skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
We went through several different iterations of the line charts. Initially, I tried using SVG via Raphael, but it turned out to be too slow. Because it's possible to have a significant number of data points, manipulating and changing the SVG markup was causing too much of a it.

Eventually we settled on using Flot, which is a canvas-based charting solution. We made some changes to the core Flot code with some plugins to do things like change line color and fill on hover, but overall vanilla Flot served 90% of our needs.

Because Canvas is essentially a bitmap, number of data points have much less impact on the drawing layer.

Of note, we still use Raphael for pie charts, because, well, they look better and aren't affected by mass data point numbers.
"Markets can remain irrational a lot longer than you and I can remain solvent." Seeing a company get itself into severe trouble doesn't guarantee any particular effect on its share price, because the only connection between the two is investors' faith that some connection ought to exist. Shorts are betting not only when the price will drop but that no manipulation will occur at that time, and when a company is "too big to fail" and will attract government intervention it's exceptionally risky.
Whatever you do get an IP lawyer involved to make sure you're not muddying ownership. Negotiate to have them sign whatever waivers/agreements your lawyer recommends.
Doesn't it "bloat" the language though?
Plea HN: Help pay my rent with just two mouse clicks.
Hey guys.

I'm a student at USC. My housing provider is holding a video contest which, if I win, would cover my rent till the end of the semester. The winning video is the one with the most number of Likes. I have 2 so far, and need roughly 600 to win.

I - and in fact, my family - would be ineffably grateful to you all if you could take just 36 seconds, and:

1) Go here: http://www.facebook.com/pages/First-Choice-Housing/105565153599

2) Like the page. (You need to Like the page before you can Like a video on the page.)

3) Like the video title "Gabriel Audick's Video entry…"

If any of you need a place to stay for a night or two near USC, HNers are always welcome.
As a group you have more leverage purchasing pretty much any service. I wonder what it would take to put together a group buy app for health insurance.
I can give you one perspective. Moral hazard and fairness.

The vast majority of costs borne by and in the US healthcare system are the results of overeating, oversmoking, and underexercising. Period. Heart disease, many forms of cancer, diabetes, most forms of pancreatic, gallbladder, and adrenal conditions, are largely the result of personal choice.

Setting aside for a moment the fact that congenital defects, hereditary disorders, infections, and accidents are no fault of the victim/patient, it should be important to note that a system that REQUIRES those who take care of their health by eating and exercising properly to subsidize the consequences of the choices of those who do not, is taken by many Americans to be fundamentally unfair.

If legislative initiative were taken to find a way to exclude universal coverage of lifestyle diseases, while still permitting universal coverage of non-lifestyle conditions, many people would not have such a viscerally negative reaction to the notion of universal health care.
In the UK, or anywhere else in Europe, or Canada - or pretty much any other capitalist country - you can leave your job for a better paying one or to start your own wealth creating business. This allows the country to maximize the value of your labor.

In the US you can't leave your job to start your own business because your children might get sick and die. Even leaving for another employer is tricky because there is often a 6-12month gap before the new health coverage kicks in and anything you had treated in the past (like a broken leg in a childhood cycling accident) becomes a pre-existing condition and the new place denies you coverage.

This very effectively reduces wage costs since the whole 'importing people from africa' thing was banned.
"Whatever you tax, you get less of."
-- Alan Greenspan

What Apple is doing could easily be compared to a tax. I don't see how anyone could expect to not see a significant number of apps and developers leaving the app store when presented with a 30% loss of revenue from the customers it generates.
Clickable: http://www.facebook.com/pages/First-Choice-Housing/105565153...
> It sure seems like if entire cultures practice it, there must be something to it.

See also clitoral circumcision, death penalty for apostasy and homosexuality, and other popular cultural practices. There are many things that are widely believed and not true.
The claimed benefits of meditation should be available to scientific scrutiny, so we can actually know one way or the other. No need for faith or appeal to common practice.
What explains the rapid and sustained rise in costs?

Health care might have cost thirty years ago but not the same degree.

Further, Health care is approaching twenty percent of GDP where once is was less than five. Wouldn't that be large factor in costs? And doesn't that seem a tad less than necessary?
Yes, Gruber's position is hardly surprising, though. He writes that blog specifically to Apple fans who want to be told everday that the company they are rooting for is cooler and better. He's playing to his audience. His sponsors are software, services which run on Apple platform.

I'll be curious if he's really drinking the kool-aid* or feels that Apple is fault but has to defend them due to the nature of his job.

*pardon the cliche
Accomplishments of the financial industry today:

Businesses have far more tools to hedge various risks (FX, commodities, etc) - thanks to the financial sector, Apple is in no danger of dying should the RMB spike.

Retail investors are capable of trading for $8 or less, and the bid/ask spread has lowered significantly.

It's now drastically easier for retailers to sell goods on credit, and it's vastly easier for customers to pay electronically. 10-15 years ago, you couldn't swipe your ATM/credit card at the grocery store.

ETFs are undercutting mutual/index funds, drastically reducing the cost of saving for retirement.

Structured products allow far more people to trade with each other than ever before.

Microfinance [1] is available to lower income people, albeit with relatively high default premiums. (Admittedly, many people criticize this.)

It's not necessarily running better - there have been harmful changes as well. The Intel IPO could no longer happen today, for instance, and in the future far more companies to go public Facebook style than Intel style. But that doesn't change the fact that the financial industry has accomplished a lot.

(Of course, I'm not denying that they also rent seek.)

[1] Maybe "minifinance" is the appropriate term. Payday loans tend to be 10-100x bigger than third world microfinance.
This is genuinely a terrible approach for anyone suffering from depression/anxiety.

If we could all pull the Louis CK approach ("everything is great but no one is happy") we would. Unfortunately those mired in depression/anxiety cannot see the forest for the trees...otherwise they wouldn't be dealing with their problems.

EDIT: shit, totally meant to downvote you. Enjoy the free karma.
Well I make no promises about the 'good' part (in fact it seems like its modern incarnation is a complete mess) but Graal Online used to be MMORPG based on a link to the past-like engine, I think at one point back in the day it even had ripped sprites/tiles from LTTP.
This is probably one of the coolest hacks I have ever seen.

Practical? Hell no. Awesome? Hell yes.
I just got this and its awesome
http://www.amazon.com/Split-Top-Laptop-Caddy-Portable-Adjust...
How many decades you expect him to be a twenty-something?
Some segments do have government provided health insurance in the US, but they are horror stories aplenty (I have some personal ones that only turned out well by divine providence or an amazing series of coincidences depending on your view on such things).

The problem is the government is broke and the health care bill was so bad that many supporters already have exemptions (including a few unions that backed the bill). Worse it really didn't address the big problem of why health care costs so much. It also had unwarranted optimism on cost savings.

At some point, I hope that the government will address: tort reform, drug trial costs, cost of medical training, bulk drug purchasing, "catastrophic" government backed insurance, and better medical savings accounts. I really expect more talking heads yelling at each other first.
We are way, way above the amount of money health care should cost.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:International_Comparison_-...

So as a matter of priority versus other spending outlays, we're way out of line.

Here's per capita GDP:
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=per+capita+GDP

Spitballing from these numbers, it looks like we spend about as much in absolute terms as Switzerland, with everyone else way, way far behind.

Here's another interesting graph, since I seem to be on a roll here:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/16/medicare-and-med...

The degree to which our government is in the red is in no small part a result of the degree to which we're invested in the health care money pit.

The amount of money that is going to health care should blow your mind. People go bankrupt every day due to health care expenses, and even if you don't go bankrupt your tax dollars are supporting this nonsense.

I was talking to a gentleman the other day who works for a medical hardware company. He said they had a radiation treatment device that costs one hundred million dollars. A tenth of a billion dollars for one machine! "Jeez," I said, "How long does it take to pay off such a thing?"

About a year.

There is, of course, a debate on how to fix health care. Is there really a debate on whether it's broken?
For somebody new to the whole iTunes Store ecosystem it is neither faster nor less mentally challenging to set up a new ITS account than it is to jailbreak their new device.

It may strike you as obviously false, and it may well have been so two years ago, but when I got my new iPad after moving to another country I've spent about twice as much time getting iTunes to let me pay for apps in foreign App Store than I've spent researching jailbreak options and caveats and then actually pwning the device.

So no, App Store is far from the only way to distribute iOS software, even though it still is the default and sometimes the only apparent way.
HTML5 Spec for Web Developers
The same lifestyle diseases are at the top of the list for every country that already has some form of universal health care.
Yup, flippa.com. It is more for sites than startups.
> Those "minor reforms" were 10,000 pages long

So what? We live in a litigious society, laws are verbose because they have to be. Make it too vague and you just force the issues to be resolved in the courts making it even more confusing because the rules become written in case law.
Yes, it's a requirement.
> our wives would kill us! :) and sell organs to pay for kindergartens, schools and huggies

You didn't specify whose organs they'd sell, but I think we can guess ....
Shameless plug: I'm working on a startup that, while it won't be able to directly fix people being denied coverage, will hopefully help people to understand their coverage a bit better. http://cakehealth.com. Not yet open to all but you can sign up if that sounds interesting to you. We <3 beta users.

And on a related note, I have noprocrast enabled so apologies for the n00b-looking account, real uid = andrewpbrett. Someone alerted me that this was being discussed.
When to Buy Airline Tickets
Last month I actually tried 26-hour days, shifting westwards at the rate of 2 timezones/day. Whenever someone asked me how I was or what time it was, I would give them the name of a country whose timezone I was currently on. Up until now, I was certain that I had invented the concept myself.
Can someone please explain to me why five thousand self employed people can't form a corporation together and get group insurance? Do shell corporations like that already exist?
Yes. Yes. And I can say that this happens in every field. Check this small interview to Erik Spiekermann about typography: http://intenseminimalism.com/2011/everybody-is-influenced-by...
I'm an entrepreneur with a wife and son. I'm 23. We pay $360/mo for individual insurance and it is pretty crappy. The deductible is high and there are several "up-front" visits, which means the first X times we go to the doctor the insurance pays nothing and deducts one of our up-front visits. Each of us have X of these, so the first X times wife goes in, and then the same for me, they are not taken from the same pool. This accumulates to several hundred dollars of visits before insurance pays for anything, and then we still have the deductible to churn through, and they've applied regular visits to that as well.

We're struggling to make ends meet here; our clients are good and we're trying to build a steadier base, but the pay is irregular and sometimes we have trouble meeting monthly obligations.

They make it such a hassle to do anything and they rip us off so hard (providers and insurers alike) that we usually just don't pay our medical bills except what we have to pay up-front. It's too much crap to deal with, the insurance always makes up a reason not to cover things, and it's absurdly expensive. Every time we have tried to pay the people have come back saying we'd owe literally 10x more than they we were originally told we would owe. It's just not worth the headache or the hassle, much easier to silence unrecognized numbers from bill collectors and let their corrupt and evil system rot in on itself.

We don't really have the option of not getting health care and dying, we don't go to the doctor for fun, we only go when we have to.
>Effectively, Readability is extorting publishers: give us 30% or we'll take everything

Readability has costs, and provides a service for free. They give you the choice of using their service for free (no revenue for them, no revenue for ad-driven content sites), or paying them a fee for the use of their service (which is strip everything except the content so you don't have to - a value-added service if I ever saw one). This fee gets forwarded to the content author, while they keep a commission for the service they're providing you. You, presumably, see a value in their service, or you wouldn't use it. You see a value in the content, or you wouldn't read it. They give you the choice of supporting the content and the service, where money is split to support the service you like and the content you like, or just use it without paying anything. The content author is denied ad revenue because you use a service which strips ads. This service now offers you the chance to support your favorite content authors directly, to compensate for the loss of ad revenue.

And you see extortion where?

>My entire point would be moot if Apple required 30% of all revenue
>from Readability regardless of whether the subscription originated
>from within the iOS app or from Readability's website

Your point is moot. Apple takes 30% from in-app subscriptions. People using the app don't have a choice between subscribing through the app or through the website, seeing as Apple does not allow linking to the website. Obviously, people using the app won't think of going to the browser to subscribe. Hence, even though it seems there's an alternative, toll-free way to subscribe, in practice there isn't. Even though it looks like it's optional, it's not, and content-based apps are going to be especially hit with this toll. The Apple 30% toll - encouraging people to develop for your platform, then putting up flat 30% fees on revenue - now that is extortion.
Your boss can be a respected friends, but not a loved buddy. In other words, you can have all the rational features of friendship but probably need to stay away from the emotional side (and definitely the romantic side).

There are two reasons for this. Emotional attachment creates decision bias which will eventually interfer with the job function of your boss (and/or your own). Leadership often needs detached objective assessment and you want your boss to have that capability.

The second reason has to do with group dynamics. Events play out differently when the boss is in the room (e.g. no venting). Keeping some distance is often the only way that a superior can encourage the growth of good staff dynamics (e.g. formation of informal leaders.

Both of these are good reasons why being a loved buddy relationship is neither practical nor actually desirable for a boss-staff relationship. It doesn't mean that you can't be friends though. Mutual support, assistance to success, (some) shared interests and so forth are all possible (and a usually good thing).
Dear Twitter: You're a Utility - Get Off The Fence & Start Acting Like One
Well, the health bill that was passed had a lot of the standard "real rules coming later" in it. So, actually reading the bill didn't give much information either. I was really interested in what would be an acceptable insurance based on deductible.
Despite 861.5 Percent Growth, Android Market Revenues Remain Puny
Simple thought experiment: iPhone with iTunes and...nothing else. Android with Netflix, Kindle, Hulu...and the rest of the world's content producers. Which one are people going to buy?

Starting to sound like Mac vs. Windows all over again. I thought the App Store showed that Jobs had learned his lesson that the systems with the most software and content win. Putting that at risk fits the classic folk definition of insanity (same behavior, expecting different results).
Kevin Kelly: A Jolt To The Soul, Exploring Asia With A Camera and No Money
> the only country to still tax you if you live abroad

Not that it has anything to do with the main subject, but that is not true. Other countries tax their expat citizens.
Totally agree, for relatively healthy younger people willing to risk bankruptcy, it's a massively cheaper option. I'm merely saying that that kind of cost is nearly impossible to achieve, as reaching it would incur costs elsewhere. Distributing the cost doesn't make it less real.
Not to be flip, but what do I get out of it? In my experience, something like this can easily consume 15-20 hours per week. The last time I did something like this I got tuition reimbursement for TAing. Helping other people learn is fun, but how many people have that type of spare time?

If you anticipate it taking less time, then what is the instructor providing? The time sink -- and the most valuable part for the students -- is answering questions about the course material / giving negative feedback on homework so students know when they are incorrect.

Please don't take this as an attack -- I think the recent movement to bring education to anyone who wants it is awesome. It's just that the missing bit is who instructs / grades / answers questions and how does that person get paid / some return besides good vibes.
Yes but the next time you download/save something it appears again (and can be a pain if you are downloading a few things in one go) compared to Firefox where you can hide its download manager behind the window.

As well as the height of it is over what it really needs to be, The download bar in Chrome really shouldn't need to be any taller than the tab bar.
I've been friends with my past managers. True, they have power over you but not all relationships are equal anyway. If your manager is good and you respect him or her, you should not have a problem doing as told and your manager wont go on a power trip. Also, if a boss is good then they will care more about you and your career growth than the company so if you have a good reason to leave, they won't be hurt. And if they have to lay you off, they can help you find a new job.
I'd have up voted you if you hadn't said "period". Unhealthy behavior is a biggie but anyone that says "here, this ONLY is the problem" just adds to the mess.

The US health care system is melange of many complex and perverse incentives. I recall a study saying unhealthy behavior adds at most 50% to costs but costs have increased many more times than that in the last thirty years. The billing system, medical education system, end-of-life-care, the health insurance system, ad-nauseum. It takes a LOT of crazy schemes to eat up 20% of the GDP of the once-most-prosperous country in the world.
"Where have all the flowers gone" isn't listed as a protest song. Indeed, apparently the 1960s had only one protest song. Yet Tool's Aenima, which is centered on life in L.A., is there. Very strange. I don't know what the submitter was thinking.
"Luckily for TinyGrab for Mac users we still have TinyGrab.com and Apple haven’t, yet, prevented anyone from downloading apps from the world wide web and installing them on their Macs without the Mac App Store."

Key word: "yet."
Worst case of 19 drops:

Drop bulb a every ten floors starting with floor ten, extending to floor 100.

When bulb a breaks, start with bulb b. Drop bulb b starting from 9 floors below the floor that bulb b breaks, and extending to the floor directly below the one the b broke on.

You can probably optimize this a bit by adjusting how many floors you jump with for bulb a, but 10 seems like an easy number.
Nope, I'm pretty sure everyone agrees it's broken. And just to re-clarify: I'm not claiming we're not paying too much. I agree with everything you've said. Just that $50-100/month is un-doably low regardless of brokenness.

I'll be reading through the links, I can always use more detailed info for future debates. Thanks!

edit for repliers: before stating that location X has 100 or less per month, how much do your taxes cost for this? That counts too, ya know.
I googled a bit, but wasn't able to find any corroborating evidence. Please post it here when/if you find it. In any case, it will be interesting to compare the APIs when MS releases theirs.
Yes, it's not like US-style unhealthy behavior stops at the US border...
My wife and I are healthy. But we've seen our rates more than double in the last year. I've heard many stories like the one referenced in the article where healthy people are having hard time even finding insurance.

A friend (a plumber) told me the other day that he was really struggling to afford insurance for his family because his premiums had more than doubled as well. He said he had incurred 3 rate increases in 3 months.

I'm just curious how many people have seen any benefit yet from health care reform? I know most of it doesn't go into effect until 2014. But something is seriously out of whack here.
The last two DS Zeldas were basically begging to be cloned by someone with even an iota of common sense - they had fun dungeon/town sections spoiled by incredibly tedious overworlds that basically ruin the games (especially in the train one, I have no idea what they were thinking). Literally all you'd need to do to fix it is to yank out the boat/train sections and chuck in an overworld.

I started on one for iOS a while back but got bogged down with A) trying to roguelike it up B) models/animation, which I can't make nor afford to commission.
I've kind of always felt like R&D is the heart and soul of silicon valley. It'll be a shame if things pan out this way.
I wish these open letters said, "we are ebaying our iPhones, removing our other apps from the App Store, and switching to Android and Windows Mobile" instead of "we are going to change our business model just because the default icons you guys pick are so great".

Apple does not care about whiney letters. They might care if there are no more apps for or users of iOS.
mike just add it. log in w/fb connect, then click add event. if you have an issue email me brianbreslin @ gmail