skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I added the glow to kind of simulate stage lights or whatever... something bands can relate to. I may end up removing it or decreasing it as you've suggested. Thanks! :)

As for the "REL-etc." stuff... in the first review, a couple of people asked what "RELA" stands for... (I had nothing explaining it)... and I actually came up with the name from all of those words so that's why I included them. I feel they each explain all of the different aspects of the app pretty well. Does that make sense or do you think I should still change it?

Maybe have 1 overview video where you gloss over most of the features and focus only on the critical ones

Those play buttons run through all of the critical features... did you click one of those?

And as for the information overload, the app does a ton of stuff. How can I properly explain what all it does concisely? I feel like I'd be leaving out a ton of important features (that would reel in most people) in a super-concise description.
5 Reasons Why You Will Fail
Certainly it's about staying relevant no-matter where you are at in your career age-wise.

Unfortunately though I think older developers face more scrutiny as far as their skills go. It's funny but being more fit/healthy does take the edge of of this 'problem' to some degree, but nothing cures it better than thorough technical knowledge and a solid work history of 15-20+ years.
Congrats on getting your idea built. Without knowing the industry I think the idea is great.

However, I think the landing page still needs a lot of work. I was suspicious when you were asking about monitor resolutions and had a separate mobile version. It really needs to be simplified greatly. There are a million articles out there that can help (clear/short desc of value, clear call to action...).

I realize it probably took you a lot of time to do the animation, but I would scrap all of that. Sorry :(

Also design wise there is nothing "music" about the landing page.

A 9 minute video seems excessive for a landing page. Cut it to 60 seconds to get the customer interested. Save the 9 minute version for after they sign up.
Downvoted? As an old guy it's the first thing I thought when I read the article.
Except I just did: check out http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/462 and search for "Hey look, I can comment."

EDIT: If you aren't signed in to Facebook, you might not be able to see the comments.
Startups and Innovation
When you're Microsoft, $300M is the same as $0 for any other company.

They're losing a few billion a year on their online division, yet still stay profitable overall, so $300M is really bus fare for a company that scale.
It's not the hosting that costs much usually, it's developers + editors + managers + their managers. It all adds up very quickly.
I have a hard time agreeing with this document. In many cases it is hard to tell which part of the wrong solution they are actually correcting. For example on the one where they write measurements out to a file, in the first case they use sqlalchemy to write to a sqlite db and in the 'correct' case they write json to a file. So what is the issue that is be corrected here? Is using sqlite without sqlalchemy ok? Both?
This is what I see - http://i55.tinypic.com/29pusn5.jpg - Firefox on Windows
I like the way the article breaks down the current wave of books on the effects of the internet and technology into the three main camps of "never betters" (we're on the cusp of a utopia), "better nevers" (world is going to hell), and "ever wasers" (this sort of change has always happened).
It seems to me that you are really trying to be original in your landing page. So much that I felt a bit lost looking at it.

- There's like an input text on the bottom saying enter.. ?!?!?

- I find the overall font/structure really weird.

- And most importantly, I really have no idea what your application is doing.

- And then, the bottom bar.. I clicked somewhere near video and it went fullscreen.. and I couldn't close that video.

Anyway, overall, I'd suggest:

- Try to focus on what your application is doing
- Try to be more standard in your landing page

It's ok if we don't see all the features.. Just focus on the most important one and if people are interested, they'll dig in to learn more.
I went digging to find out the real details[1].

I really like this:
> For each transaction we'll charge you either standard pricing, or micropayments pricing – whichever is the lower rate.

It takes away the headache of choosing between the two systems while starting up.

However $12, is the lowest price point you'd want to use the micropayment model with. And as your volume increases, the 'low price point' drops to $8 with $100,000+ in monthly volume.

Just food for thought.

[1] https://merchant.paypal.com/cgi-bin/marketingweb?cmd=_render...
1. At first glance I am a little overwhelmed by the landing page. It may be because I am not in the industry, but it doesn't seem to give a clear, concise, quick overview of what your site is about. You put it simply above, "takes care of the tedious number-crunching aspects of being in the industry". So refine that line into a mission statement and clearly put that on the page. The items on the left and right of the screen should be more like bullet points below the top. Very confusing and hard to look at. Not sure what I should look at first or what is important to know.

2. It asked me to download a plugin. I have most of the standard plugins for media installed on Chrome, so not sure what it is asking me for. I assume it is something to do with Windows Media Player, but I can use other sites requiring it just fine. I would either check for the plugin and alert the user nicely with a message on the site that certain content requires a specific plugin or not include that content at all right off the bat. If I had just happened to come across your site I would have immediately navigated off simply because of this.

3. Clicking on the "more" links in each of the boxes just adds additional bullet points. Take me to another page. Let me explore, let me learn more about how your service is going to change my way of doing business.

4. I watched part of the video tutorial. It is a bit lengthy for an intro video and is definitely more of a tutorial. I was expecting it to be more of how does this service help me. Also, if you are going to have it as a tutorial, I would break it down into shorter segments for each aspect of the service.
So is this being driven by people working on the VP8 codec or the WebM project? Or is MPEG LA just trying to show that VP8 really is just a patent encumbered at h.264(and protect/add to their revenue stream?)
When I was about 14 years younger, I embarked on a project that, in retrospect, was way more than I could handle, but I was, as you suggest, too ignorant to realize it.

It took me a long time. Years of part-time effort. But I finally rolled out the first release. I learned a whole lot along the way, and it felt awesome to bring the project to some level of completion.

I'm probably too experienced now to be fooled into starting a project that I know is way more than I could handle, but maybe I should do some of those projects anyway.
I'm sure they're so giddy about being able to hire that they didn't think much about it.
1. Harsh, but that is the most accurate description I've seen.

2. This is mostly how Gartner, Forrester, et. al. work.
Release of mosquitos with suicide genes to eradicate dengue fever
Quick thoughts:

- You've clearly put a lot of effort into this. You seem to have a big collection of useful features. Congrats on that.

- I checked out the site before reading your post. I didn't really get what it was about -- something to do with bands or something. You wrote in your post, "It takes care of all the boring, tedious number-crunching aspects to being a professional in the industry." That kind of concise tagline is missing from your site. I would put all those boxes with features and stuff below the fold and summarize your service above the fold with a heading and maybe a short paragraph. E.g., https://www.wepay.com/

- The video, which should be featured more prominently, is way too long. It's clear you put a lot of work into all the features, but it's too much to show off all at once. Give a "big picture" view of the service and skip over the details. I'd aim for no longer than 1-3 minutes, the shorter the better. The video's job is to give people a taste, and get them excited.

- I tried going back to the site after writing some stuff here. It immediately took me to the video page and I didn't know how to get back to the homepage. Really confusing.

- I now see that when I click on "Bands" it gives me more of an overview video. I didn't expect that. That video still has a lot of details. Needs more summarizing to tell you what you're seeing and why it's the solution to your problems.

- The design could use some spunk. It may be handling "boring, tedious" details but you don't want people to think your app is boring and tedious. Not sure what to suggest other than maybe getting a designer's input.

Nice job so far, good luck!
Ask HN: Introduction to latex?
I'm in my final year, and looking for a guide to Latex to get me up and going with my dissertation. Does anyone have any sites or books they would recommend? Cheers
Almost all of the sites being archived or deleted (yes, archived - the reporting that these are all up for deletion was overly simplistic and incorrect) are for programmes or programme strands that are no longer being broadcast, in some cases for many many years.

From what I've seen reported, the only site of any significance which is being removed is 'WW2 People's War', which asked people to put their and their family's personal stories of the second world war into a central archive (http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/). I believe that this was already being archived by the British Library, so won't be lost.

The overall decision to cut 50% of the 'TLDs' is definitely political, to placate an administration that's beholden to the Murdoch media empire, but the choice of which ones to kill seems mostly pragmatic.
I think that was just a bit of link bait for HN: notice that they didn't use that term in the actual post. Though maybe I'm attributing to malice... ;)
Ask HN: Please review my startup, Crowdbeacon.
Hello HN!

Like other review-seekers, this is my first submission. That said, I read HN often and I’m a huge fan of the community (have been fortunate to meet a few members in person). Along with the support of a small, boot-strapped team, this week we launched our location-based service called Crowdbeacon, and would love your feedback.

http://www.crowdbeacon.com

Crowdbeacon is a location-based service (I know, I know but bear with me) that was created for one purpose: to help people find what they need. To make this happen, we developed a platform that prompts users to “Ask for anything”… with their questions delivered to local experts and businesses based on self-identified category, subcategory and keywords. On top of that, since we can’t guarantee that questions will be answered by users or businesses we comb other APIs (Yelp, Foursquare and Wishpond for now) and search them for what the user is looking for, hopefully finding the answer along the way.

We’ve had a lot of success in the first three days (articles in TechCrunch and LifeHacker resulting meeting our initial user goals) but of course realize there is a long road ahead.

Any feedback you can provide on the product, marketing, and potential for growth is much appreciated.
Looking at the numbers here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_video_game_consoles_...
it looks to me like Xbox has been successful and competes well with the PS3 in North America, but has dismal acceptance in Japan. But both of them are trailing behind the Wii.

So that's clearly a success compared to the Windows-on-phones idea, but I don't think it counts as having "crushed the competition".
Heh heh, try to back-button yourself out of that page.
> "What is the government? nothing, unless supported by opinion."

--Napoleon Bonaparte
It's not inherent in SQL, it's down to the optimizer
I feel like there's gotta be a hint of irony in the title.
Sure. Take for example clean energy (NOTE: I policy wonk'd in this area). There are some folks who want to 'disrupt' the field with technology. Some support this (most consumers should) and some don't (the more vertically integrated legacy suppliers). My job was to determine talking points to get attention from the powers that be in key parts of government (DoD, WH, States) and communicate a value proposition in support of the disruptive technology elements. Without calling them disruptive-we needed to learn what they valued. So my job was to use geospatial, market data, academic and legal to support policy recommendations. Then get people to hop on board. Clear(er)?
This is a legitimate point, Elop would have got options while he worked for Microsoft, that creates the scope for both insider trading problems and conflict of interest issues which are legally regulated.
You can use libjacket to get c/c++ access to a lot of what's in Matlab jacket. It's still incubating but has enough to pull pieces for apps: http://wiki.accelereyes.com/wiki/index.php/LIBJACKET
The Social Sign In revolution is happening
The success was at Trolltech, before they got bought by Nokia.
I checked out the page BEFORE reading your description, so this is my impression as a normal web user. Sorry, but it's kind of brutal. I'm trying to be honest.

First thoughts:
After viewing the page for about 20 seconds, I have no idea what it is. If I were a normal user, I'd be gone by now.

Seconds thoughts:
Now that I've read all the boxes around the page, I get that it's for managing a band. Took way too long to figure that out. The 6 boxes need to be shrunk down into one "sound bite" to describe what the site is. You don't have to tell your users all your feature on the front page - that's what a "more info" link is for.
Also - there's a SIGNUP UP NOW, below that there is an Enter, and below that is another Enter. Over on the bottom left is another Enter with a smiley face. Not sure what to do first.

Decided to pretend I'm a band:
Clicking on Band starts a video tutorial. Wasn't expecting that. Video tutorial goes by pretty fast. How do I stop this video? The "Enter" button at the bottom of the page is apparently a free text field that does nothing.

Decided to sign up:
Filled out the fields. Clicked Continue. Took me back to the form and told me the user was not found.

At this point, I'm done. In general:

Too much going on for a simple landing page. The idea of a landing page is to convert casual surfers into signing up.

I never saw the Terms of Service anywhere.
WikiLeaks: Bank of America documents a dud?
jedberg is known to be ironic like that.
Young guys complain that no one will hire them because they have no experience. Old guys complain that no one will hire them because companies only want cheap, young guys. I complain because I like hearing my own voice. Nothing new in the world...
Having $60 billion in cash appears to be symptomatic of a lack of strategy on the part of management. It's money that isn't being put to work to create value for the stockholders nor is it being paid as a dividend. That raises the question of for whose benefit is that money being held?

I do not "think that Apple is failing as a company." However, they are in fear of losing their halo and the $60 billion dollars signifies inertia based on that fear. Here's the dilemma - purchasing a $20 billion dollar company with another $20 billion in unrealized value probably means the acquisition target is perceived as troubled. Getting involved in that kind of mess doesn't damage companies such as HP, the perception is that they are used to dealing with messy management issues. But it is easy to see Apple's halo easily tarnished by a pursuit of a company like Yahoo! or Foxconn. And even after spending $20 billion Apple would still be under dividend pressure.

As for the Mac App Store, I did not "call it a failure" either. I pointed out that Mac Apps was a lackluster announcement - calling it the highlight of Back to the Mac is faint praise for anyone but the faithful. Apple boosted Mac sales by requiring a Mac for iPhone development, but with the growth of other mobile platforms, Mac sales are bound to slow. The Mac App store is a rearguard action and although a sound business decision because it's so cheap to implement, is clearly uninspired.
I'm guessing your on a bit higher resolution? This is how it looks on my resolution: http://i.imgur.com/XmpRl.jpg

But I'll definitely have to figure out a way to satisfy all resolutions. I was trying to go for something atypical... not a big fan of the cookie cutter startup landing pages I see all over the place... but I guess there's a good reason they all look similar.

As for the forefront description, my app does a ton of stuff so I'm having a lot of trouble coming up with something short and sweet that describes it all.
I can be slightly malicing sometimes. ;) (Did I just make up a new word?)
Its funny I had the EXACT opposite experience. I realized I wanted to make the products and left to look for opportunities to do so. But I think the point is that people use think tanks for self-affirmation. Whether its research, talking points, connections - my boss once said - it's better to be used than useless.
Although it works for me, I'd imagine that's a Google Translate issue.

Here's the original article URL: http://www.hs.fi/talous/artikkeli/Nokian+ty%C3%B6ntekij%C3%A...
Nokia, HP and RIM, Oh My: A Mobile Developer's Perspective
It is an uninsightful thought at best and an ad personam argument at worst.
Nokia (NOA3.DE) share price
Detroit citizens demand RoboCop statue
Dear Nokia fans: you’re nuts
Indeed I did. I admit, it was a little underhanded way to get you to click. But it worked, right?

We're just trying to get the very best people we can. Apologies for the ruse.
Best tech for Valentine's Day (roses are red... is there an app for that?)
There certainly seemed to be people using Emacs on Macs :)
I think you have too much information on the front page. Give a static tour of your service so I can figure out what you're really offering. It looks, to me, like you have way to much text on the front page -- I don't think people will move around the little boxes to explore the service.

I can't really understand what you offer from your the video on the front page video -- (i.e. I know I can track gas consumption, but I want to be able to really see what that table looks like for more than a second).

Your front page is complicated because you're trying to quickly describe a complicated service...why not offer a live demo on the front page? Also, forget the "rely, relate..." I'd use words that completely describe the service..."track, engage..."

Cool idea, make the front page simpler. My .02
The thing is, when you're older, there's really no way to reach the younger generation. They aren't listening to you because you're older, for the most part, and they've been listening to their "out of touch" parents their whole lives. They won't understand until their your age, and then they'll have to deal with another younger generation.

This isn't a criticism of anyone, just my obeservation about why there is a gap.

It is a shame too, because youth has the energy and age has the wisdom, and if the two could be combined, companies would benefit.
That's not the logic that sank the company.

Seriously, $5 or $10K increase in monthly rent is a pittance. There are a lot more wasteful things I could bitch about than that, and I'm a cheap-ass.
Whether it was Android, Microsoft, or slowly dying, people working there would be affected, so I'm not sure the choice of Microsoft changes things too much from that point of view. With Android, perhaps they could have kept more people on board to hack on it and customize it, but still, the axe was going to fall.

Should be interesting to see how this is handled in Finland. Stock is down, layoffs, and some "arrogant foreigner" in charge would be a recipe for even more change in some places.
Ask HN: The deal Microsoft-Nokia
I think the deal Microsoft-Nokia is like the deal Microsoft-IBM back to the"80. At that time MSFT was looking for distribution, today Nokia is the distribution.
Well, I can speak about the problems from the other side of the fence :)

Someone said on this thread that offshore works only when you give a very detailed specification of the project.

The biggest problem problem I'm facing every day is not having a way to get answers to my questions. There are many layers of intermediaries that filter out information and delay the answers. I do have to deliver the project and I can't always wait days or weeks every time I have a question. Most of the times I have to assume that you want a certain solution and implement it my way. Unfortunately, it's not always the desired one.

I can give you an example: someone wanted a payment system implemented but they missed giving me the library used by the payment processor. I had to wait few days to be able to get the library from them, only to find out that they gave me the wrong one (32bit instead of 64 bit)... and so on. There are many many little things like this that take time and could have been solved very easily through a phone call (or even an e-mail).

I'm not a junior, a have 10 years of experience (not all of the working offshore) and I can do your job pretty well... I know how to do it, but I have to know what you want. That's a part of the reason why you sometimes have to give very detailed specifications, not because of me but because of the people between you and me that don't do their job.

Not all companies do this though, some of them get it right. Daily scrums with everybody involved speaking on the phone help a lot. Giving me a way to talk directly to a competent person, also helps. Sometimes a simple yes/no answer makes a huge difference. When we start a new big project it helps to work on the same office, even for a few days. Don't be cheap, it may be cheaper to work with me but it's not that cheap, remember that I can very easily move to a different company or even country (and I'm not talking about the salary, but about everything else).
I love the idea that you have to clone Reddit BEFORE you're worthy of sending in your resume. Brilliant.
The real issue is "Cool URIs don't change" vs "The BBC is hideously bloated". Keeping these sites online isn't so terribly expensive. Keeping a few hundred extra lines in your .htaccess isn't expensive. I've not seen a decent estimate of the cost savings, and as far as I know one doesn't exist. The material is being archived inside the BBC, as well as in torrents like this one. But the URLs are being broken, for no reason besides sending a message.
>Why isn't he hosting the content? Because hosting a heavily trafficked site ain't cheap.

Rehosting it isn't legal either, but then neither is torrenting it.
Really interesting concept -- I'm going to look into it for my start-up. Thanks!
Personally, I've grown a lot as a software developer because of my experience with project failures. I had one that turned my life upside down, but that helped me gain the attribute of fearlessness.

I've seen the worst that can happen, and that's given me both courage and maturity.
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Sorry but it's appalling.

I went to the site before reading what you explained the site does, and left it almost immediately.

It comes across as spammy and complete information overload.

Hire a designer, or get a friend at least, just to make some visuals for it. It'll be well worth the money. It needs serious work.
usually stocks go up when layoffs are announced...
Palantir apologizes for WikiLeaks attack proposal