skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
So, the one thing that you didn't answer was the difference between a "project" and a "workspace" if there is one. I do have hobby things that aren't open source where 50 cents per day would be doable, if unwelcome. However, if it's 50 cents per day per project, that can add up pretty fast and $55/mo isn't a trivial cost considering that I can run my development and test stuff off my machine (granted, with the caveat of having to do all the annoying setup myself).

I'll probably get an account for open-source later today to play around with, but if your Ruby stuff is really good (when it lands) and works well for collaboration, I could easily justify $15/mo to my boss and sometimes one isn't trying to create the solution for every cheap hobbyist out there. It can be good to be the Basecamp of IDEs and maybe that's how you should sell it (in contrast to my comparisons to Eclipse and RubyMine).
Thanks - I might get back to it in a few hours. Currently busy now - I did have 20 minutes to spare earlier and thought a small challenge could be fun.
I intended to leave this comment on the linked website but unfortunately their mandatory open id is completely broken with the 3 open id accounts I owned.

I always love taking philosophical guidance and development advice from people who can't even get their own shit together.
Now that you mention it, how is Emma Watson doing at Brown University?
You mean Huffman, right?
No, that's not my objection to slavery. That's my objection to using support of slavery as a false example to discredit the idea that popularity can be used as (sloppy) gauge of morality.
Considering that Amazon is currently looking to hire people for the sole purpose of trying on shoes... Yes, they need this tech.

http://www.amazon.com/Careers-University-Recruiting/b/ref=gw...

Search for: 133938 (reference code)

> "Amazon.com is looking for a Women's Shoe Fit Model to try on our shoe selection and provide fit feedback to help our customers make the best purchasing decisions. The perfect Cinderella must have the perfect Size 8..."
Looks like site is down. We're working on bringing it back up!
Keywords Aren’t Turkey: Don’t Stuff
I haven't dug into this code at great length, but it looks like the images-only limitation is totally artificial, gated by the isImage method on line 23 of https://github.com/glenmurphy/dropmocks/blob/master/files/mo...

Anyways, Dropmock's server-side code is ~500 lines of Python, the bulk of app code is in JavaScript and comparing files like https://github.com/glenmurphy/dropmocks/raw/master/files/moc... and http://min.us/smedia/minus/scripts/mock.js suggests that the heart of the "harder part" is still Dropmocks.
I would love to know what the typical acquisition process for Google is like. Where does it start (product team, management, engineering, etc)? How long does it take? How intense are the negotiations? Are deals typically cash or stock?
I liked the episode of lupin the third where they melt down the gold and apply it the body of a truck and then paint it and drive it over the border. the guards search the truck, but the gold IS the truck.
Http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Pepperdine-University-Research-
Innovation videos: making sure they’re not ignored
"DRM very rarely works. DRM on movies, tv, and music does not work. Every example of DRM trying to impose artificial scarcity on these media has been utterly broken."

Since you say there is no scarcity, create Photoshop for me without making a copy. How about a Metallica album? Oh? you can't?...that means that not everybody can create it..and there is scarcity. You (and every other person that tries to make the case for piracy) claim that the scarcity is in the copy..when it's actually in the creation.

"Indeed, even when digital media is distributed without DRM (as is increasingly the case for music through Amazon MP3, iTunes, and other distributors) the world doesn't end, and artists still make money."

You need to look at the big picture. Movies (and anything digital) are only about what people are willing to pay. Right now, piracy still has some stigma attached to it and most people will pay rather than pirate. If everyone knew they could get something for free, the value would eventually be $0, which will make it impossible for anyone to make money (or even recoup the initial costs). Since software isn't worth $0, I would say DRM has done a pretty good job.

A good example of this is iPhone apps. For the most part, you can't charge more than a few dollars, because that's what people are willing to pay.

"There are many examples now of artists giving away their work in exchange for variable donations (down to none), many of these have been hugely successful in generating revenue."

This isn't a viable business model. Donations only work so far. There are also many examples of people that asked for donations, had thousands of downloads, and got very little in revenue.

It's funny there aren't more people that have your views on things such as the GNU/GPL licenses. Since there is no scarcity with digital goods, am I really hurting anyone when I use GNU licensed code in my proprietary app (the original code is still 'free')? But, whenever there is a discussion on copyright infringement, people talk it's not theft yet when the guy from thesis used GNU code and didn't release it under the GNU license, it was called 'theft' by many people here on HN. It's because of this that I can't take the movement seriously.
Evaluating regulations by count is like evaluating software by lines of code.

Cato is DEFINITELY using Orwellian language: http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/2011/03/the-kochs-and-the-...
Fifty Years Ago (Lisp)
I don't know that I agree that data portability is the problem. Nearly everyone (college aged kids) I know use Facebook exclusively for social networking. I don't think they care if their groups are portable.

I think the root problem is encouraging people to make them. I think this is why Groups became shareable but a better UX or automatic algorithm for creating them would help tremendously. Some kind of incentive for creating groups would help as well. I think the group messaging features could do this (group text, especially).
I was initially confused by the demo.

Potential use cases

1. I have a perfect fitting shoe, I'd like to buy another perfect fitting shoe of a different brand.

2. I haven't found the perfect fitting shoe. I'd like to find one.

I assumed this would be solving problem #2, but it solves problem #1.

I thought I would tell it "I'm currently in shoe X, and it's the right length but chafes on the right side" or something of that nature, and it would tell me a better shoe.
To understand real-estate and its development, I recommend the Urban Land Institute [www.uli.org].

With "only" $5 million, you probably don't have enough to make a big enough impression on the commercial side to get preferential treatment. Real estate is similar to startup investing in that there are relatively tight communities of investors who do deals together. In my opinion, there is little reason to seek a real-estate license if your goal is to invest - commissions are just a line in your pro forma. What is valuable is insight into the market - not the conventional wisdom which floats around among agents.
FANTASTIC comment! :)

Believe it or not, I DON'T only do long-form salesletters so I don't divide myself into a "long-form-only" camp.

Typically what I do is figure out what the client needs... assess the market/product,etc... and do 1 or the other to START.

However, if I'm not absolutely positive that whatever form I'm using will work - I always recommend that the client test a longer copy page versus a shorter copy page.

All in all... it's not "long form vs. short form".

The bottom line is... you put out all your selling points, and defuse all the objectives. At that point it can be either long or short.

And you end it right there without any "extra" words :)

That could be 300 words... or 10,000 words. Like you said - it depends on a TON of variables!
the two requirements are pretty related.

Not many consumers (besides people collecting donations) need international, and very few merchants would be happy without it.

It's been made clear to us that this is a pretty big opportunity.
as a german I'm a bit disturbed they didn't call it Nazi-Germany in the text. And the nazis tried to get any gold for foreign exchange, even from gold teeth of jews they executed, so I have some doubts about this story ..
I know it's not your fault, but it's one of the reasons that the Australian internet market is so rooted.
I like the humor, although it's a bit scary.
I would consider buying a new pair of shoes today through these guys if they supported more than running shoes.

That said, what stops someone getting the size recommendation through ShoeFitr and then comparison shopping for the actual shoes? I don't think this stops them being valuable to Amazon, but it does seem like a weakness if they're independent.
You probably have to sign an NDA about it.
Startup Genome
Twilio Startup Fund Announces Seven More Winners
> Has piracy stopped at all? no. It's gotten worse and so have the excuses.

Has it? I used Napster to download tons of music. Nowadays I use iTunes (and Amazon). I find it easier than poking around torrent sites or the awful gnutella junk and the music is reasonably priced and DRM free. Things are organized better and it makes my searching and downloading relatively painless.

I don't buy movies online yet because of they are laden with DRM. I don't buy blue-ray for the same reason. I'll buy DVDs only because the DRM has been thoroughly cracked--they go directly to my computer as I haven't even owned a DVD player in 5 years.

Make movies and TV shows downloadable and DRM free for a reasonable price and I'll start buying in a heartbeat.

non-pain = lack of DRM + ease of obtaining + delivery speed + quality + reasonableness of price.

If movie studios want to deal with piracy they have to compete on all those points. And they have to consider the whole pipeline from the internet to my TV. These aren't excuses they're just the economics of the situation.

> Why can't people just admit that they don't give a damn about the artist and just want free music/movies?

Because that's just not the case.
How Not to Be the Charlie Sheen of Your Office
It is Never Easy, But There’s a Lot of Change Going On.
App Engine Channel API in AppScale
That seems to have more to do with personal taste. I think the Android settings menu is horrible.
You seem to read a lot of BAD salesletters written by lousy copywriters.

And THAT is where the difference is.

In my letters, my claims are backed up with proof. The testimonials are of people you can call on the phone. And I personally use the product before I even START writing.

Bad copy written by an unethical copywriter sucks.

Good copy written by a great copywriter will keep your eyes glued on the page as long as they want you reading :)
This reminds me of boo.com. The bubble must be about to burst. Again.
There are a couple places in the CSS where Tahoma or Trebuchet MS are given as the font families without any fallbacks - lots of us linux folks don't have fonts like Tahoma, so an Arial or Verdana fallback would be nice so we don't see our ugly default serif fonts.
Spot on. We run SaaS and it's been a fascinating learning experience.

This excerpt captures a lot of the tension perfectly:

"As a simple analogy, if you sell a user a diesel generator, they will expect it to need maintenance, needs refueling and have the occasional service issue. Sell them electrical service and watch them come with pitchforks demanding refunds if you have an outage of any sort."
200 Countries, 200 Years
I actually think it has made the discourse worse, in that we are getting only the cookie cutter replies, of nice article and good job type comments. As much as everyone hates trolls, they do bring up good point sometimes regardless if you agree or disagree with them.
Sure, if Microsoft was actually selling windows.
Seattle WA: Distilled - Sales Role

We're a Search Marketing consultancy; HQed in London UK, we opened a Seattle office in 2010. We work for plenty of large brands - though we have a bunch of startups amongst our client list as well.

Looking for a Sales Exec with some experienced to join the team and keep us growing fast.

http://www.distilledconsulting.com/jobs-opportunities-seattl...
Re: the problem of indie developers dying due to copying being quick and easy.

The appropriate response is to embrace it as Valve has with Steam. The low incremental costs of distribution allow new business models such as "steam sales". This model has generated literally billions of dollars for Valve and other game makers. And in several instances small game companies have come back from the brink of death.

You can fight against the grain or you can work with it (steam, amazon mp3, humble indie bundle, etc.) The idea that taking advantage of the characteristics of digital goods is akin to surrendering to piracy and thus an end to all revenue for creators is profoundly mistaken. Above all else that's the point I'm trying to make.
My wife, who actually is a Clinical Psychologist has a motto.

"A problem is not a problem, unless it is a problem"

She agrees with you. It is the pop-sci nuts who do not.
Infected Android app runs up big texting bills
$1 is less than the cost of a 20 oz Pepsi, a gallon of gas, and a gallon of milk.

If songs were an average of 3MB each, you would need to purchase around 5,300 songs to fill a 16GB iPod. Buying 5,300 of anything isn't going to be cheap.
Why is it so easy to accept that pretty much everything in our bodies is genetic but not intelligence? I don't see why it would be any different. We already know that the brain is not just one big 'computing mass' but instead consists of many thousands of extremely specialized systems interconnected in a genetically-determined way shaped over thousands of years of evolution. If some of these systems are missing or not connected properly because of some genetic alteration it causes a wide spectrum of effects in our mental development. We know depression has a genetic element. We know downs syndrome is genetic. We know that identical twins separated from birth are remarkably similar, not just in how they look but also in how they act, how they see the world, what kind interests they have and so on.

It's naive to think everyone is born equal that way.
Actually... it's the EXACT opposite of that.

Think about it.

Who is going to read a 10... 20... 30 page letter.

Someone one the lower half of the bell curve who can hardly string a sentence together, or someone who likes to read and is therefore (usually) more intelligent?

I personally use long copy to get clients who own MULTI-million dollar businesses.

Do you think they're on the lower half of the bell curve?

Nope :)

If I didn't use long copy to them... how could I show them how different I was? How could I display my USP? How could I talk about my guarantee? How could I get in touch with them emotionally so they pick up the phone and call?

Short answer - I wouldn't be able to.
how is this like boo.com ? boo raised 200Million in capital if i recall correctly. shoefitr raised $125k + the $25k in prizes they won at superconf.
I'm good friends with the ShoeFitr dudes, they're good guys. They have some serious tech, high reliability web stuff, and they even put up with it being in .NET!
Anyone saying that Postel's law is one of the reasons that the web is robust needs their head examining. It was a terrible idea that has been plaguing browsers for a long time.
Computers themselves are very pedantic, so we wouldn't be very good at using them if we weren't good at being technically correct. The compiler won't forgive you for missing a semicolon or mismatched parentheses.

So I strongly suspect that our programming ability is related to our capacity for being pedantic, as annoying as that may be socially.
Perfectly said Paras.

It's all about knowing your market, giving them something they're familiar with, and then BEING INTERESTING :)
Four Career Lessons from Russell Simmons
Sometimes selling certain items + other items had a rule leading to a higher percentage. For example, an external HDD could be included with a PC at a discount, but the salesman gets a commission based on the ordinary RRP. Because of the arcane ways some commissions are calculated, this would raise his margin on the deal overall, leading to a higher commission on the PC as well. Not the intention of the retail company he worked for -- but that wasn't his problem.

Lots of little rules and promotions are constantly coming and going in retail, and my friend was quite single-minded about optimising for them.
Congrats Lucy, Ben, and Jon!
I am the original poster and I knew that it was a repeat but, honestly, my intention is to respond to up-votes so as to fine tune my participation in the HN community to maximize your enjoyment of my presence here.

In short; I am attempting to be Constructive[1] and am using up-votes to guide my attempt.

----

[1]: http://xkcd.com/810/
And the rich get richer...
Would you still use Facebook if it started charging its users?
If Facebook started charging a monthly or annual fee, would you still use it? I know some people who get a lot of value out of it, and I know some who use it only because it's free.
I wonder how much their user base would decrease? Increase?
After speaking with a friend, he said "It depends." If it was like $1 a month, then it would be worth it. Anything more, then it would not.
What would be your dollar/currency threshold?
(Author of the post being discussed here - hi there, how you ya doin').

My point in writing that post was to give the reality-based side of the story because, as I mentioned, there is a frickton of people out there who would have you believe that you can make a whole lot of dough doing, almost literally, anything if you really love it enough. Naturally, this is true of some people (like programmers and writers), but the problem I have is that the message being sent by these people is that absolutely anybody can have this particular part of your life unearthed if you just pay them $297 for a couple of hours on the phone. They'll tell you to start a blog about [thing], then write and sell an ebook about [thing] or offer coaching on [thing] - rinse and repeat until you have time to pick out your yacht. It's horseshit.

Ahem.
Wow! Never seen that before. I get the point, though most of their concern seems to come from very nitpicky things, as well as javascript, which I wouldn't point someone to w3schools to learn. I stand by the claim that it serves the purpose of learning basic HTML+CSS.

Someone spent a lot of time on that site...
However, you were writing on an online forum about a topic that was only tangentially related to the subject

The article was about a button, and what Tolkien's estate did about it. I guess you could say "only tangentially."

If you're communicating in text to strangers, it's best to err on the side of being overly specific

More specificity is fine. Specificity is not the issue here. If you knew of the contents of the button, the comment makes sense. If you read the comment, then looked at the link and the article, the comment makes sense. I draw the line at those reading only the 1st sentence and not bothering to make sense of the 2nd and 3rd sentence. How is that any different from a dog parsing an angry utterance from a human containing 'Fido'?
Like the episode of Monk where an eccentric rich fellow wrote hundreds of volumes of his diary talking about his treasure. Nobody can figure out what his clues mean. Turns out he wrote them with gold ink.
As someone who has published papers in ACM and IEEE conferences, I have had similar feelings to that in the article.

The thing is ... conferences (the unpaid Program Committees) are required for curation. There are too many papers published ... by attending and reading papers from top conferences, I can keep things sane. ACM and IEEE support the conferences by underwriting them. Consider a conference like SOSP ... last time I was there, I think there were 500+ academics in attendance. Despite corporate sponsors, there just isn't enough upfront cash (participant registration fees come in AFTER the venue is booked, for example) I can't see a way for academics to self-organize at this scale.
No offense taken. I'm actually personally re-doing the order form on the 1 example so it looks more "clean".

The design doesn't matter though.

"Pretty" doesn't sell.

Trust me on that one.

What sells is understanding your customer, having a product which gives them exactly what they need at a fair price, and showing that customer how different that product is from other similar products.
I'm not making a case for piracy. I'm making a case that there's more to unregulated digital distribution than just piracy. The mistaken belief that there is only piracy is fundamentally incompatible with developing healthy and profitable legal frameworks and business models for digital goods.
Google offers patches to fix Chrome, $20K to crack it
As you say, not all things are universal. Data structures, however, are based on principles, such as divide and conquer, that you may well argue transcend the human condition.
Hmm, did you mean...

(bwhen (foo (plusp 1))
(frob foo))

bwhen is actually the first version of the macro, heh. It does seem a bit more idiomatic with parens, but I've gotten used to the other.
It happened to Facebook Breakup Notifier recently. Facebook revoked API access without notification.
And they are actually making money on a scalable business.
Thanks for the comment.

Yea it's hard not to generalize since it's only 1 article, ya know? I tried being as specific as possible without turning it into a 30 page article :)

And yes, you're absolutely right... and hit on something most people don't understand.

It all depends on the target market! ;)
The right way to approach landing page design is to systematically test various variables. The landing page should evolve over time as you learn what works and what doesn't.

The problem is that this process is very time-intensive and subject to the discipline (or lack thereof) of the stakeholder. Plus, many people like generalizations and easy answers.

With all marketing your mileage will vary, depending on what you are selling. It is up to you to determine when extended testing yields limited returns. But the important thing is to test. There is no excuse for not testing.
Secretive Seattle Startup Lumier Co. Raises Top Tier Angel Round
Are those 3rd party components easily replaceable?
> for the sole purpose of trying on shoes

I see what you did there.