skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I can see where the confusion arises - I wondered too. Using the conditional tense would help a lot here, unless there was a reason for creating the impression that this was a real tweet.

So it would become:

>Today, a tenth grader who perhaps may not be our finest societal achievement judging from a cursory glance at her neck tattoo that proudly proclaims “To hot 4 you”, could drunkenly sit on her keyboard and mistakenly send out a tweet that six hundred thousand people read within the hour.
my mom won the green card lottery 10 years ago, when I was still young and surely wouldn't have been very useful or profitable. 10 years later, I'm getting my master's at one of the best universities I could've hoped for, and a pretty good chance of being able to do interesting work with competitive pay. I'm extremely grateful for the lottery, which is the one thing that made all of this possible.

my mom also got a chance to actually apply her computer science degree (which she couldn't do before because of the explicit sexism which meant women were generally employed as, perhaps glorified, receptionists), and now works as a senior software engineer at a large company. I imagine her true potential would also have been difficult to estimate prior to the move, as she'd done very little actual programming after college - but she effectively got a fresh start here, and was able to quickly advance in an environment which allowed her to be judged solely on technical competency.
Somebody has: http://www.watchguard.com/products/xcs-overview.asp

Not seen one myself yet, but $Boss who went to infosec came back impressed and is trying to arrange some for testing.
Some people seem to be born troubleshooters they seem to be able to just know how to fix any problem especially obscure problems.

For example your car is acting up and the troubleshooter knows it's the fifth contact on a relay since it's the old original model 5b relay which he can tell from the sound of the clicking and he knows the fifth contact tends to corrode on the left side each spring when the humidity is higher. Give it a whack and a spray of contact cleaner and tells you to park it in the sun for an hour. Good as new.

The normal way is taking 20 or 30 years to know about a trade or just life in general and just seeing it so much you become a bit like the born troubleshooter but you'll never be as good.
Tagger: a library for extracting relevant tags from text documents
Sendgrid accepts incoming emails: http://nanceskitchen.com/2010/02/21/accept-incoming-emails-i...
https://github.com/Vagabond/gen_smtp

Just stumbled upon this, probably not just vaguely related, too.
Are the claims about 'top graduates' in 'top programs' flowing into startups at a rate that is any different than in the past substantiated by fact?

This whole article reads to me like a statistician selecting and manipulating certain data to prove the desired result, except, there seems to be little more than limited conjecture in this piece.
Well, I don't disagree that the telegraph was a major earth-shrinking development. I just disagree with the analogy with the internet.

The telegraph dramatically reduced the latency of communication (from the maximum travel speed of a courier to that of the speed of electrical impulses). It didn't improve channel capacity at all though. In fact, it had less capacity than paper in a courier's satchel.

This restricted the communication to those who can pay. And even they preferred to write crude, abbreviated messages due to cost.

The internet didn't improve latency over the telex or phone networks (in fact, you're almost certain to see more latency on the packet-switched internet than on the circuit-based PSTN). What it did do is dramatically increase channel capacity, driving the cost of communication down to the point where anyone can communicate across the planet for nominal cost -- and can even send information-rich messages in data-hungry formats like video.

The telegraph was the invention of instantaneous global communication. The internet was the democratization of it.
You're taking the stance of investors are valuing Facebook and the like at X. Prove that's wrong. I think in general if you're going to value companies at significantly abnormal multiples of earnings. The burden of proof should fall on the person assigning those multiples.

But I'll play along anyway. I'll use Facebook as an example. One of the reasons for Facebook's lofty valuation is the very thin trading volumes. People are buying/selling very small $ amounts of Facebook stock in a private market at very high valuations. Imagine company X has one million shares of stock outstanding and I sell 1 of them for $100. Do you think company X is worth $100 million? If so I've got an endless supply of companies for you and I'll even be silly enough to part with them for the bargain price of $50 million. One of us will be rich...

So I contend that the published valuations are somewhat meaningless. The question then becomes what is a company like Facebook worth? Generally there are three main factors that determine a companies value. Tangible assets (cash in this case), earnings, and the value of retained capital. The first is easy and relatively insignificant in this case. The second is very hard, the third is just about impossible. My point is simply that high valuations relative to earnings should imply that there is a very high probability of significant growth in earnings. I think the people that believe in Facebook believe in what it could become not what it is today. If that's true, then the true profit engine is vaporware and it is therefore impossible to have enough certainty in a sufficiently positive future to justify the earnings multiple.

Now one example doesn't prove the point but I do think there is enough anecdotal evidence to justify thinking about the possibility of a bubble.
I don't know much about cigarette manufacturing, so maybe somebody can explain. What is keeping the counterfeit cigarette manufacturers from omitting the RFID chip, thereby making the pack un-detectable by customs officials?
Like all governments, it boils down to what the governed persons are willing to tolerate. As people become more complacent and idle, and as more people get their information from tainted sources, things only get worse. In general terms, a population deserves its government.
Bubble Alert!

Nothing says bubble more than this:

A guy with no experience, no vision (at least none he's shared -- perhaps the entire article is some kind of viral PR experiment), gets funded!
Hadoop rather mapreduce came from Google which is a great innovation.

Cassandra came from Dynamo;
And Dynamo is from Amazons R and D efforts.
Btw Amazon is an innovation as it leads to large amount of savings in energy.

Thrift,Tornado,HipHop -> not innovations useful programming tools but not gonna change anything.

Rarely any innovations have come out of Web Applications.
In fact the best innovation in data mining [The correct term for Big Data], have come from Universities or R&D efforts of IBM/MSFT/Google/IBM/Amazon.
>Sorry if I've missed that. But last I checked they had just changed the top-revenue rankings to include IAP, and smurfberry-bearing titles shot to the top. To change that algorithm the way they did looks more like celebrating that nonsense. [2]

I just looked at the top free game list, and most of the top 25 don't appear to be smurfberry titles. About 7 or 8 of them appear to be like that. Most of the ones with IAP are for removing advertising, upgrades to the full version, or additional content, all of which are pretty legitimate uses for it.
Why NPR sounds like it does: a behind-the-scenes look at production and polish
Why student loans are not like subprime mortgages
I'm not sure how most of the DMCA is constitutional but there it is.

I agree with you, except for the part about "it will probably be overturned". I'm much more pessimistic.
I made this page a while back using Robert Scoble's list

http://www.readevery.com/best?q=500_tech_entrepreneurs_to_fo...
PhD. is from science realm. Programming isn't a science, it is a craft. Like in any craft, you have master craftsmen who is able to and have produced masterpieces and you have apprentices and journeymen. There is also CS which is a science, and PhD is completely applicable there. And as expected and normal in any other area, the PhD in the science - CS - isn't automatically means that the holder is a master craftsmen in a somewhat related craft - in this case programming. The same way like for example PhD in economy theories vs. financial manager/CFO or just general manager/CEO - science and theory vs. craft.
Before muddying the water for future generations of potential Lisp programmers in this forum please master macros first before spewing unfounded bullshit about their limitations.

1. Macros were never meant to 'offer guidance for improving your semantics' however they are the mechanism that makes it possible to create your own new semantics (which is just not possible in any other family of languages). The semantics that you want to create are often specific to the domain you may be working in. Learn from those who have mastered the domain and created their own semantics and then come up with your own.

2. It's clear that you've been drinking the OO koolaid for a while. Let it go and try really learning macros. Leave the baggage at the door, it's just not required where you can go with macros.

3. Ruby is a badly diluted hack that borrowed some ideas from Lisp and other languages.
No you cannot accomplish in Ruby what is possible with Lisp macros. For a start all the Ruby mechanisms that you suggest execute at runtime. Ruby does not have direct access to it's AST the way that Lisp does.
Lisp and Ruby are not even in the same class of languages. Contrast Ruby with Java, and then yes it looks great.

If your talking about the "hundred-year language" then just forget Haskell.
Lisp is the future, go and learn Qi. Qi has a turing complete type system, this is already light-years beyond what Haskell's type system will ever have.
So you're saying that if people just keep making photo sharing apps (flickr, facebook, color, instagram)....eventually those people will invent space travel or nuclear fission?
P.S. That goes for any of you ;)
As someone already pointed out, this is a movie reference. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0137523/quotes?qt0479105
It might depend where the price breaks are. If you are buying one or two at retail then you are probably paying a large mark-up for the buzzword "SSD". Buzzword mark-up is not as significant if you in the market as an OEM buying in bulk.
My interpretation is that this provides a mailbox API, to provision and maintain mailboxes on THEIR servers. Doesn't sendgrid just perform a restful post when an email is received rather than store it and all? Almost akin to pop vs imap.
I'm not familiar with them.. And, google isn't proving helpful with finding them. Could you please point me to their website?
Sadly, I'm pretty sure there's a limit to how much "damage" the internet can route around. :-(
Solar Airplane Makes Historic Landing
Social media reminds me of SEO — both had an initial boom with tons of snake oil hucksters. But I think both fields have matured for the most part and the dust has settled. If someone tries selling social media or SEO as a full fledged marketing program that's a mistake, but if it's part of something larger that makes sense. The clowns are the ones who sell those services as a cure all, the serious folks are those who sell the service as a measurable value add.
Building a great team at your startup (slides)
Greplin (YC W10) is hiring search engineers - big data, small team
WHO WE ARE

We're a small team working on indexing, search, mobile, UI, NLP, machine learning, and massive scaling (to name a few).

We're based in SOMA in San Francisco and offer competitive salary, equity, and benefits.

We push hundreds of code changes a week - the product looks different at the end of the day than it did when the day started.

We use, create, and contribute to open source projects.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

We're looking for great engineers. Search experience is not required but is a definite plus.

You should love using code to solve hard problems. You should know the fastest way to do something - which sometimes means the least CPU cycles and sometimes means the least programmer cycles. Your knowledge of data structures and algorithms should be solid - whether you learned it at a university, from a book, or through experience. You'll commit code your first day.
Isn't it awesome that the "democracy" can be bought by bribing a small number of politicians in charge. Whoever set that system up, didn't think it through.

"Democracy is not freedom. Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. Freedom comes from the recognition of certain rights which may not be taken, not even by a 99% vote. "

http://articles.latimes.com/1992-01-12/local/me-358_1_jail-t...
Energy-producing fusion will require a neutron flux. That leads to nuclear activation and is significantly less clean than one might wish, but I certainly hope that the engineers find some way of making it work.
I'm working on it. :) We hope to have a private alpha start the end of next month.
These articles constantly surface and they are beyond stupid. Facebook is VERY meaningful, 99 Designs (Helping small companies exist) is very meaningful. Marginalizing innovation because they arent curing cancer is stupid and misses the value.
The history of democratic politics is replete with such examples.

The general view is that marketing entrenches information asymmetry.
I am very grateful for this post. One of the most common pieces of valuable feedback I got before starting my company (as a sole founder) is that I need to keep going no matter what - especially in times of self-doubt.

I always considered myself to be confident, and self-assured (not obnoxious, just confident)...but starting a company is a completely different cup of tea. I have both a Computer Science degree + an MBA. I learned Rails on my own and I thought that would be the hard part. Just to learn that transitioning from hardcore product development to sales & marketing is even trickier than I thought.

When you think about all the promises you have made to people, and things you have sold in various ways, it's perfectly natural to get self-doubt....especially given that things will NOT happen exactly the way you planned. This. Happens. A. LOT.

Self-doubt is one of the most unspoken about aspects of starting a company and I am glad that Ben has so courageously spoken about it so publicly.

If you have never done a startup before, nothing can prepare you for the experience fully. I read every PG essay, most of Founders at Work, almost every other bio/story of most if not all of the tech founders from Fairchild Semiconductors to Facebook, watched dozens - if not a hundred+ - of Mizergy interviews, understand finance & economics (I can explain the differences between a Collaterized Debt Obligation & a Credit Default Swap), also know most of the fine points of the standard term sheet (including to focus less on valuation on more on things like liquidation preferences, etc.), know enough legalese to understand most contracts, I built teams from scratch, recruited people to work with me on a project bigger than myself but under-resourced, hell even worked at another startup before...but having done all of that...I still wake up every morning and there are MANY things that I am tackling for the first time - and it makes me doubt myself.

Most people won't talk about it, but I think we need to start being real with ourselves - for the health of the startup community. Especially for those of us that don't have investors or many mentors, or don't live in the Valley, or are not YC-alums.

So Thank You Ben. For being so honest. For being so real.
Have checked your patch and commented here: http://romfont.com/2011/05/12/google%E2%80%99s-open-accessor...

Have also put up some photos of input/output example of Arduino Uno + Usb Host Shield + Nexus One here along with some code: http://rancidbacon.com/p/android-arduino-accessory/
Do you have a reference? That would be really messed up...
Yes but even with modern cars you still need all the mechanical things, and things get way beyond a multimeter and a soldering iron on modern cars pretty quickly. There are many black-box computers, many complex sensors, thousands of wires that are next-to-impossible to trace/track through wire looms, the firewall, etc... I'm handy with a multimeter and a soldering iron, but still:)
It pops up in Nicholas Nassem Taleb's works, too: "the technologies that run the world today (like the Internet, the computer and the laser) are not used in the way intended by those who invented them", and: "the three most significant inventions of the past 100 years (...)"
This is an attitude I've never agreed with. Say you're an investor. Would you rather this CEO put on an I-know-what-I'm-doing face, and imply that he's got this all under control? Or would you rather he be upfront about his lack of experience but determination to get it right by learning and surrounding himself with smart people that can help him? Maybe he fails, maybe he doesn't. At least you know what you're getting into.

Dishonesty is dishonesty no matter how you cut it.
Yes, There Are Tech Startups in Nigeria. Sarah Lacy's Favorites.
"But the 10,000-pound gorilla in the room is the unclear legality of these storage services playing host to pirated music. And that’s where the labels might have some legal muscle." What a horribly written article.
My initial thought is to agree. But what would we do in the situation where a computer error caused it to be weighted toward something other than date of application? What if it were 90% people with last names that start with "R"? Or 90% males?
Match.com: Deceptive Billing, Deceptive Public Relations
Match.com has been uncovered using deceptive practices to keep auto-billing customers after they quit the website and then using deceptive Public Relations as damage limitation.
But should the certification be done by a "union" or an external body? A "union", after all, has screwy incentives.
Any thoughts and suggestions are appreciated
"The question of illegal immigrants came up too but if you look you will find that a skilled welder / carpenter / mason has opportunity in Mexico that they don't need to emigrate for, so its not the issue one might suspect."

I don't think the issue is with ILLEGAL immigrants, just immigrants. Trades are something everyone can get into either by just starting entry level or learn for very cheap (and they may have learned back in the country of origin). They are also willing to work for much less because they know they don't have the money to go to a college and get a higher education to obtain a higher paying/less laborious job. So they are very happy to take a moderate paying job and will work for less than someone who feels they should make more because they may have had the opportunity to pursue another career.

A friend of mine is a landscaper and became one when he moved out of southern california and made good money. Moving back here to southern california though he had to change professions because he could barely make minimum wage doing that here. His only option if he wants to return to that profession is to go get a degree to become a landscape architect.
Have you heard of svpply before? (I have not). Now you have. This is what this post was written for.
Brief overview of Password Managers (I'd really love criticism if I'm wrong).
Don't be so quick to dismiss 'hacks'. Important innovations often start out in unrelated fields, or build on discoveries or solutions attempted in unrelated fields. We don't have to look too far for evidence of this: the Internet, the laser, and the computer were all important inventions that changed the world in ways its creators never intended them for.

I'd argue that innovation happens in widespread tinkering. So it could be true that most of the tinkering today happens to be on webapps. But it's presumptuous to assume that none of these attempts would result in innovations of significant worth to humanity.
European Union: Location data ruled legally private.
Could we perhaps just give sub-threads a descending rank (starting at 1 for the highest voted comment) instead? Comment scores were never an indication of accuracy, so validation may be the wrong word. There do seem to be more than a few people (myself not included) concerned with an indication of consensus so a middle ground solution that brings that data back could be useful.
The problems with HTML5 audio
Keep calm, carry on.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1571427
I'd love to be able to see the names of people who have repeatedly upvoted your comments. It'd be a great way of finding people who share the same kind of mindset, enhancing HN as a 'people discovery tool'.

It would also work for 'if you think this person is clever, you might like to read things posted by these others'.
Amazon.com: the Hidden Empire (a comprehensive review of Amazon.com's strategy)
If you don't overpay for the shares, your enterprise value should be the same or slightly higher. So market cap should be flat to slightly higher but there are fewer shares outstanding so price per share would go up. When buybacks don't increase share price, by definition market cap must be decreasing.
And the American system is very inconsistent as well. Exclamation marks and question marks would lie logically outside in the American system. For example:

- And then he told me he was 'sleeping in late.'

But:

- "What did he mean when he said he was "sleeping in late"?

- And can you believe it, he was "sleeping in late"!
Yeah. I definitely heard plenty of clamor when WordPress went down.
Are you able to do this without Jailbreaking?
I think there is a bias in where the author, and a lot of the people who have commented below, get their data points on innovation.

If you're routinely reading tech blogs and forums, the usual suspects will appear and you'll naturally assume that the innovation taking place is all web-app related and social media related. If you're reading scientific journals on the other hand, you'll be overwhelmed with the amount of R&D taking place in whatever field you're following. American corporations spend hundreds of billions annually on R&D. These innovations show up in subtle places most people take for granted. Just because you can't see it, or it's not on TechCrunch, doesnt mean it isnt happening.

I would politely suggest that this author, and anyone that routinely reads the same 7 tech blogs, subscribe to MIT Tech Review. It offers incredible insight into more... "fundamental" (for lack of a better word) innovation (not to say improving the way people communicate and access information is not fundamentally innovative).
I have some detailed articles on the Making of Crash Bandicoot at my blog:

http://all-things-andy-gavin.com/category/games

or the first of the Crash series:

http://all-things-andy-gavin.com/2011/02/02/making-crash-ban...
Devs Stuck in iOS Patent Troll Case
First Chapters : Visualising writing styles
Intel left outside
Right, the point being that with certain styles of writing it makes a lot more sense to resolve for aesthetics rather than a simpler grammar. This perspective was largely ignored by the Slate article.

The question sentence could be resolved "logically" by placing the period outside the quotes, and possibly dropping the question mark entirely as you are already describing the quotation as a question. But if you're telling a story, including a question mark and putting it inside the quotes and leaving off extraneous periods is the best way to convey the overall meaning.
Is Nathan Myhrovld’s Intellectual Ventures behind the iOS patent troll job?