skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
David Ogilvy, in his seminal "Ogilvy on Advertising," describes the paradox of the "Gorilla in a Jock Strap." He explains that if what you want is buzz and recall, you simply show something outrageous, and people remember the ad. Put the company's logo on the jock strap, and people remember the brand.

But do people buy the product? Does the ad reposition the brand or company?? It is certainly possible that this advertisement does either or both of these things, but simply generating buzz in and of itself is not a valuable use of an advertising budget.

Now that I think about it, compare and contrast this to the famous 1984 ad. I love it, it's great theatre. It made everybody talk about Macintosh--because it mentioned the brand. It positioned the brand as being against IBM and corporate computing.

This ad is empty calories, buzz without direction.

Think about this: if all they wanted was this level of buzz, they could have put out a press release indicating they were buying Yahoo. Same buzz, doesn't cost M$300.
Ask HN: Tech Start-up for people with families?
Are there instances of people who have families to feed and have successfully started Tech start-ups in US? This is especially important in US because the cost of living is high. What is the thought process of the people who make the decisions that involve huge financial risks, not only for them, but more so for their kids and spouse.

If there are any success stories then they would be immensely inspirational to a lot of people out there.

Thoughts?
400 Protesters Arrested Outside Republican National Convention | SlashBe
Grant money for a tech startup?
Has anyone been successful at getting federal/state/or city grant money for their startup? I was looking into applying for several grants. I think it is worthwhile to try since it forces you to get a certain level of documentation done for your business plan and the same work done for a grant proposal seems to be appropriate to send to investors.
I agree bootstrapping can work well. The term "Bootstrapping" is quite a fuzzy term I think though...
Are these bootstrapping?

* Using your own savings. (Could be thought of as Angel from yourself).

* Using an existing profitable business to fund the new venture.

I think there are many many paths to the same end goal, and of course it entirely depends on what you're making. Servers are cheap - if you're making webapps, what are you going to use a ton of funding for? Hiring more help, but beyond that?...

Of course the best thing about bootstrapping is you can do as you please and end up owning everything :)
Download Gilmore Girls Episodes
The best part is that they have tons of TV shows so you shouldn't have problems finding the one you are looking for. And server is amazingly fast. Downloading will take just a few minutes only. Site updates daily with new episodes, new shows, new songs, new movies and even new upcoming episodes.
Download Charmed Episodes
What is the best way to download Charmed episodes? Well, it's a very good question and hopefully my answer will be as good as the question us. As you might already know many people use iTunes for music
First reaction:

Uh... someone is posting on Hacker News about... some anal retentive dude cleaning a car? Is this some sort of circlejerk for neat freaks or QA engineers?

Now, after reading some comments:

Okay, I can see how it's a little interesting to see just how ridiculous you can get about cleaning stuff and how ridiculously detailed the techniques can get. Still, I have a natural aversion to cleaning and think it's useless and overdone half the time (thus, strong bias). The effort is appreciated, but really, big whoop.
"more modular and more flexible" is neither necessary nor sufficient for producing good software

I'm glad I'm not the only one that thinks this way. I wish I could upmod by 1 million.
It doesn't mean new people to YC have read it. If it gets voted up (this article has 11 points as I post this) then it is news to someone (or 11 someones)
I would argue that it is necessary, though not sufficient. Writing black box tests for non-modular code is a nightmare.
It sounds like bootstrapping's been really successful for you, but it sounds like it required a lot of patience. I mean, it's easy to be passionate about your brilliant startup idea, but about consulting?

Maybe it's just that I don't like the client management. I can see that some folks would enjoy building new things regularly, maybe trying to extract common functionality to a project, but most of my contracts have just been fairly drudging.

Anyone who's bootstrapped by consulting care to chime in?
How Chrome puts the skids under Nokia
Yeah, maybe John Hodgeman could be tapped to play the part of the doofus.

I'll await further installments with interest. Maybe someone a bit more young and trendy could be be picked to play alongside the Gates / Hodgeman PC-analog...
Vodafone to Resell Dell's Netbook
Should You Go Back to School?
Threads are the same as processes to the Linux scheduler.

When the alternative is using a shared bus all the time, it works out nicely this way.

Most programs are single threaded, and even most multithreaded programs don't share that much between threads. Of course the scheduler is going to schedule across CPUs in a reasonable way, but if it makes sense to keep it on the same CPU, it does that. The point is to keep bus contention to a minimum, and this does that in the average case.
You obviously don't buy into the whole idea of the subconscious. If you have to explain it FOR it to work then yes it has most likely failed. But whether or not you have to (or even can) explain WHY it works is a whole different thing.

BTW I'm not sticking up for the ad. I doesn't do anything for me.
> Thiel and Levchin also wanted workaholics who were not MBAs, consultants, frat boys, or, God forbid, jocks. "This guy came in, and I asked what he liked to do for fun," Levchin recalls. "He said, 'I really enjoy playing hoops.' I said, 'We can't hire the guy. Everyone I knew in college who liked to play hoops was an idiot.'"

And because paypal was successful, everyone will believe his strategy is perfect. Some sports and drinking are not a death knoll to your tech startup ability.

Classic example of just trying to hire everyone that's identical to you, totally missing people out of the ordinary. Yes, working hard and having no life is not that unusual.
The yahoo announcement did cost Microsoft shareholders deer ;-) But to the point, I agree with the principle you cite, but I don't think this ad is just empty buzz. I think making two people who are so outrageously successful look normal and a little stupid is supposed to make it easier for other normal folks to stand by their Microsoft PC buying choice in spite of Apple's coolness.
Ask HC: Which books on user interface design do you wish your CEO/Cofounders would read?
Do you Hackers have some advice for my nonhacking self? Here is a list of some of the books I've already read, I haven't delved into UI yet.
http://www.shelfari.com/o1517988867/shelf

Thanks HackerNewsCommunity, and I hope I didn't break any rules when I put that link to my bookshelf.
Microsoft just took the cream of my graduating class. Their college recruiters are amazing.
TheSUBWAY on HOKU - Hoku Scientific Inc - SocialPicks
Don't Make Me Think

http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/032134...
This is what you get when you have a closed, totalitarian system. I've said it before and I'll say it again - Steve Jobs makes Bill Gates look like Richard Stallman.
"They continue to try to fit every new product into the existing Microsoft ecosystem"

As companies get both bigger and older, internal politics seem to have a larger impact on company policy. There are surely many Microsoft employees who have a vested interest in keeping things exactly how they are, investing money and resources in existing projects that maintain or expand their power base, regardless of the benefit or lack-thereof to the company as a whole. It's a type of corporate inertia that's difficult to overcome once in place.
Usability Tip: Turn Inline Links Into Padded Blocks for Larger Clickable Areas
Agreed. You make it sound so easy, dude! :-)

One of the key things you need to have if you're a startup is determination/perseverance, but the timescale is 2-4 years of building something you're really passionate about.

If you're trying to build out a consulting business you need the exact same qualities, over a much longer timescale working on things you may not be remotely passionate about.

I'm constantly torn between building to flip and building to flip so that your next venture can be built to last. Looks like that's what you did and it worked, thanks for the wonderful post!
Building stuff is cool.

Universal machines / replicators are cool.

Early prototypes of things that will be better in a few generations are cool.

However, Fab@Home and RepRap are sad, and make my embarassed for them.

I posted a longer rant to BoingBoing a while back:

http://www.boingboing.net/2008/06/04/reprap-universal-con.ht...

I'm hugely interested in self replicating machinery, metalworking, and other forms of constructing items (I launched SmartFlix based on these interests).

...and I've done a fair bit of reading on RepRap (I was considering building one a year or so back).

I am dramatically underwhelmed.

The construction is shoddy, the technique (basically hot-glue extrusion of thermoplastics) is hackish and has poor tolerances, the concept of "self replication" is grossly dumbed down (a very very large number of parts are not constructed, even from high quality inputs, but just store bought), etc., etc.

In short, I was fairly embarrassed for the RepRap folks.

Their toy is somewhat cool (although nowhere near as cool as, say, the Gingery lathe that is cast from aluminum melted in a cast iron cookpot, and machines itself as construction progresses), but to claim that it represents any important step forward in self replication ...
I think that whenever a user base becomes uncritical, lapping up every move a company makes, the quality of the end product is likely to suffer in the end.
My personal favorite is Magic Ink:

http://worrydream.com/MagicInk/
This story seems oddly familiar to the story of Jimmy Cayne while Bear was having trouble. Turned out Jimmy was really sick.
Thanks Fiaz, I'm on it! Perhaps there is something else I should read when I finish the Steve Krug book? I'm a blank canvas..
I accept that the ad may do more than just generate buzz. I hope so! As much as I dislike MSFT's current policies, I'd rather see them change than die.
Emotional Design

http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Design-Love-Everyday-Things/...

Designing Interactions

http://www.amazon.com/Designing-Interactions-Bill-Moggridge/...
I think the user base became "uncritical" the day Jobs took the reins back in 1997. Flaky iPhones are just the most recent example.
SINGLE-PAGE VERSION: http://www.slate.com/id/2198535/pagenum/all/#page_start
Here's a thread to get you started:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=288901
Thank you for sharing. My own venture is going to be bootstrapped to a certain extent, although at this point it is less ambitious than your plan. Best of luck to you.
While I disagree with you, after spending 20 minutes reading his forum post, I clicked back expecting to see the homepage of AutoBlog.com and quickly realized "oh yeah, this was on Hacker News"
I understood the ad.

What do I do now?
One possible reason is when pages lock-up due to ad-block blocking google analytics.

I just ran into this, and turning off ad-block has resulted in ads practically everywhere. I had no idea!
While they may be 'technically' accessing the web with their phones, it's not the web as we know it via our Laptops/PC's and broadband connections.

My cell phone circa 2001 has net access, but I wouldn't exactly call it the "Interweb" as it was just weather/sports/news on a tiny screen walled in and horribly limiting.

Good article though, and I'm sure the iPhone will influence better browsers for mobile phones which will help this.
HOKU SCIENTIFIC INC - HOKU:NSD News Releases by Stockhouse.com
Since Don't Make Me Think already came up, going to add
About Face (have 2.0 but heard 3.0 is even better)
http://www.amazon.com/About-Face-Essentials-Interaction-Desi...

and Design of Everyday Things
http://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-Things-Donald-Norman/d...
Isn't it "fuck you" money not fuck-off money? 500K is barely fuck you money, more like "screw you I'm working slightly less each year money"
'hyperintelligent' please.

More like hyperlucky to get out of the dot-com boom of the late 90's with billions instead of millions.
The palmrest discoloration has been fixed by using different plastic, as my wife's MB can testify.

My MacBook is covered in stickers, so case whiteness becomes less of an issue.
Thank you for taking the time to help me.. Spectacular looking books, I've got my work cut out for me.
It might be good PR to NOT give Arrington an invite. In fact I'd give everyone an invite BUT him if my startup wasn't live already.
Looks great, the examples seem so obvious! I bookmarked the Ebook and I'll read it in it's entirety.
There's a strong urge to come up with a Rails stack that's end-to-end async, that looks and tastes like Rails but automagically performs 10x faster.

I'm not saying that's irrational, but it's not necessarily the best way to meet speed targets. Database queries are not immune to the 80/20 rule. You find the queries that are killing you, you factor them into handlers that run straight SQL async handlers, and you keep standard ActiveRecord for the vast majority of your code that isn't performance sensitive.
Slightly OT, but I just finished the book by Felix Dennis. There's this quote:

"The meek shall inherit the earth, but not the mining rights"
Not only is the book great, Steve Krug is an all around nice guy and fun to listen to. Just heard him speak yesterday at the Business of Software conference. If you ever get a chance to hear him in person, I'd take it.
Symbian (Nokia) has something like 65% marketshare so definitely.
Makes me think of Windows. A lack of interest in Vista could be the best thing that ever happened to Microsoft.
A 36:1  ratio is actually pretty good
Apparently Captain Obvious needs to spend some time with the Gizmodo bloggers.
"The Non-Designers Design Book" by Robin Williams.

It was written without the web in mind. It's mostly about typography and spacing for posters, business cards, flyers, etc. But it translates suprisingly well to web design.

http://www.amazon.com/Non-Designers-Design-Book-Robin-Willia...
The point is, however, that most people in developing countries aren't going to be able to afford a $300 iPhone. They're going to be getting a cheap phone with basic functionality.

The innovation that the article is talking about is by using basic mobile technologies like SMS to create mobile banking and payment services. They aren't talking about creating a new bunch of iPhone apps.
The LAST thing you want is your CEO and fellow developers doing is reading a book on good UI design. Do yourself a favor and consult an expert in the field (designer) and leave the CEO/developers to do things that they're actually good at (like promote the company and code)
I've done a little bit of consulting on interface design - even managed to have a site we did mentioned by Jakob Nielsen in a list of ten greatest redesigns. My take on UI is that it's not about reading books but all about people. Which is probably why a lot of programmers are terrible at UI (not meaning to hurt anyone here, just stating my opinion...) Here is how I work:

1) I constantly ask "will my mother understand this". If the answer is no simplify it. And my mother doesn't know that a page can be resized...

2) It's all about consistency. Links, textboxes, etc. should be the same across the site.

3) Hallway usability testing. make simple HTML mock-ups and watch a few people play with them - preferably your moms friends. This will tell you a lot about where the cranks are.

4) Stick to standards. Don't get all fancy and make your text fields arty and bleeding edge just because you can: your mom won't understand it.

5) Don't use flash unless you really really need to.

But the most important thing you can do to get better at user interfaces is to go to the local coffeshop, find a nice girl, chat her up, start talking about computers and realise how little she actually knows about how things work. There's a fair chance she might not even know what a browser is. Do this a few times - the experience is enlightening. Besides you'll get out and have a good time with some girls that think you're really smart :-)
Does Google really need another PR-fluff piece? It would be like another article on how good Exxon-Mobile is at making money. We get it, move on please.
3 is already doing something similar: http://www.three.co.uk/personal/products_services_/mobile_br...
Lucky? They IPO'd after the crash with a profitable business. It's currently worth billions MORE than it was before- eBay got a great deal.
Hmmm seems like a clever email list gathering scheme. It's also apparently working quite well with over 23,000 sources.
This guy: http://mortenlund.wordpress.com/ is a crazy serial entrepreneur that has started around 40 companies. He was an early investor in Skype, started antivirus company Bullguard, etc. He has a wife and four kids...

He is in Denmark, but according to the Economist Copenhagen is more expensive than both New York and SF.
AWS Security White Paper
Since someone is going to say this sooner or later...

As much as I'd like to write a more robust language than Javascript, I'd probably prefer this over PHP.
Furious Author Cancels Pirated Book
whenever a user base becomes uncritical...the quality of the end product is likely to suffer

Oddly, as a contented owner of an iPhone 1.0 (best eBay purchase ever!) I'd argue that the iPhone demonstrates exactly the opposite. I haven't used an iPhone 3G, but people seem to think it's an inferior product in various ways. And the reason it's an inferior product is that, in fact, Apple has a very critical user base. And the user base complained, and Apple listened to their complaints and adjusted the design to suit, with bad consequences.

Last year, when Apple released an EDGE phone without 3G support, folks like Gruber offered some very reasonable explanations: 3G is faster on paper, but the coverage in the USA isn't as good, and the chipsets aren't as mature, and the battery life is bound to suffer.

But the bitching and moaning continued. The public and the majority of tech pundits didn't know or follow these engineering arguments. They just knew that 3G was faster! On paper!

So, never one to miss an obvious marketing hook, Apple designed a 3G phone. They gave the market exactly what it was asking for. And the result was a marketing coup: The 3G phones flew off the shelves. And now it turns out that the coverage isn't that great, and some customers are reporting flaws -- flaws of the kind that tend to happen when you design with newer chipsets and a short lead time. And the battery life isn't as good.

What a surprise!

Another complaint is that third-party apps tend to crash a lot. Apple had that problem solved last year, too: They didn't permit third-party apps. Every app on the phone was directly controlled by Apple's QA team. It wasn't necessarily Apple's idea to allow broken third-party apps onto your phone. It was criticism from the user base that drove them to it.

And the fact that the phone is now more expensive? The market seems to love that up-front subsidy. It's what they're used to. Only those of us who actually do math dislike it.

So it's not so simple. I think that, on balance, it's a good thing that Apple listened to its users. The market seems to like phones that are faster on paper. The market likes third-party apps, even at the expense of occasional breakages. My one wish is that the company hadn't discontinued iPhone 1.0 when they brought out iPhone 2.0. I understand why they did so, from a marketing and a production standpoint, but I'm going to be sad if and when my original iPhone is run over by a truck.

I wish good fortune to the designers who are working away on iPhone 3.0...
Yes, but the typical data access patterns differ between threads and processes.

Again, this architecture makes sense for the "lots of totally independent processes" case. The problem is that this case isn't as common as you'd expect. on Linux, if you fork a process, you're sharing memory between them until you write to it. in threads, you're sharing all read-only data unless you've explicitly duplicated it.
Guess what. Dinosaurs used to live in Canada too. The earth is in a constant state of change. The state where I'm sitting right now used to be under a sea.

It's amazing that supposed free thinkers and critical minds are in such a hurry to believe that we can do something about the climate of the planet for better or worse.
The best admin interfaces are ugly as shit, but work quickly and efficiently and require almost no training.
Attributed to J. Paul Getty.

Just finished the Felix Dennis book too. A little self-indulgent at times but a good read.
That's my point. While in fact I do like the content, I'd like to keep this forum more narrowly focused simply because with more generic content comes a more generic crowd and with that LOL cats.

I can see that my mundane comment of polite disagreement above is taking quite the karma hit. I guess the crowd prefers a wider topic scope.
Yelp, YouTube, Slide, LinkedIn. All of these are Web 2.0. That doesn't even count what they've invested in on the side.
I signed up a while ago, after seeing it mentioned on This Is True. I've been underwhelmed. It's a lot of email (3 or 4 a day) and takes too much time to digest.

A sample from today^Wyesterday:

"Looking for a woman cheesemaker to profile from the general rural region outside Washington DC, Baltimore, Pittsburgh or State College, PA."

"Punjabi-American Politically Active Folk"

"I'm looking for any information on awkward friendships. For
example, you hang out with a friend (of the same sex) and it is uncomfortable, stiff and almost like a really bad date."

"I'm working on a story about the trend of unusual hotels that used to be prisons, banks, caves, etc."
Track Hurricanes On Stormpulse
Snapz Pro X for screenshots and department web site or email to share.
You are allowed to make use of any patented technology for personal, non-commercial purposes.

IANAL, but this is very surprising. Why then people don't make, say, a motorbike in a workshop instead of buying it?
You need to link to it as
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walled_garden_%28media%29 ; those are the hex ascii codes for the parens.
I've always heard it as fuck-you money. Meaning you can afford to say, "fuck-you" to anyone you want (boss, your competition, a cop, etc...) and not have to worry about paying your bills tomorrow.
$1M or so would allow you to live a nice lifestyle while working part-time at a fun job (like coffee shop clerk, or book-shelver at a bookstore). Then spend some free time hacking together stuff that might eventually make money. All us tech guys would be doing that anyway, or at least working on something programming related.

Even if you can't spend the rest of your life like this, and eventually have to get back to making money, you could easily go 10 years or so.
This seems like a news story written about news stories. The idea that a regular user buys an iPhone 3G and has all of these problems and then sues Apple a fees days after the launch is just silly. We all know updates are comming (as they have been).

The real story, which I'm guessing is just some troll-like law firm looking to make some money, isn't even very interesting.