownership.

Let's look at what you see when visiting the site.

Abstract: "An analysis into the genesis and development of Cosmopolitan Thinking and to what degree it can cope with the realisation of its desired World Order as the very mechanisms it sought come to strangle its progress."
Word Count: ...

And right from the opening copy (which you quoted) the site markets itself as a celebration of being long, verbose, and obscure.

If undergraduates want to egotistically talk about international relations they can go to the inevitable debate section of virtually any phpBB forum. They're bound to find more vibrant, better-written, and better-argued essaying there.
Microsoft has much tighter controls on their ecosystem than Google. If Nokia choose Android as it's platform of choice they would inevitable be compared a sea of cheap Android phones. Cheap WP7 phones don't exist. Microsoft has minimum specs phones must meet to use WP7. Nokia's arrangement with Microsoft probably allows them to be the only phone manufacturer that can dip into the value segment with WP7.

There is also short-term benefits for Nokia choosing Microsoft, like dedicated engineering resources from MS and money put toward marketing the OS.
I'm afraid to say something like this, but some linkspam/scraper sites are verging on looking almost useful.

I was trying to Google references to Greek Playwright Aristophanes' use of fart jokes (yes, seriously I was looking for that) and I came across this linkspam page:

http://wn.com/2934_Aristophanes (seems to have dropped in Google ranking)

For one thing, this site doesn't offend my eyes. It doesn't immediately insult my intellect, either. After the first second, though, it still proves to be just as useless.

In a way, what Cuil was trying to do was to apply enough AI to make an actually very useful scraper site. What would the world be like if such sites actually existed?

http://wn.com/linkspam

(Seems like the site is just trawling through my cookies to make guesses about what I'd like.)
Snow is a personal preference. Boston and Detroit are comparable in terms of snowfall, the difference being there are umpteen ski resorts within a three hour drive of Boston.

I like the OP's Utopian vision for resurrecting Detroit, I had a similar idea related to other manufacturing ventures. The infrastructure should mostly still be in tact. The only thing that is missing is the industry. The perfect fit to me is the green energy industry (solar, wind manufacturing). It's the perfect opportunity to get Detroit back on it's feet, and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Throw in a tax break that both sides of the isle can live with, and there would be virtually no opposition.
Interesting. The use of the word "variant" on Wikipedia misled me.
On Search and spoiled bloggers
I half agree with you. We are working at a much higher level of abstraction these days and the skills required have changed, but I don't think its any easier.

Part of my electronics degree (in the early 90's) involved programming a controller in hex through a 18 key keypad. Not quite card punching, but the screen display was just 2 characters. There was no editing - you had to start from scratch if you made a typo. It might sound a bit geek-macho but actually it wasn't difficult - just awkward. And you didn't need to worry about which text editor you used, whether the source control plugin was compatible - you just worked with what you had.

In the 80's it was still possible to thoroughly understand the electronics, the assembly language AND write your own programs in C.

Now, a web developer has to understand networks, databases, multi-tier architecture, ui design (not to mention the complex dev tools). It's still a big spread, but each of the fields is much deeper so we have to make do with a working knowledge in all these areas rather than "complete" knowledge.

Today's graduates probably dabbled at high school with web page design, photoshop, powerpoint and spreadsheets at high school rather than circuit boards and assembly.
You know, I bet a good year for Nokia would mean a bonus worth way more than his MS stock.
Next-gen social network on the iPhone. Available for beta distribution.
Fingerprints on touch interface as interaction pattern
Okay, there generally seems to be a feeling of anti-PDF sentiment so I'll look into providing just a standard HTML+CSS page as an alternative. (To note though, almost every academic article is provided as a PDF directly by Journals or through repositories like JSTOR).

It's kind of the chicken and egg problem: there's no content because they're no users, and they're no users because there's no content. I'll try and "force" a few friends on to drum up everything up a little and increase the excitement of the site.

Also, thanks for the link!

Cheers,
--x03.
Well, the question I find myself asking about this is, "why do I want to read essays about international affairs"? The answers boil down to:

1. Author has a unique personal perspective (background knowledge, historical insight, whatever).

2. Essay has a striking thesis, and defends it well.

3. Author is a big shot, and it's useful to know what they think.

There's undergraduate work that meets criteria (1) and (2) --- but it's rare, and effectively lost amid the ton more than that that doesn't. To attract repeat business, you've got to attract the good stuff, and establish filters which separate it out. Around here, the problem of attracting the content is called the "chicken-and-egg problem", and Google will turn up some discussion.

Two further thoughts: First off, the pointers to the essays should state a thesis. As I write, the top one analyzes "the cause of piracy and the solutions available to the International Community ... using several concepts that are relevant to the failed state of Somalia ...". OK, fine (prolixity aside). He's talking about Somalian piracy. What does he have to say about it? If I don't know, I'm moving on.

Also, if you're trying to convince people your essayists' stuff is worth reading, there might be a better pitch than "undergraduate"; even "young" might work better.
What this really means, is that Google should eliminate the middleman. Google shouldn't fight content farms. It should become the unstoppable juggernaut among content farms and do this by being actually useful and creating pages with value.
In response to: "Microsoft will continue to invest in the development of Windows Phone and cloud services so customers can do more with their phone, across their work and personal lives."

I liked this part...
Translation: Microsoft swears not to pull a Kin. ForSure.
Marcel Dicke: Why not eat insects?
How do you propose solving the problem of helping people find what they are searching for if it doesn't involve a search engine?

As long as there are search engines, there will be algorithms that people try to game. And as long as people need help finding things, there will be search engines. It seems the only way around this would be to remove the ability to make money on the Internet.
You deserved whatever you can get, but you should only get up to the value you provide.
Talent. Diversify. Community. Future. Ideas. Good will. Open source. Innovation.
I didn't realise that introductory paragraph was such a barrier -- I'll look into getting that amended. As for the images, you're right: they're too same-same and identical, it was just meant to provide something other than text-text-text though.

I appreciate all your points and I'll look into them!
Detroit: High crime, cold weather, ridiculous tax structure inside city limits, no outdoor activities... just pick some podunk town in Texas, you'll be better off all around.
How often is money made with normal people that are difficult to get along with? If it is the same as normal + easygoing (i.e. rarely), then the defining characteristic would seem to be brilliance (according to the referenced quadrant chart).

Perhaps, however, it is more likely that a brilliant entrepreneur is difficult as opposed to easygoing, so the article's point of needing to get along with difficult people makes sense in that aspect. Do VC's & angels in general find that correlation to hold true?
Other than the fact that if nobody lives in Detroit and nobody wants to live in Detroit, the last place we should want industry is Detroit. What makes sense is for industry to be built where people want to live. That apparently means not Michigan, and generally, not in the north. (Migration in the U.S. goes generally from the north to the south.)

Claims about the infrastructure are unconvincing. If the infrastructure is sufficiently intact and if that's an actual plus so that it's worth starting a business there, then businesses would be started there. Or is the market being inefficient, and you with your oh-so-wise opinion of how things should be know better than the people who would stand to make money off of being right about your suppositions?

Here's a better idea: Let's help Cambodia get back on its feet by subsidizing its industry, they would benefit more per dollar than people living in Michigan.