skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
The place has been just hit by an 8.9 earthquake and a tsunami. If I had to list reasons why not to go over there, my concern over likelihood of natural disasters is much higher than concern of nuclear accidents.

All else being equal, I wouldn't mind moving close to a nuclear plant. The thing is, power plants (in general) are built in less hospitable places. So it's never "equal" to begin with.
"Long-term" is a long time. The next few years? Maybe. The next hundred? Of course not.
Music Theory for Experts - Leonard Bernstein at Harvard (video excerpt)
I don't want an iPhone. I like my Android phone a lot, it's just a big pain in the ass sometimes, mostly due to a lack of attention to detail in the design.

You've sidestepped #1 entirely, so I'll leave that be.

#2, I have over 100 apps, most of which came with the phone and/or are components of other things. It's like your grandma's Windows desktop in there. It's not much of a pain to get things more usable on the home panes, it's just a UX headache that doesn't need to exist.

And as for inconsistency, the original article was talking about inconsistency among different apps, not phones/UIs.
If you're referring to the physical jack, then, essentially, no. They were standardised in the 1970s, and the form factor hasn't changed at all, while electronic parts have become much much smaller over the same time frame.

There may have been advances within the connector itself, to improve the signal-carrying properties of the internal connections, but the overall design of the connector is basically unchanged.
If this happened today, you wouldn't need to go after Bayer in this case, just the individuals at Bayer that are responsible. If John, Mike and Jane all belong to the same club, and Mike murders someone while in the bathroom at the club, do you collectively punish the whole club, or do you go after Mike? A corporation is not essentially different in this context.

In this case, it's up to a court to decide if people knew enough about HIV in 1984 and 1985 to make the right call. HIV had only been discovered in 1983, and that very little was known about it at the time. It's easy to look at this in hindsight and think badly of them, with everything we've since learned about it, but that's not the standard by which they must be judged because omniscience cannot be the standard of knowledge by which we judge anyone.

Putting people in jail outside of this context (e.g., when there isn't any evidence that they've done anything wrong) kills innovation because it severely punishes any risk-taking (which is another word for innovation).
So, is it currently possible to run the Replicant fork of Android on a Motorola Droid on the Verizon network? I would like to give that a try, if so.

This page says how to port Replicant to a new phone, but not which phones and networks it's been done for.

http://trac.osuosl.org/trac/replicant/wiki/How_to_port_Repli...
Yes, it would get the competition going again, but I think it may be China that have the determination and drive to pull that one off (if they keep to their schedule). Although the US has been known to pull a few rabbits out of their hats from time to time. But perhaps not as willing to take risks any more and that may be what is needed.
previously submitted:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2323841
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2321408
This seems like the most plausible explanation to me.
Twitter: 140 million tweets per day and counting
Biz Stone Joins Huffington Post, AOL As Strategic Adviser
It's one thing to ship MVC & Silverlight as unsupported projects and iterate fast, but quite another to iterate phone software quickly where you could potentially brick millions of phones with one small software update.

As noted in this blog post, an update applied to the phone broke it and the user had to get a brand new phone. This added a customer service burden to the mobile provider / network - which in turn means they will moan to Microsoft when they do this and give them less enthuiasm for WP7 devices in future if it keeps happening.
Mobile Devices Driving Local News Consumption
If you can generate $100k revenue from your maid/pool boy/gardener business, why not?
>So my company retains copyright but licenses ddar to the public under the terms of the GNU GPL 3. Thus there is no disclaimer to sign, since my company still claims copyright.

A disclaimer isn't needed now that it's clear in the COPYING file that TBL Ltd (the copyright holder) is the one publishing it. Thanks for clearing the air.
Regardless, TeX failed for the masses because it was too complicated to begin with (the masses are not programmers, nor are they interested in "programming" their documents). WYSIWYG word processors and desktop publishing software do a decent enough job quickly with a learning curve orders of magnitude shallower, and rightly so since it's the learning curve that poses the greatest barrier to entry.

And while many attempts have been made to flatten that curve with various tools, I'm hard pressed to find a compelling competitor to Microsoft Word or OpenOffice in terms of ease-of-use.

People in general are far more interested in the final result than the "beauty" of the steps to produce that result, especially when it comes to the written word.
The OpenMoko does not run all free code, and neither does any other shipping cellular device. The code in the baseband processor is very specifically NOT open on anything. In most cases, neither is the GPS. This is because, iirc, that the FCC requires it to be that way, for spectrum licensing and usage reasons.
Make good use of your summer vacation. Mow some lawns, rake, do whatever you can to get paid in cash, then open starter checking and savings accounts. If you need to buy things online (hosting, etc), get a prepaid Visa card from your local drug store.
Driving a car doesn't produce large, economical quantities of electricity either, it's about managed risk and cost-benefit considerations.
Finally! Very welcome and highly wished for.

Interestingly there seems to be an error: a spike on Jan 1st to almost double the regular installs, getting back to the normal number on Jan 2nd (confirmed on a number of apps).
Well in that sense I'd say that "ft[j/1000](j + 1)" is a conditional too.
The Startup Fix - Get visual help for your startup
The Startup Fix is a little project where I will take couple of hours per week of my own personal time to help a startup. I will do so by helping them on an aspect that I think is lacking in most of startups nowadays: the visual aspect. Logo, fonts, colours, layout, user interface, Twitter, Facebook, newsletters, call-to-actions, you name it.

If you have a startup and want to be a part of this, well here is your chance to submit your application. I am now taking applications for April 2011.

If you don;t need this service, but know some people who would, just spread the word.

Thank-you!
What's so special about Y Combinator?
James Surowiecki: Scrimmage - Owner's versus Players in NFL's Labor Dispute
Homeownership should not be part of the American Dream
Zune Hardware is Now Dead
Kass: A Contagion of Black Swans
Tarsnap is not open source, so I intentionally avoided looking at the code to avoid any doubt over provenance. I imagine it would be harder, since Tarsnap is backed by S3 and AIUI Colin's own transactional storage layer to make it work with S3.
Why User Experience Cannot Be Designed
They do indeed have some conversion stations, but these stations are already working at full capacity trying to support the kantou area grid (which is having rolling blackouts due to power plant shutdowns). They're also probably not very portable.
Bubbles are produced by rational small-scale behavior. That's the fascinating thing about bubbles. The "greater fool" theory is frequently a good bet. Except, of course, when there is no greater fool and you're left holding the bag.

More importantly, outside events or circumstances could mean there isn't money in the right place to be able correct market price mistakes.
I don't think the author was so much defending it as explaining the point of view. If you're fanatically devoted to your product, then it's more important than any of the people along the way, with all of the good and bad things that that entails.
Before saying that nuclear power isn't safe enough, consider where we get most of our electricity from today: coal. Coal may have been around a long time, but it is far more dangerous than nuclear power. The fly ash produced by coal burning often contains substantial concentrations of uranium (not too bad) and radium (very bad), as well as all sorts of other toxic but non-radioactive chemicals like lead.

Although there is a lot more net radiation coming from all the fly ash we produce that there is from our nuclear reactors, the EPA doesn't bother to treat fly ash as hazardous waste, so most people don't think it's scary. This means we already have a bunch of radioactive waste dumped into our landfills without much oversight at all.

While nuclear waste is very dangerous, there isn't a whole lot of it, and it's quite safe when it's stored properly in a radiation-sealed container. It doesn't end up in our landfills, or our air supply. It's a point source of pollution, which makes it much easier to take care of, and it is much nicer to leave future generations some concentrated, shielded radioactive waste in remote areas than to leave them tons of low-level waste in their water supply.

I'm an advocate of solar energy, and nuclear power is a hell of a lot less safe than I'd like. But as long as we're burning coal, we should be worried more about the risks of that, even though they may be less scary-seeming, because they truly are more dangerous.
Not if you have a human life span.

Aha - there's our problem!
My process is something like this:

1. Start with code centered around pure functions. This is a really good default for your project. It gives you flexibility, completely DRY code, and an easy way to think about concurrency.

2. Store large datasets or shallow objects inside maps. They can be efficient and work really well with functions, especially in languages like Python and Clojure. They're even more useful when, for example, they have a literal dot notation (Javascript) for keys.

3. Sometimes, though, it's just easier to structure data inside of objects. Having a map of maps of maps is fine, but projects can quickly become confusing--at least in my experience. The problem is especially bad if multiple people are coding around maps without any enforced structure or validation on creation. In these cases, objects can make things simple and (often) more unified. When I use objects, though, it's good to avoid mutable state. I think of an object as a handy, unified interface to a map, but with the following extras in a unified way:

- A constructor, potentially with sensible defaults
- Validations and sensible fallbacks
- Data-specific error messages
- Methods that are closely related to the data it
holds (and always return the object itself, so
chaining is simple)

In my perspective, building code using functions and organizing it around objects is a nice middle point. It's optimized for both productivity and order, especially if you're careful to avoid state.
I think you've totally nailed the naiveté of the OP. The reason both statements are ludicrous is that they judge the person in question outside the applicable context. Hitler was a brilliant leader and speaker, but he was a monster in other aspects. Horror stories about Steve Jobs abound, generally coming from people not working day in day out with him. The fact that he is a narcissistic, egotistical guy ("I'll be employee zero, then") has nothing to do with him being a bad boss in this sense.
If this is anything more than a bug, it's really troubling. There is really no possible justification for not allowing full screen web apps to have access to the Nitro engine.
Thanks alot for sharing this. Was looking for this for my webapp. Couldn't locate Facebook forms...pls help
It's not a personal attack and now you're using a strawman argument to deflect my response (I'm not saying you don't have a right to voice a personal opinion, simply that you aren't looking at this objectively). If you read the link I posted you'll see that what you think is a "large downside risk" only seems that way because of a perception fallacy - we believe incidents like nuclear explosions and airplane crashes are much riskier than everyday risks like lung cancer deaths and car accidents.
I had the opinion once that he was a crackpot who had attracted a following. Today, he seems - while still appearing a little eccentric - at least to have an ability to discern computing issues far out on the horizon. I don't think his reasonings can be discarded without a careful analysis.
Functional programming does scale very well conceptually, and you've been using it for quite some time. It's just had a different name:

Unix Pipes

I believe using them to compose several small programs together to get a new solution has been fairly well documented :)
The difference between Chernobyl and Everything Else
Any feedback from anyone is appreciated. I'm trying to engage people who aren't able to follow more technical discussions about this nuclear plant crisis, so don't talk about micro-sieverts unless you're willing to explain exactly what everything means.
this is good. I like it!
Since it's not present in UIWebViews either, sounds like a bug that it's only available to Safari, rather than a grand conspiracy theory. UIWebViews are pretty important to a lot of native app development.
Live from Seattle Swedish, it’s knee-replacement surgery
Define fast and big.
7 years of foreign occupation occurred, with all the good and bad that comes with it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_Japan
The article itself is basically a wrapper around a Hacker News post where this was previously discussed.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2317804
I must say I didn't like the authors cocksure attitude that "Most of the people dislike the syntax of Obj-C and it does slow down development".

And also, the whole discussion turned into a discussion about exactly how dynamically typed something is, and that feels quite irrelevant to what he tried to show.
Sure, can you tell me more?
'People' have not died because of the reactor problems - there has been one reported fatality due to a crane accident. And do you have a source for "the containment vessel is now broken in one reactor"? A site linked elsewhere in these comments (http://mitnse.com/) reports that the suppression chamber in one reactor may be damaged but that's not 'the containment vessel'.

I agree with your desire to stop the FUD, but be careful you don't spread it yourself.
Yes, certainly the initial loss of life is the worst part of this. But there are still many more lives at risk, and not from radiation.

The radiation most civilians see from a BWR steam release will be measured in microsieverts -- one CT scan equals thousands of those. The cleanup workers are going to be at higher risk, but I think it's safe to say none of them will die from the doses they are receiving. Ultimately, the danger from radiation in this case is vastly outweighed by the other dangers associated with a flooded area with no power, and that's what is so unfortunate about the media coverage about Fukushima; it's overshadowing the real ongoing danger to human lives.
Verizon’s HTC ThunderBolt finally official; $249.99, March 17th
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that a fully free cell phone OS is preventing you from being tracked. Even if free software was bug/backdoors free (I'm not sure about it). How do you connect to the network? Through a SIM-card, with an ID, linked to your cell-phone contract. And whatever goes on the broadband/network of your cell phone contract provider is free to read for him. You don't initiate your phone calls with an exchange of GPG keys with your contact, nor do you register your contract with a fake name. The only solution for that is the combination of a prepaid SIM in cash with encrypted VOIP on 3G+.
It's not a technology problem, it's a people problem.

The technology works incredibly well. And in Japan, the people are well trained and prepared, and I have every confidence that they'll be able to cool the reactors down without releasing much radiation into the environment, as long as nothing else goes wrong.

Now take that exact same reactor and build it in Iran, Bangladesh, Congo, Libya. Do you have the same confidence in it? Japan was a best-case scenario.
Previously discussed here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2317804
Any word on performance properties of various network topologies. What topology would provide absolute maximum network performance between instances?
The more money there is, the more people will take a crack at it. It's sort of like the App Store and the explosion of great indie apps.
I'm curious about what I view as two contradictory points in the article: If I create my own language/syntax layers as I go through the various layers of my program, how does that make it more maintainable?

This obviously works for the single programmer, who understands the code he's written (assuming he/she hasn't been away from the code too long), but what happens when you have to maintain someone else's code? If I have to jump into a particular spot on the code to solve a problem, how do I know you've defined <+- as some special monad?

As a maintenance programmer, it seems like I'd have to learn a whole new language with each program I have to maintain. (and I, the hypothetical maintenance programmer, am probably not as smart as the original programmer).
Which critical bug fixes are these? I've owned and used a WP7 since a few days after launch, all of the bugs are in the "annoyance" category, I don't know of any absolute show-stoppers.
> The problem is especially bad if multiple people are coding around maps without any enforced structure or validation on creation.

Using a functional style doesn't mean you can't use constructors, and constructors don't necessarily mean you have to use objects.
"I've done a ridiculous amount of reading the past few days, and I still believe that nuclear power is probably the best source of power that we have available to us."

The best source of power that we have is to use energy more efficiently.
As Design Talent Rises, Standing Out Becomes Nearly Impossible
What would really make my iOS life easier is a good RSS client. I'm hoping for something that I can give a URL to and which will give me back an NSArray of dictionaries of entires, or something like that.

Too much to ask? Or should I just go the XML parsing route? (which seems like it would be a lot of work and brittle) I've not yet dug into this, but this is the next set of functionality I have to work on.
Off topic-ish:

Is inventables actually just linkbait garbage which happens to also sell things? They never list the vendor of their products, the prices are always high (often twice that of retail), and they never have any technical details or volume pricing.

Oh, you're interested in this Sorghum based "Non-Toxic Decorative Wood Composite?" [1] Well, you can buy a 4"x3" sample for $15 but they won't tell you who makes it (Kieri USA [2] does) or the cost for boards.

The manufacturer is usually only a Google search away, and I'm willing to pay a premium for a small sample, but I'm not going to order even samples unless I can get more detailed information. Does Inventables actually serve any purpose other than to act as linkbait for a bunch of interesting products?

[1] http://www.inventables.com/technologies/non-toxic-decorative...
[2] http://www.kireiusa.com
"Most software today is very much like an Egyptian pyramid with millions of bricks piled on top of each other, with no structural integrity, but just done by brute force and thousands of slaves."

Brilliant. :)
I used to trade logo/web design work for hosting and domain registrations (before I had a paypal account). I'm sure you could trade programming work for those too.
I will offer a possible explanation that might not be popular. There are certainly bad bosses, but there are many more bad employees. Many employees will not be happy with any boss. These people want a friend and not a boss. Even people outside of this group generally try to avoid confrontation. Avoiding confrontation seems to be the main goal of the average corporate employee and it leads to bad work. I am personally willing to tolerate a lot of flaws in a leader if he or she is actually a good leader. I think that Jobs may fall in that category.
Google Analytics Location Tracking Changes: Where Has London Gone?
I think it says even more of Jobs in that he recognized a visionary in Lasseter and was smart enough to just get out of his way.

So, he's a meta-visionary? That's what the real angels are, the ones that succeed, and the rest are cargo-cult wannabes. (Perhaps some also-rans who had a little bad luck?)

I'm beginning to see more and more that people with entrepreneurial mindsets need entire sets of strategies for dealing with people who are without the mindset. Maybe this is the reason why Jobs has a reputation, because his strategy is to not suffer fools.

It seems like most people in workaday communications are accustomed to filtering out unnecessary BS, taking the one or two relevant points and acting on them. I can see how this is useful, but if they ever start working for someone who only sends a few relevant pieces of information, they're still in the habit of filtering out!

This can lead to infuriating situations.

An example: I send out an email to my assistants. I need someone to complete a transaction in thus and such a timeframe. They need to get this device from me and meet with the other party. I tell them it's an 88 key MIDI keyboard, I give the product number, and instruct my assistants to Google it, so they know exactly what it is. I give the other party's contact information. Let me know if you can handle it.

I get no answer from one assistant, but the other emails back and says he'll be by to pick it up. He comes by, looks at it, then tells me he can't do it, and looks at me like I'm stupid because it won't fit in his vehicle. ARRRRGH!

I have other examples. It seems to me some people are accustomed to ignoring 75% of communications.

(P.S. The gentleman is no longer my assistant.)
That Fool | Watch That Fool Korean Drama Online
Opera 11.50 preview with OpenGL / WebGL hardware acceleration
Google Voice SIP URI working again :)
For enterprise hosting, yes, I would. They are giants in the enterprise server industry, no reason for them not to be the same in the enterprise cloud industry (which has barely started to heat up).
I didn't "sidestep" anything. I specifically said I do not store music on my Android so I have no familiarity with it. It isn't sidestepping, its addressing my lack of familiarity with the matter. I mentioned the documents as an aside because its a good problem to have "I can't find my documents" vs "I can't even get documents on the damn thing."

Gotcha, thanks for the clarification on the inconsistency. A lot of people are talking about hardware inconsistency, so that is what I went with. For app inconsistency, I guess I don't use enough apps to notice a problem. The majority of the time I can open a brand new app and guess what will happen if I hit the menu button (a menu pops up), the home screen (I go to my android home), the back button (I go back in the interface), or the search button (if its an app that has some sort of searchability, then I can search). There are indeed cases where that doesnt work, but meh.
Link to part 2, which is Bernstein actually conducting the orchestra: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FLRcNJYSZE

Part 3 is short and especially poignant. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Il5tKqSJQgA
Yes, advocates are over promising on safety, but the incumbent alternatives (burning fossil fuels) have their own downsides with global impact.
Japan’s earthquake shifted balance of the planet
Startup Profile - Vignature (video-based electronic signatures)