skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
HN - this was a project I built for a class at HBS (Online Economies). The class covered strategies for solving the network effects problem of a lot of online businesses. I thought it would be great to actually build one of these platforms and then try to apply the strategies discussed in class.

Looking for feedback on the app but happy to discuss strategies for cracking the chicken and egg problem....
Neat! .. I should've googled before posting :)
Nokia drops commercial Qt services
This is "what an applications programmer does for a living". Its a series of steps to accomplish a domain-specific task. Which is fine, that's what almost all programmers do.

Other developers (e.g. systems programmers, common library developers, device driver hacks) do something almost completely unrelated. They look for nuggets of functionality that can be used by applications. Like "make a list of things to do, then execute them in order". Or "accept instructions from a program, but authenticate the source". Or "make a concordance of all the terms in a problem space, for use by other code".

And making these pieces is also not at all like the process described. Its more like "look through endless manuals for ill-described OS features and diddle with them black-box style until you find out how they really work, then stitch them together. Test for time-domain anomalies (internal object lifetime; task termination order etc) and prove you have covered all the bases. Try to make it idiot-proof. Create a document that describes how to use your invention, using analogies and examples because few will have the attention span/willingness to actually delve into it.
This is why you put the script on github and blog about it, that way there's a chance the script could save millions of times the amount of time it took to write.
I've worked at a few startups in the past and can give you this history:

1) First one was an ISP, boot-strapped. 4 years. Mildly profitable, sold to a larger ISP.

2) The next one was a short stint with a e-retailer. They were almost immediately profitable, but needed some serious cash to grow. So it sold within a couple of years and the founders all still work there. It's wildly profitable now, but alas none of the founders can capitalize on that success outside of a steady job.

3) Next one was a NLP middle-ware company (yes, they exist) that had been around for more than a decade, I came in near the end and worked there for 3 years. It sold right after I left (I didn't have equity). I believe it was unprofitable.

4) After a few years bouncing around mega-corporations I came back to startup land. We're 4 years in. Just hit profitability this year and then the Congressional funding disaster hit (we're almost entirely government business). We're going to see if we can make it through, but we may end up selling.

5) My wife and I just launched our new company www.kymalabs.com (her main job, my part-time job). We'll see how long that goes! We'd actually like it to grow enough to pay our bills and give us long-term employment, but who knows!
Thanks, but I think these are all the articles that I've commented on .. not the articles that I've upvoted.
A philosophy of clean data
This explains why nintendo has been so cocky about the piracy issue with the 3DS. They think they can arbitrarily nuke the systems of 'pirates'.

Of course, this will also nuke homebrew completely, as they generally rely on R4 carts or similar.

This is just another shot in the war about who owns your hardware. I look forward to the class action lawsuits. I will refuse to buy a DS until this comes to a head. I am a game developer and I like messing around with hardware when I can. I won't buy a 3DS if I run the risk of bricking it by being curious.
It's like a search engine not indexing anonymous sites because they don't want to invent use a page rank or some other classification.

The TC change inhibit me for commenting again. I don't like to correlate my FB user with TC, FB is a more private stuff for me and far from my "hacker life".

Also, posting anonymously or with a user not correlated with your real life is something good about Internet. I believe that this is a big mistake from TC.
The author presumably went to college and in addition lives in the era of the internet. He thus has access to the most powerful educational sources in the history of human civilization. Many people simply will not be educated. Especially if they are rewarded for ignorance. There comes a certain threshold of incoherence where a person should be simply ignored. They are being disrespectful of their listeners. Of course then I see them upvoted on hacker news, where the average IQ is probably a standard deviation above the norm. In situations like this ridicule is the correct response if it alerts people who might not know any better from paying attention. I am over correcting for the lack of ridicule of stupid ideas that is the norm.

Fox News should be insulted and ridiculed, and so should similarly formatted ignorance from the left. There is no reason why simple fact checking and logical coherence shouldn't be the cultural standard in the age of wikipedia at our fingertips.
NodeJS already provides some tools to delegate work to processes. I think it is just more low level than the framework he describes.
I'm getting a "There was an error with your request" when I try "music" in italian.

Looks cool, I'm interested in this.
I went through a length evaluation process of Riak recently, and came away with a generally positive impression.

First of all, it's beautifully engineered, as long as you just need a KV store or a graph DB (I wasn't in love with the MapReduce stuff, but that's another story). None of the hassle that Hadoop/Hbase have about some nodes being special (HBase Master, HDFS Namenode, etc). Also, no running multiple daemons per server (e.g., no distinction between regionserver and datanode daemons, like HBase). Easy config files, simple HTTP API (so you can just throw an off the shelf load balancer like HAProxy in front of it), and lots of little things that just make life easier.

I also really like how it's very explicit about the CAP tradeoffs it makes - with powerful conflict resolution available for when consistency has been sacrificed (instead of trying to sweep the issue under the rug, like many other distributed dbs do).

However, there are a few downsides.

First, as mentioned in the article, with the default backend (a kv-store called 'bitcask') all the keys per node have to fit in memory (and each key has, on the order of, 20 bits of overhead, IIRC). Annoyingly, this fact isn't noted anywhere in the Riak documentation that I saw (although, there is a work-around by using the InnoDB backed). This won't matter too much for many use cases, but it can be pretty painful if you're not expecting it.

Second, you can guard against data loss by specifying N copies of each piece of data are stored on your cluster. However, under some conditions (https://issues.basho.com/show_bug.cgi?id=228), the data may be replicated on less than N distinct nodes. So, the failure of less than N nodes could result in dataloss.

Finally, to the best of my knowledge, the largest Riak clusters in production are around 60 nodes, while Hadoop has 2000 node clusters running (e.g., FB) in production. Perfectly acceptable for most users, but just one more thing to worry about if you're planning to roll out a large cluster (more potential for 'unknown unknowns', so to speak).
"The socially outgoing and confident worker will always outperform his socially awkward counterpart of equal intelligence."

I think you missed the point of the article.
If you compare the price with solutions without the syncing experience, you can e.g. get a 100GB package from Strato HiDrive for 5EUR a month.
(edit:) or 500GB for 10EUR/month.
"Let's not turn every corner of the internet back into real life." Great point, could be the start of a manifesto!
I don't have the citation to hand, but I'm pretty sure the research came from the Sutton Trust who specialize in this area.
Fact-free science
Damn, there I was hoping this might be an updated version that fixed all the flaws in the original test that people pointed out.
Ask HN: Anyone else going to the AWS S3 Conference in London next Thurs?
He's referring to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhtml I'm not sure what DHTML you are thinking of that would be server-side.
2. Face to face only works in areas with high startup density. Not sure if it really matters?
Arguably many of the people who lead/manage now don't deserve to.
It's a little difficult to interpret, but that's 0.6 billion units shipped, not $0.6 billion.
Don't mean to ask something personal, but curious to know how much you sold it for. A relative figure in % to your yearly pay before would be fine too.
This is what I did too. I used the little plastic notches (probably not the right term) that you screw into the wall to mount bathroom mirrors.

Two huge white boards, flat, easy to remove, < $30.
Myself and a few colleagues are going along, would be cool to meet up with some fellow HN members for a beer or two.
Well, internet connected, always on, multi-player game consoles will not go back to the way things used to be. I bought the most recent SFIV for PS3 and it wouldn't let me play it until I did a system update, but that system update wanted to delete my Linux partition. We pay more money for toys that in the end own us and try to keep us in their sandbox. Just imagine if car makers and insurance companies colluded to detect that you're driving into a high risk neighborhood, your rates go up. Piracy is becoming a term describing plain disobedience to overly strict rules.
Four Attacks on OAuth - How to Secure Your OAuth Implementation
I knew what Oneiric was, but not Ocelot. It seems to be a kind of leopard native to Central and Southern America.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocelot
"Profit" as in after everyone gets paid?
Macintosh Project Genesis and History: 1981 Memo
A Physicist Experiments With Cultural Studies (1996 hoax)
"The difference is that children of wealth traverse it at a height of one meter over a mattress, while the middle-class and poor traverse it at a height of 20 meters over a lava pit."

I notice no one is commenting on this part. Namely, that for children of financial privilege, the risk/reward ratio for a career is markedly skewed compared to their middle class peers.
@cubtastic71 great idea!

@frankdenbow we definitely have more ideas and designs to announce after we come back from SxSW this year.

Thanks @ck2 for sharing this.

Took a lot of learnings from other fellow HN posts (ie. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2176771), and will share my own learnings pretty soon. =D
IPhone App Business Marketing Activities
Just started a mobile app business (iOS & Android) and I have decided to share my experience with everyone. Started working on the first app almost 3 months ago and I hope to submit the app in 2 weeks. Currently I am focusing on marketing activities. Here are some thoughts http://tukulogics.com/blog/ (Part 1 & 2). None of these are proven for me but I want to try all of them. Ideas are mostly compilation from reading 3 app marketing books and from online research. I would love to hear your feedback. So, let me know what you guys think

Part 1 - http://tukulogics.com/blog/?p=50
Part 2 - http://tukulogics.com/blog/?p=63
About a year and a half. 4-5 months into it, we pivoted quickly (back before anyone called it pivoting). We had investors, and mostly living off "ramen noodles." At 10 months in, we turned it on to make money. I still remember the fun of getting our first paying customer, and then checking everything over and over again to make sure everything went well. It wasn't until late spring of next year that we started seeing real progress and upward momentum, and could support and our operation without needing investment.
Good article. Although instead of writing "A browser that doesn’t support Javascript ..." (implying some failure or deficiency in the browser) he might have written "For users who selectively disable Javascript ..."
This service apparently runs a Markdown-to-HTML converter on your Dropbox subdirectory whenever you change a Markdown file.

What about client-side rendering of Markdown? You'd have an HTML file which includes a separate Markdown-to-HTML converting JavaScript, and an invisible pre containing the markdown. That HTML file, consisting mostly of Markdown text, can then be edited in a simple text editor.
Lisa Stone, CEO BlogHer, Practice Makes Perfect Raising Venture
El raro vuelo del águila
Indeed. Currently you can do that. In my case I simply use Facebook as a photo-sharing site. That's all the interest I have in it.

Sites that require a Facebook login (as some startups create) get instantly closed. Sites that offer Facebook login have that option ignored. Sites that nag you about using that feature (eg tv.com) make me irate.

But comments takes things a step further. What if you get widespread adoption of Facebook comments to the point that you can't comment on most things without logging on to Facebook?

At that point it's getting to the point where either Facebook is your online identity or you have no online identity.
Do you have any evidence or case studies to back up your claim? That rich kids earn more than middle class kids on average?
www.whiteyboard.com/index.php -- perhaps?
Mobile Messaging Startup Kik Raises $8M; Launches Group Chat And Photo Sharing
Thanks for this, I really like this type of post.
Isn't this why many providers are moving to OAuth2? Complexity of implementing and lack of security?
Top iPad Finance Apps 2010 | Tricks Window
Im 3 years in and still not ramen profitable. Sadly, I have been working hard at it for 3 years and still no where near where I want it to be. But I am only one person.
Google announces bitcoinj: a bitcoin implementation in Java
From the bitcoin.org forum: "Google is pleased to announce the release of BitCoinJ, an implementation of the BitCoin system in Java. You can get it here under the Apache 2 license."

I suspect this is maybe not Google the corporation but a Google employee using their 20% time.
Clerks do get charged in the U.S. fairly regularly, depending on the state. In many states, it's a strict-liability offense to sell alcohol to a minor, without the prosecutor having to prove intent. Usually the clerk is exempted from liability if the minor showed a fake ID (that wasn't so bad as to be obviously fake), or if the minor looked clearly over 26 or 30, or whatever the state's threshhold must-ask-for-ID age is. If it's a 20-year-old who didn't clearly look 30+, though, and you didn't ask for ID, it's a criminal offense (in some states).
why is that shocking?
Not to sound heartless but doctors, nurses and medication are expensive. Treatment for cancer is expensive. People who work in healthcare deserve to get paid, right?
Houses are usually people's largest source of savings. So when people deplete their savings to save their life, why is it shocking?
You have a requirement, now you need a specification, until you can specify the needs accurately it is impossible to design a solution. So now you need to ask questions regarding the algorithms that will be used, what hardware can they be run on, CPUs, GPUs? What size are the datasets? What sort of speed is needed? What constraints are there, such as cost? Etc. As for hardware manufacturers, you might look at Supermicro and Appro, it really depends on your needs.
Time-based Video Metadata & how it's Monetized
From the bitcoin.org forum: "Google is pleased to announce the release of BitCoinJ, an implementation of the BitCoin system in Java. You can get it here under the Apache 2 license."

I suspect this is maybe not Google the corporation but a Google employee using their 20% time.

Edit: I could be wrong, according to the IRC chat, it is an "official" project: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/fyzhk/google_is_ple...
Is there precedent for this? I can recall stories about getting cut off from a service if modding is detected but not about this sort of thing.
The bank does not own your mortgaged house. They have a claim on it when it comes time to liquidate. It's easy to see that the homeowner "owns" the house: they can rent it to anyone else at any rate, raising rates as the market changes; the bank is stuck with the terms of the 30 year mortgage.
Yes, the catch-all use of 'piracy' is becoming as much a problem as the 'piracy' itself.
No, his point was that rich kids have better attitudes, skills and perceived work ethic which is simply not true.

"Middle-class kids generally fuck up their first few years of the career game in one of two ways." - really??
Last hit for me: launched solo in 1998, self-sustaining though I didn't make any money personally (kept folding it back in, worked programming contracts to live), got angel funding in 2000 and popped staff to 14, first profitable month in March 2001. Became consistently profitable in October 2001 and never again went into the red. Sold to a venture firm in 2006.

Current biz: launched in 2009. Still working on profitability. This is a long tail business so I've learned I need to be patient.
Skype Rolls Out Advertisements In Windows Client
Firefox 4 would rather you write getters and setters the old fashioned way for every single object you create than reference objects’ member variables directly via dot-notation.

Bizarre, but it really emphasizes that where implementation performance is concerned, you have to test, test, test, and test some more. Your intuition about what is fast and what is slow is probably 99% correct. But the other 1% may surprise the whumpus out of you.

Also, I would consider things like this to be highly unstable unless I read a white paper from the implementation team saying that this is by design. If you hurriedly remove all of your dot references and replace them with functions, you may find a point release of the implementation changes everything again.

You have control over your implementation on the server, but users can upgrade their browsers at will without consulting you first :-)

p.s. Did I miss it, or did they only test browsers without looking at server implementation like V8 or Rhino?
Thbthbthbthbthbhtbthhtbhtt.
I hope someone figures out how to set off the bricking process on other people's systems. That way, there'll be a huge controversy which will put this procuedure in question.

Nintendo can make some great games, but their business decisions have a habit of being borderline tyrannical. They have this attitude that they're doing everyone a favor by existing.
Not for completely disabling hardware, no. The closest would be the risk of bricking your PSP but putting on custom firmware, but generally that was just a software issue or a user screwup, not a systemic attempt by a device manufacturer to screw the customer.

The closest is as you say, Xbox Live cutting you off from service if your console is modded.
Computational X
Ok, how about:

"Show me statistics that say rich kids are socially outgoing and more confident than middle class kids."
JavaScript Getters/Setters Considered Slow

"considered harmful" is link bait
Public radio decides it's time to chase trolls away
Or Revolver Ocelot, if you didn't totally block out MGS2 from your memory...
May want to add a DNS record so it works without the www: http://kymalabs.com/
Moonageddon: on March 19, the moon will reach lunar perigree
Reminds me of Otto's Mops:
http://audiopoetry.wordpress.com/2007/04/05/ottos-mops/
I don't understand how this works ... what does this accomplish ?

They're remaining on the same spot in the list.
I wonder if making trivial tasks look monumental really makes people more interested in programming.
Yup, I actually did this same thing this weekend! It was a little over $10 a sheet (not $5 as you say), but that's nothing compared to OfficeMax quoting me $163 for a 4x6 foot (framed) whiteboard.

$13.04 for a 4x8 sheet at Lowes: <a href="http://www.lowes.com/pd_16605-46498-300_0__?productId=301523... 1/8"D x 4'W x 8'H Trifty White Hardboard Wall Panel, Item #: 16605</a>

Or, they also stock a 32"x48" piece ( <a href="http://www.lowes.com/pd_61082-46498-31023248_0__?productId=3... #: 61082</a> ) if you just want one for a cube wall.

Note that this won't be magnetic. The OfficeMax representative said that the magnetic variety was around 3x as expensive as the non-magnetic. Comparing $13.04 to $489, I think I can make that sacrifice.

I'm cheap, but I secured mine to every other stud (32") with some polebarn screws I had on hand (nice white hex head, rubber washer to avoid crushing the hardboard). That way, I just have to spackle and repaint 8 little holes, instead of re-doing the drywall. Cheaper in the long run!

Oh, and it works great as a whiteboard.
Venture capital gets disrupted (in a good way)
Blake, this list is fantastic! It is good to see that they drive home the point of mixing the tech side and business side in order to build a great company. I sit somewhere in the middle (more towards business/hustler) while my partner is more of the hacker... having that synergy between us allows us to get multiple points of view and ultimately make more effective decisions.
Maybe a little smaller than a leopard. :)

Ocelot: The ocelot ranges from 68 to 100 centimetres (27 to 39 in) in length, plus 26 to 45 centimetres (10 to 18 in) tail length, and typically weighs 8 to 18 kilograms (18 to 40 lb)

Leopard: Head and body length is between 125 and 165 cm (49 and 65 in), and the tail reaches 60 to 110 cm (24 to 43 in). Shoulder height is 45 to 80 cm (18 to 31 in). Males are about 30% larger than females, weighing 30 to 91 kg (66 to 200 lb) compared to 23 to 60 kg (51 to 130 lb) for females.
There's also millions of low-end mobile devices that can reach the web but don't support javascript.
> Just imagine if car makers and insurance companies colluded to detect that you're driving into a high risk neighborhood, your rates go up.

Or worse, that your car simply stops working if you make any aftermarket modifications to it. Try to add a sunroof and your car spontaneously gets cinderblocked.
I make it a point not to lie or exaggerate on my resume. This puts the burden on me to do things that are actually worth telling the truth about.
You're correct, we didn't test on server implementations like V8 and Rhino... You make a good point though, it would be interesting to test the results in those environments.
If this link is accurate, then it should be as simple as popping your R4 cart in and booting a game, then quitting.
I noticed that in the beginning of the article, he uses the I-want-to-sound-like-computer English, eg "place cup on hallway table" and "pick up coffee pot". Towards the end, he becomes more effusive, and friendly to his articles, eg "hold the kettle with the spout over the coffee filter". This inconsistency is a clue that he didn't take time to try to step back and see it as a whole. Perhaps he should have imagined a nagging mother-in-law telling him how to do this ("and don't spill any coffee grounds on my clean counter, and don't forget to turn off the stove when you're done I don't want my house burned down just because you want to pretend to be a pioneer.").

Also, "define such-and-such" is computerese, not really how one would express this in English. Something like "when I say such-and-such, what I mean is do these things in order..." or "this is how you such-and-such" might be better.

All-in-all, though, an interesting exercise.
Post-mortem: the results of giving away my PHP software for free
This article just now taught me how to make coffee.
BCC was profitable within about a month of conception and has been since then.

AR will, knock on wood, probably hit cash-flow positive in May (about six months after launch) and pay back development costs in a month or two after that. I was originally targeting 12 months for surpassing BCC & consulting but, knock on wood, I have since learned something about my market which may make that pessimistic.