skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Ask HN: Average time to receive a reply to a Y Combinator application?
I was just wondering how long does it take for Y Combinator to review applications.

I am sure they are very busy and it is not easy to choose which startup you want to accept. I just wanted to know how long does it take to receive a reply or a question in your account?

Are rejection letters given right after they review your application or after they are done the application deadline?

Gracias
There Are No Rules in Customer Development
The website isn't the problem.

Focus is the problem.

You do a wide variety of stuff. How can you be an amazing expert in all of them? You can't.

Do one thing. Be amazing at that one thing.

/Phil.
Your network is probably the most valuable thing to have as a consultant. Work on that at all times. Go where potential clients and partners go, and go there often. Spend the money on it if you have to, it is worth it. See it as another form of marketing.

It seems like you're taking a shotgun approach on the site regarding services. Don't spread yourself thin. Focus on a small number of services and providing things like quality and value for money in order to attract clients initially - then seek out other opportunities.

Lastly, mention any good previous clients on your site.
Wait now, hold on a minute. I thought people have been saying that Flash on the Android was horribly slow.
They actually have pretty mediocre uptime, too. Good for a cheap dev box, not so great for production stuff.
A good place to start would be Barry's blog: http://barry.wordpress.com/

Hes not updated it in quite awhile though.
> raises the bar for getting into your server slightly,

Talking about bots/viruses/script kiddies and not targeted attacks. 18,000 to 5 is not what I would call slightly. In fact I would call it 4 orders of magnitude greater. Extremely greater.
Yeah, I forgot how big that market is. My bad.

Seriously though, if you were building this site, I'd suggest you'd probably worry a lot more about how it looks on an iPad than a WinXP box running IE6.

The site I work on doesn't even cater to early-adopters the way the Nissan site should, and we have lots more iPad / iPhone / Android traffic than IE6 these days. (And I mean each individually, not in aggregate.)
Wait, so Twitter support did that? I guess they can but it seems slightly sleezy.
Yes, of course. New and all that.
It's interesting to see if a crypto-economy emerge. If a vibrant black market succeed, the Diamond Age world just might be possible.
This is another good resource for similar content. http://academicearth.org/
Summary: Software has no glitches, they are just there (and users are accustomed to them) because the process and the organisation around the software is not sane.

I share the pessimism - I've seen such things even in the smaller scale.

CS grads come to the interview (for a thesis) and say, well I'll design the system and write a spec, but I won't touch code (meaning I don't know what, maybe 'I'm no idiot' or the like).

I saw a PhD design a knowledge representation system and asking me (no PhD) where is the button in eclipse to run the code - ten lines of an API example from the docs (give me teh codez, eh?).

And I just learned that the official software development model for Germany's federal institutions is a modified V-model: I counted around 30-40 steps (excluding the artifacts) and just one read: "Coding the system". I laughed from the heart. Now imagine replacing this step with "Go for a walk" and the whole project, well, what would it be? Failed? Incomplete? I don't know.

In short: Organisations, as Nietzsche put it, are much more childish and immature as individuals. (Corporate) software development as a relatively new engineering discipline will have long years of struggle to come. Keep your heads up (and sane)!
It might help to look not at languages, but at attributes of languages. For example, garbage collection has gone from an expensive feature in "advanced" languages to something used in almost every programming language. This is compelling evidence that garbage collection is, in general, a good thing.

Or how about the idea of having special syntax for some common data types, like lists and dictionaries and (sometimes) sets? This kind of thing is spreading and becoming more popular, because it really does seem to make people's jobs easier.

Some more up-and-coming language attributes include type annotations, more immutability by default, and Erlang-style message passing concurrency. And maybe support for asynchronous I/O, either with JavaScript-style anonymous functions or with coroutines. Some of these things really can make certain programming tasks dramatically easier.

The religious arguments tend to be anchored to languages, but there's some real information if you look past that to a deeper level.
This is what MS said on the issue (from Wikipedia):

"With the release of IE6 Service Pack 1 in 2003, Microsoft announced that future upgrades to Internet Explorer would come only through future upgrades to Windows, stating that "further improvements to IE will require enhancements to the underlying OS."

I think Vista messed up their plan. It doesn't sound like they just thought they were done. At least that was what they said in 2003. Now maybe you're saying internally something else was happening, but I hadn't heard that before.

Apparently in 2005 they then announced that they needed to do an out of band release for security.
true, but thats the whole point. You rarely need something other than emacs ;)
I read it back and realised I misunderstood what you meant, understanding it as being about the "magical moments" what you said makes sense, I was looking it as you meant caring about what all users want, not what individuals with support requests get. In hindsight I have no idea how I came to that conclusion, the previous section makes it clear :-)
"Instead of sending each other interesting articles, they could just see what the other person was looking at and start their discussion there"

Isn't that what Delicious was? (http://www.delicious.com/) "Keep, share, and discover the best of the Web using Delicious, the world's leading social bookmarking service."

So instead of saving the good articles you find to share with your friends, you are going to save the whole process of looking at the non interesting stuff and then finally showing your friends the good articles? I personally like it when a friend of mine sends me a link to a news hacker article or anything else instead of telling me the process of how they got to the end result.
Would imagine that one of (possibly the only?) violation for UberTwitter is the trademark violation. They had already been forced to use @UberTwiter (without the double 't') for this reason.

Sucks from a user's point of view, UberTwitter is by far the best client for Blackberry, SO much better than Twitter's frankly terrible official app.
Even though its counter intuitive tax cuts work, but they have to be the right kind. All these credits, temporary cuts, refunds don't do anything. Its the flat rate lowering and tax simplifications that increase growth and revenue because it alters long term behavior. A great recent example is Egypt, they lowered their rate from 40% to 20% and doubled revenue while standard forecasting said it would be cut in half. Other example are abound throughout the former Soviet Bloc, you lower/simplify taxes you get more revenue.

In the US we spend more money complying and avoiding taxes then actually do on the taxes themselves. Think about that. If you look at US government tax revenue it's always about 18% of GDP no matter the tax rate. (Look it up, its really interesting it's called Hauser's Law) So the only way the increase revenue is to grow the economy and the highest correlation to economic growth is how many billion dollar companies an economy produces each year. So everything the government does should be centered around freeing start-ups to become billion dollar companies. That means simplified regulation and the removal of corporate welfare, both protect large companies from smaller start-ups.
Clickable: http://ana.im/

On your 'services' page, the 2nd headline reads:

What Were Really Made Of

Shouldn't it be: What We're Really Made Of ?

HTH
Number of clueless script kiddies far, far, far outweigh number of determined people after my particular server.

Reducing risk of actual threats == security.

Dogma, let it go.
70% of something is better than 100% of nothing.

100% of nothing is preferable to 70% of "something", if it costs you 90% of "something" to deliver the service, and "something" is already the maximum price the market will bear (and Apple will not allow you to increase the "something" only on iOS to compensate for their demands anyway).
The videos on that site stutter a lot for me. Probably the fact that I'm on an ancient laptop.

:(
I'll be damned if I have to start listening to my daughter interrupt my technical conference calls with "you know, you guys could have this already done with a few lines of ruby"
Why the Kindle is No iPod [2007]
Straw man argument about the lazy people who sleep all day. Your smug sarcasm and attitude is also not appreciated. You sound like a child.

Facebook employs less than 3000 people. Apple less than 50k. The underemployment rate in the US is over 15%. That's millions and millions of people without work. Is John Doerr single handedly going to put all these people to work?

How about Obama talk to a group of executives from mid-cap or small-cap private and publicly traded companies run by not-any-less real business people who employ MILLIONS of people on a daily basis?

This billionaire hero worship is just so over the top and short sighted. The real economy of everyday goods and services is SO much bigger and just as important than consumer devices and social networking.
Just hide it with a userscript - the element ID is "posterous_footerbar".
If we're going to believe this website, looks like Apple will let you keep $3 more per $100 than PayPal and $11.50 more than credit card processors, assuming a $1 subscription fee like The Daily's:

http://feefighters.com/paypal-calculator

Maybe regulators should probe those guys.

(Credit to @schwa on this one: https://twitter.com/#!/schwa/status/38676753316708352 )
You do get a lifetime discount after that time is up (or at least you did when I signed up).
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.cloudspace.com/...
WTF: How long before Zynga becomes the most valuable video game company?
Well said sir, well said.
Yes. Apparently if you keep trying to make api calls with a banned app they keep feeding you these tweets.
I signed up for hosting from these guys about a year ago and have been pretty satisfied. The service just works, and the support I get has been great. Granted, I'm just running a simple little personal site. It's nothing of critical importance or anything.
After the exit... Lamborghini Aventador: 350 Kph beast
> Port obscurity is pointless when there's much better ways to secure your host.

Good security is layered. This reduces attacks. Reducing attacks is better. Changing port is better than not changing port.

And most people posting here obviously didn't read the article because it clearly stated this was in addition to all the other security measures you put into ssh.
Apple dominates app market, Android trails far behind « The Orange View
Ask HN: Applications for IBM's Watson?
Example: Wikipedia.

I can imagine Watson being used to accelerate the curation of content. For an assertion that [needs citation] a system like Watson can present possible supporting evidence, ranked by confidence scores.

Can you think of others?
The heavily statistical techniques used in Watson won't turn into a strong AI just by throwing more computing power at them, any more than I can turn into a horse by walking on my hands and knees while snorting periodically.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/13863110/The-Unreasonable-Effectiv...

(Wow, that analogy ended up a little more disturbing than I'd intended.)
I'm particularly interested in this claim:

"For the Kindle to be the "iPod of reading," it would have had to have been preceded by a "Napster of reading." And, of course, it wasn't. Which probably tells you something about the difference between songs and stories."

Is there anything intrinsic about books that makes a "napster of reading" impossible? The only reason I can think of is that reading a book is harder than listening to an album.
Is there any reference for the reasoning behind error-ing on the standard for loop?
(interviewer here)

The context right before he said that was that platforms are the interesting things, not languages. He's a Python user at work so he's getting his daily dose, but mixes things up at home.

He then goes on to say some of the quoted stuff about punctuation/structure. I took it as programming languages in general aren't an interesting topic to him, but Python caught his eye and actually interested him for the educational value.

Zed can obviously speak to that better than I. I just pretend I know how to interview and write :)
I've got one problem, but I haven't really figured out how it fits in exactly.

Assuming a lot of things in how this plays out, I don't find it terribly unlikely that some subscription services will have to raise their rates to maintain a profit. Maybe not a big problem for iOS users, since they get the benefit of using the app store for purchases.

What about non-iOS users? I subscribe to Netflix, but I don't use any apple products to access that subscription. According to Apple's rules, Netflix can't have the subscription available at different prices, and so my price goes up because of Apple's policy.

There may be some ways around this, like Netflix offering two plans - one that includes iOS use, one that doesn't - without hiking the latter. But they might not.

I haven't yet worked out what the "fairness" of this all is. As a consumer, I certainly don't feel that I am entitled to never having price hikes, and I realize at the same time that some of the money from products I pay for is used to support products that I don't pay for. But this feels wrong to me - maybe it's just the directness of it. Apple says "pay more" and even people who don't buy Apple products have to pay more.
Batman for Wallstreet criminals?
Provides additional context for the antitrust review of Apple's subscription plan. May be the $2.2 billion app market that's under scrutiny, not tablets.
The erroneous assumption is that HN was special to begin with...
If you meet Sundays, I could drive over from Houston.
Why do companies keep thinking I want to share innately private things, like my browser history or credit card transactions (Blippy)?
So they are just like all the other tracking and analytics products like toolbars & alexa with the added advantage of having no restrictions on what details you sell on (after all, it's all public) and that it is directly identifiable (since that is all publicly available as well).

And people want to sign up for services like this because they can brag about something like their sitescore(tm)? "The Sitescore reveals the web's real trailblazers. get points for discovering and spreading cool new things online."

I understand that I'm in the minority here, but I just don't get it.

EDIT: Also isn't this a rather poor value proposition? I click on a fair amount of poor content that I wouldn't recommend. I'm fairly sure that in my youtube lifetime more than 50% of the videos I've seen would get a "I would not recommend this video to anyone" checkbox filled in. It doesn't sound like any of these services can differentiate a bit between a link bait blackhat SEO autoblog I bounce from in 120ms and a deep paper that changes my outlook on life. This is why all the other services have voting...

If adwords tricks 6 of my friends into clicking on an ad for a for profit college is that prima facie evidence that I would like to click on it as well? What did mom say about jumping off a bridge?
this is exactly it. the problem with the rules is that apple requires any app that makes money outside of the app to also give apple a way to skim. Apple could of course just enforce this for the apps that they are direct competitors with, but that seems like an even bigger issue.

I just thought of some other things that would be effected:
google apps for business, any app that google distribs would need the option for in app payment.

this is 3.3.1 all over again.
Would the real Commander X please stand up
Is it opensource? Can you also provide a link to the source code?

Is it an RDBMS or a NoSQL? How can I download and use your DB?
Note that this article is targeted at brands and not startups. If your objective is conversions instead of engagement, Facebook marketing can work very well.
Here's the part where Apple argues that the iPad is part of the PC market, and thus represents < 1%. No antitrust.
> Do I understand correctly that, merely by initiating the subscription from within an app running on iOS, that Apple is becomes entitled to 30% for all deliveries made on said subscription?

Yes.

> Is your only other choice then, within your app, to say, "please type this URL into your PC's web browser to subscribe..."?

You don't even have that choice. If you offer a subscription via the web, you must also offer the subscription, at the same price or better, through the app. They'll reject you if you don't. And they'll reject you if you even so much as hint that there's a way to subscribe outside the app that won't cost you 30% of your revenue.
The problem is that YOU're going to end up paying an additional 30% of the price. Don't be fooled...those companies at the other end of the subscription will pass that 30% straight to you.....
And paying the bandits on the highway was the cost of doing business if you wanted to run your trade caravan through the forrest.

I love my Apple products. I'm in awe at what the company has accomplished over the last decade. That doesn't mean they can do no wrong and their decisions can't be questioned.

I'm not talking about the cost of doing business here. I'm talking about the cost of being a customer here and the potential cost I might be forced to take, even if I decide not to be a customer any longer. If Netflix raises its prices across the board so they can stay in the garden, then it doesn't matter whether I accept Apple's rules or not: the prices are raised across the board.
Once again, Apple is underestimating the average consumer's willingness to take the path of least resistance. Apple became very niche for graphics & layout artists back in the day and lost a market they could have owned. By trying to hold its customers hostage, they enabled IBM & Microsoft to become household names and the Apple name was "that other kind." They came back because they innovate, but innovation only stays innovative for so long.

They need to distinguish better between their "average Joe" and their "power user" products & strategies because "power user" products will sooner or later become "average Joe" products.

If they wish to limit themselves to a niche market then this move makes perfect sense. If they want volume and to continue market domination, they're repeating history and, regardless of how smart their executives are, I don't think they can pull if off because we don't live in that kind of a world.

I've been wanting an iPad and iPhone like you couldn't believe. But I'm patient and they made me nervous with their exclusive AT&T arrangement so I wanted to see what their next move was. I've been enjoying my Android phone very much. Looks like I'll be doing the same with whichever non-Apple tablet I choose. Too bad.
Something mysterious about being transparent I guess. I feel that there is a lot emphasis on "show the world everything and let the community reward you/scold you on your actions" type of mentality with these sort of services that entices some people.
That looks awesome, unfortunately I'm working on a Windows box. :(
Sundays would work for me, hopefully we can get more involved if this is not going on already.
Fair enough regarding making the port harder to find, but I hope it's not your only countermeasure.
Don't forget the government role--even if the media simply reported what Secretary LaHood said the coverage would have been over the top.
Taken in aggregate, I agree.

But take a look at this reddit, for instance: http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/

There are deep ends to this very big pool that is reddit. Plenty of kiddy-sections, too, where the water is warm and attention spans are short.

e.g., Free endorphins! http://aww.reddit.com
Word on the street is that those clients may have been doing some sketchy things ("changing tweets to monetize... privacy issues with DMs"):

http://twitter.com/#!/marshallk/status/38679317034565632
In case you missed it, there was more discussion about Ruby4Kids here:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2158231
Do bullies get more sex? Well Yes, and this doesn’t depend on the gender
the majority of adolescent victims of peer aggression are abused by same-gender peers; that is 85% of victimization is directed towards same-sex peers indicating an arms race intra-sexual competition that evolved in both males and females.
You are getting downvoted for being so strident about something that comes pretty close to contradicting the site guidelines. It is not in fact true that popularity controls what stories are germane to HN.

I think you may think this nerdy Glass Bead Game of connecting the dots between arbitrary subjects and "entrepreneurship" is a compelling argument, but some of us have been here for many years and have seen too many different subjects --- Egypt! the TSA! Unionization! Ron Paul! The War! Red light cameras! Gitmo! Fighting in middle school! Peak oil! Corporatism vs capitalism! Apple murdering the web! Taxation! Censorship on Twitter! Global warming! Homophobia! † -- justified this way.

When you write a comment that acts shocked-shocked! that anyone would question your judgement about exactly how strongly connected a topic is to HN, you run the risk of making people feel like their intelligence is being insulted.

Keep something else in mind. There are people who vote on the front page. There are people who comment. There are people who vote on comments. Some of these groups overlap, but they aren't the same. Most HN'ers would probably agree that the latter two groups are responsible for the site's character more than the former. Which is a long way of saying: nobody's too impressed with the score on this article.

Next time you start feeling the outrage welling up in you about how people are bitching and sniping about stories that most people on HN seem to like, keep in mind: Paul Graham has been having to punch in manual filters to suppress some of the most "popular" stories on HN. He did it for Egypt and he did it for the TSA. The way you want to believe this site works is not how the site currently works. Thankfully.

† Take a guess how I came up with that list.

PS: Because you have a software security background, I'm atypically interested in finding out a little more about you. I'm also a fast reader. It may interest you to know that fully half of the top 10 pages of your best-ranked comments here are political, and that's not counting your takes on DRM or how "bubbly" the startup scene is. Everyone wants HN to spend time covering their favorite issues. I'd love to spend more time talking about cooking and whiskey.
Sure, the more the merrier, and I figure if you can bring a victim or two that'd be good as well.
Is it against the rules to offer a different service to iOS devices than you do to Android, Web and/or PC users? For example, maybe Netflix could make "Netflix Premium" available on iOS devices, and charge $12/mo instead of $9/mo, covering Apple's 30% cut.

I'm sure this has been considered, but I'm not seeing where exactly.
I don't disagree. The question, I think, is whether or not regulatory agencies will force Apple to re-tool their terms. That will depend on whether or not Apple is found to have a dominant position in "the market". No one has defined "the market" yet though.