skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
>"I don't know that Bing has "failed" yet, but I highly doubt it'll be anything other than one amongst many in the pack in 5 years."

For Microsoft, having a full featured reliable non-core product with measurable market share is a success because it allows Microsoft to offer vertical integration without the specter of anti-trust allegations - imagine the howling in DC and Europe if Bing controlled 70% of search (never mind the valley).

Bing's robustness helps Microsoft sell software and services, while it's modest market share keeps infrastructure costs lower and Microsoft's core revenue stream coming from areas other than search reduces the pressure to game search algorithms towards their advertisers in order to increase revenue in the way that Google does.

What the article shows is not that Microsoft is inept, but rather that they are able to create an internal unit with many elements of a startup, scale that unit massively, and then transition it into a solid corporate structure capable of surviving over the long term - in other words, the article shows that Microsoft was not only able to successfully foster internal entrepreneurship in order to quickly move into a new market and capture meaningful market share in the face of a mammoth, entrenched, and powerful rival which dominated the market, but also to consolidate that position swiftly before their rival could respond in a significant way.
Congrats and props to you for making the jump. First get your finances in order and get a rough idea of your runway (how many months you can live off of your savings or other sources of income).

Some other ideas are to get a mindmap of the possiblities of where you can take this idea.

Use the business model canvas to sketch out your initial business models and the possibilities of your idea (http://www.businessmodelgeneration.com/).

Start an action plan - I use Tony Robbins "OPA Method". Ask yourself, What's your desired Outcome (O), What's your "Purpose" (P) - why you're doing the idea and write doing all the reasons, and finally what are the concrete Actions (A) you specifically need to do to turn your idea into reality.
Do you think there is anything wrong with a system that places profits and dividends over transparency and principles? Didn't Fred make his move because he felt that what Apple was doing was wrong and that bothered him? And so you are saying that, since he is "an investor," it's his job to put aside right and wrong and focus only on returns?
That's a pet peeve of mine on here as well.

I also downvote identical comments where one party posted after another, but due to the comment sorting they wind up being displayed first and getting most of the upvotes that rightfully should have gone to the earlier but lower-karma poster.
>[kami] "For example in /r/programming, there used to be things such as posts with 91 comment karma and _0_ downvotes. This stuff doesn't exist anymore, the community has grown, become a lot less homogenous and more 'nay-sayers' have introduced themselves."

WRT Reddit what I've heard on the site is that they have an obfuscation system that adds downvotes and hides the current voting position. It would be impossible thus to see that a story had 91 upvotes and no downs as apparent downvotes are automatically added. It's supposed to be part of the system to prevent people from gaming karma scores.
But Backblaze aren't storing data on S3, they built their own storage pods. See first-level comments.
"why didn't you just protest and get a better deal before quitting it for good, since you gonna quit anyway?"

My reasons for leaving were strictly nonfinancial. I've socked away enough money to cover me about three years in NYC. I'm 24 now, so it makes sense for me to take some time off and figure out exactly what I want to do :)
"have to"?

I'm cheerfully imagining a conversation between myself and someone wanting a dowry for marrying my hypothetical daughter.
I left my job back in 2009 at the dumps of the financial crisis. Take a 2 months break, do something you've always wanted to do. I went to Hong Kong and partied for 2 months, recharging, before preparing for my current startup. No need to hurry, your next startup will consume you.
That's probably true, although parts of CS have an almost active aversion to new technology, especially on the UI side, which might be part of it. Sort of the stereotypical bearded Unix guru who doesn't want any of your damn newfangled touchscreens or GUI widgets near his computer science.

(I don't even really mean that negatively; my own computing style tends towards CLI, and/or "weird" window managers like dwm.)
Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Look, Mr. Scott, I'd love to explain everything to you, but the Captain wants this spectrographic analysis done by 1300 hours.

[La Forge goes back to work; Scotty follows slowly]

Scotty: Do you mind a little advice? Starfleet captains are like children. They want everything right now and they want it their way. But the secret is to give them only what they need, not what they want.

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Yeah, well, I told the Captain I'd have this analysis done in an hour.

Scotty: How long will it really take?

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: An hour!

Scotty: Oh, you didn't tell him how long it would really take, did ya?

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Well, of course I did.

Scotty: Oh, laddie. You've got a lot to learn if you want people to think of you as a miracle worker.
I used tools to help me focus and organize my work, such as google tasks, remember the milk, and especially RallyDev community edition (free).

at some point it hits you that 'you are your own boss' means you have to tell yourself what to do
Ask HN: Chicago-Area Startups
I live in Chicago and thought it would be interesting to get some perspective on startups in the area. What is your company? When did you start? Where in the Chicago area are you located?
It does! Didn't know that, thanks. :) I didn't check, given the name. ("til" and "drop" are names from k.)
The Book of Programming - The Two Aspects
Can you be much more detailed about:

1. Longevity of the data - when can it be deleted?

2. Damage resulting from losing a random 1TB

3. How often do you need access to the most commonly used TB, the 50th percentile TB and the least used TB

4. Is there a significant amount of duplicate data?

People have already left 40 comments and you haven't replied.
Free textures
I agree. It was only in the last year that I could use Bing as my primary search engine.
Ask HN: Any programmers with ADD? Share your experiences.
A little about myself: For the first 5 years of my professional life, I was a web designer but then found myself intrigued by coding. I didn't immediately know I had ADD. I knew something was different, just couldn't put my finger on what it was specifically. I started to suspect at around 21 years old that I had some ADD tenancies but I didn't pursue the diagnosis right away. I could never hold my concentration on projects that became tedious or too complex. To me, it felt like I was coming off as lazy to others. The truth was, I wanted to do a good job. I wanted to love every part of my project. I just couldn't. So I started to investigate...

A year ago I was officially diagnosed with ADD (inattentive sub-type) by my doctor and have been taking Concerta (methylphenidate derivative) - which has made such a big difference. My ambition now has a target. And for the first time in years, I have the motivation to work on a few ideas I have longed to work on.

Do you have ADD? Think you might? Do you program or work in the tech industry? Share your experiences! I would love to hear them.
Try this: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4940680/i-want-to-try-org...
The android ADB debugging protocol includes the ability to forward UNIX sockets over the usb link, so your phone has this facility built in.

http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/tools/adb.html...

Unless I have misunderstood the adb docs, it shouldnt be too hard to set up, even though it only seems to allow ports to be forwarded from the host to the phone, rather than the other way around. Nimble use of netcat/iptables should remedy this.

EDIT: people seem to be calling it "reverse tethering" and while it involves the adb, it doesnt use the port forwarding. See: http://blog.mycila.com/2010/06/reverse-usb-tethering-with-an...
Not rare at all.
First.. Let's assume you have enough money to get by for at least 6 months. And provide for anyone in your care. Including health insurance for emergencies. If you don't have money saved up, well, I'd try to get your day job back or something else, because you could be setting yourself and your family up for catastrophe.

That said, the first thing you need to do is to get your ideas down in writing somehow. Take a day or two if necessary. It's really important. Don't just "start coding" like other people are suggesting. Get organized first. If this idea was so good that you quit your day job, you should have no trouble writing down a few pages about what you're trying to accomplish. Call it a "business plan", or not, at this stage it doesn't matter. But at least write down what you want to do, who will buy it and why, and who your competitors are.

I started to write a bunch of stuff about how to plan out your business, and then I realized that it would be easier for you to just get Four Steps to the Ephiphany by Steve Blank - it's full of worksheets that will help guide you through these early stages.

It sounds like you might need to meet some technical people to help you build your idea. You can meet them here on Hacker News, but it's far better to go to meetups in your area and meet real developers in person. The best developers will want to take some ownership in this part of the business, rather than just being told what to build.

Try to build relationships with people and tell them about your idea. If it's in a space that they're interested in, you'll find people who want to work with you, and at this stage it will be helpful to be able to bounce ideas off of others. Seek out the kinds of people who will tell you what's wrong with your idea or poke holes in it.

Hope this was helpful, and good luck!
Everybody's an inventor
That's why we were using complexity estimates in points (say 1 to 5) instead of actual time estimates in my last startup. Once you have some worklog, it's easy to calculate how many points the team can get done in a week (or whatever your estimation cycle is). This little abstraction made estimates much more reliable.

I guess some "agile" methodologies propose a similiar approach, but we didn't really follow any specific one, just figured out what works best as we moved along and kept the process as lean as possible.
Move to NY. There are tons of top paying Python jobs in NY - including many web-related positions.
Representative democracy now represents lobbyists rather than voters. Media now represents corporate interests rather than the public interest.

NOW represents? That suggests that it has changed sometime in the last century. But from everything that I have read, the corruption is actually less today than it was a hundred years ago.

Pretty much anyone I talk to, regardless of their political persuasion, doesn't feel the system is working.

Oh the system is working, alright. It just isn't working for _you_. :-P
How can i get traffic to my new blog?
It is funny that you mention architects because, my job title where I work is "Architect".

I totally agree with you in that it is the people that is the most important of all things. Tools are just tools and processes are just processes, it is the people when given right tools and shown right processes that make all the difference.
The author makes the point nicely at the front: "because the nature of the work is creating."

I'm not a developer but I can confidently say that it's not just developers - NO ONE can estimate time when it comes to creative work. I use the term creative loosely, it could be anything from developing a business strategy, to crafting a story, to art directing an original visual, to writing code for a novel problem.

The problem is the same one that makes it difficult to say "when will we have a cure for Parkinson's," "when will we have fusion power," "when will we discover a viable alternative energy"? You often see estimates like 20 years, 40 years, 50 years - but properly interpreted, these aren't actual estimates of the amount of time it will take, but rather like a proxy for a much more probabilistic, uncertainty-oriented notion.
I think UPS uses 2D barcode that is currently known as MaxiCode. I've also seen Datamatrix codes on some electronics.

There are probably many more examples of use in logistics and manufacturing.
I have also my admob account disabled on 6 april 2011. Don't know why, they didn't tell me. I am angry too couse I don't know what I done wrong...
I don't buy it. Fred's a smart man - he knows with a company the size and scope of Apple releasing certain information will only feed competitors and fuel speculation. Steve Jobs said he was taking a medical leave of absence because his health issues are more complex than he thought.
That's enough information.
What is Fred looking for, biopsy reports?
Want to hire the most experienced programmer out of a group of candidates? Ask them to estimate a programming task, then pick the one that gives the longest estimate.
Gruber picked it up because he recognized a kindred spirit. As for the snark, it was just today's way of saying that Apple and iOS are overwhelmingly better than Google and Android. I don't read anything else into that.
Downloadable sounds for your lover/s to wake up to. Project by Nancy Garcia.
Can we organise to get our lost stikipad data back?
Wow. Doesn't take much to get Lord of the Flies to break out on Hacker news (in response to comments about war, rape, etc).

There's also the possibility of mass emigration. Like say if one country had a need for a lot of skilled engineers, programmers etc and another country had a hefty supply of the aforementioned.

The countries themselves are left as an exercise for the reader.
Here's an article I wrote about the merits of the program if anyone's interested: 14 Reasons You Should Enter the MassChallenge - http://bit.ly/f6wSvm

Tweet me @andygcook or andy@rentabilities.com with any questions
The SEC and Private Markets
It would help if android had a built-in app for that instead of having to go hunt for one you can trust.

Almost all devices in Japan come with i-nigma preloaded apparently, but not USA.

Also, WTF does every QR reader insist permission for access to your personal info, storage write and internet access. Why?
I in a way agree with the OP however I think we are decades away from the proposed future. The problem is multi-tiered

- If you are outside of a major city, chances are you don't have internet wireless coverage everywhere. In fact many places in the city face this issue. This is more of a physics issue than anything. Inside my office building I get fairly bad coverage. Don't forget tunnels and such. My apartment has ZERO coverage. Only my wifi. And not all apartments I visit have wifi or coverage.

- Price and transfer rate. Sending my hard drive to dropbox is about $50 a month (or more) and not to mention taking about a month to actually upload.

- I don't want to rely on a company like Dropbox to exist. If they fail (see delicious) I don't want to be stuck with nothing. In fact single points of failure are bad. And I don't mean Dropbox can have a hard drive failure, I mean what if DB decides to triple their price.

- America's internet infrastructure kinda sucks with current insanity pushed by isps regarding data caps/etc. Just wait till people REALLY put our infrastructure to the test.
I'm still waiting to get my data back. I HATE losing data. Yes, it sours us on the cloud. But I'm OCD about keeping data. I take it nobody got their data back. I need it back. (I know it's partly my fault.) When I have enough I'll be spending $1m to hunt them down. But does anyone have useful information that would make this unnecessary.

AFAIK, they didn't lose the data thru a crash, they took the site offline and shutdown the company while pretending to upgrade it.
Fred argues for an "open" platform, but I guess that "openess" doesn't apply to Twitter.
So much for principles.
"You will not be able to purchase this software ever again after the 100 copies are sold."

Right... I suppose your copy self-destructs if you attempt to copy it?
Indeed. The coherent thought that this post was put up with and that it communicated, more than made up for grammar and formatting errors.

Perhaps, the reason there were all these errors in the first place was because it was written in _that movement_ when one has a "quantum of thought"
From One Guy And A Laptop To Millions In Revenue – with Ed Scanlan
I am asking about the average range to get a general picture of the market there in the USA. Having that info I will be able to estimate my level according to the market. Now I see that it's quite a low salary if it's about $80'000/year. If I work 8/12 hours per day for that money, then I get about only $30-$40 per hour. Am I right? Thanks.
@pbhjpbhj

I know what you're talking about but it doesn't apply to comments. The only thing that automatically adds up and downvotes to comments is what they call 'fuzzy comment karma' which is to prevent bots from figuring out too quickly that they have been shadow-banned, since to them it looks like they are getting 2 downvotes here and 3 upvotes over there.

The system has been active longer than the post was old and it's just and example, if you read through comment threads back then and now, you will notice the difference without having to rely on karmic metrics.
Did Apple Ban Best Buy from selling the iPad 2?
Just to clarify what k7d is saying when he quotes "agile" methodologies:

Any prescriptive agile methodologies (first, do X. then, do Y) are really antithetical to agile. True agile processes are exactly what his own startup did. They used what worked. They implemented a practice (complexity points) that was relevant to their principles (accurate estimation). Of course, you should also be tweaking your process as you go along.
Then maybe you did leave at the right time and are just having a window of uncertainty. It will pass. What's important is that you have the savings to survive what could be a lengthy process. I couldn't have done the same but we all have different situations.
I do agree with him.

In my opinion, software development is exactly a creative process. Many times, you have to come up with a creative solution that fits within certain constraints. Also, in the beginning usually only a vague image is known. The artist (developer) has to fill this in and make sure it is what the client wants.

Also, many creative works are collaborative efforts as well these days. I'm not sure how that changes anything. If anything, it makes estimates harder.
This:

> It's not just developers that are bad with estimates either. Everyone at some point is just winging it because it's something they've never done before and won't be able to successfully make a judgement until they have.

When my manager asks, "How long will this take," about half the time my honest answer is, "I don't know."
There are 2 sides to this, one of which is detailed in most comments below, and I see it from a lot of devs I work with but mainly the less experienced ones, and that is the eternal optimism issue. That's been covered a lot already, so no point in belaboring that.

The OTHER side is that, at least given my experience in the financial software domain, managers don't WANT accurate estimates. They absolutely abhor them. And developers are punished for giving them. So they aren't given.

An accurate estimate, such that one can be made, is usually around a 70%-80% confidence interval. It includes many specifically unforeseen, but generally known issues such as problems with the environment, lacking specifications and time required to get them, including "making $#@! up" fudge factors, technical hurdles, cogitation and exploration time, etc.

But managers can't hear that. All they want to hear is something they can sell to their superiors, which is often the customer. An accurate estimate is almost always going to be larger than that, so they won't accept it. So, the development staff is forced to skimp on quality or features to make an artificial date. But that's ok! Why?

Well, it's partially an organization's willingness to accept "there's never enough time to do it right, but there's always enough time to do it twice" (or more), but that's not even half of the issue. The larger part is that NO ONE WANTS IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME. I've seen this time after time.

It's a win/win to provide sub-par product. Why? It makes a manager look great to give low estimates (win), hold the developers to that, and deliver a product with less-than-promised quality, or scope, or both. That provides customers something to gripe about (which EVERY customer wants; it makes them appear "tough" or "thorough"; win), and it gives the managers something to "fix" and appear reactive to the customers' needs (win).

Who's holding the bag for all this win? The devs, and support. There are inevitable promises of being able to go back and fix things, but that never happens; once something is in production, no matter how crappy, it has the almighty momentum. If it's "working", almost no matter how fragile it is, there's no appetite to change something that works so that it can work better. That provides no revenue, and does impart considerable risk (with limited or no QA, having moved on to the next thing) and/or cost (keeping your QA around to regress fixes).

Although that mindset infuriates me, I don't honestly know that it's not the best way. It seems to have evolved, and companies that do it seem to do ok, so maybe it's the Darwinian process at work.
Interesting..even i was observing, within an hour this thread got carried away into different directions even though the article and some of the comments were good.
> As a non-emacs, non-lisp users, is this really worth trying to learn?

I've been using org for about 2 years to take notes... I've taken several hundred pages worth of notes using it by now. I've been using it for about a month as my task / appointment manager, and I'm impressed by its flexibility.

I was in the same spot when I started because there's a lot of things that Org is capable of. I used the following resources when I was learning Org. You might find them helpful:

1. Carsten Dominick (lead dev of Org-Mode) talks about Org at Google: http://orgmode.org/talks/index.html#sec-1

2. "Power users describe their setup" section on the worg tutorial list: http://orgmode.org/worg/org-tutorials/index.html

By this point, you'll have atleast some idea about how org can be used. If you decide to delve in further:

3. Sacha Chua's blog posts on Org-Mode: http://sachachua.com/blog/

4. Org compact guide: http://orgmode.org/guide/index.html
Not quite the same thing as modifying an existing USB key, but there's a nice swath of Atmel USB chips supported by LUFA that could achieve similar effects:

Home page: http://www.fourwalledcubicle.com/LUFA.php
Hardware support: http://www.fourwalledcubicle.com/files/LUFA/Doc/101122/html/

(LUFA is what powers the ATmega8U2 that replaced the FTDI chipset on the new Arduino Uno boards.)

Stuff something like a Minimus USB or Teensy into a usb stick case, and you're all set to cause endless fun for your coworkers. ;-)
Hey veyron, where are you located? You can email me from my profile.
I'd call shenanigans. Typical password gives entropy that is way too low for any reasonable security.
Is the Xoom available in other territories? I thought it was currently US only (although I believe it comes out in Canada today).
I believe it. I know quite a few developers from there and aside from being quite talented at what they do, their English is excellent. But having spent little more than a weekend in the country I didn't want to assume they were a representative sample. :)