skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
You raise some good points, but the original question was specific to startups, so I'm making the assumption that 90% of the business really lives on hosted servers or is backed up on hosted servers somewhere else, and everyone has the ability to work from home on weekends, etc...

On the credit card front you can only report the loss if you know about it. Lacking property security, audit trails, and alerting mechanisms, most people never know when their site's been compromised. Vast numbers of data theft incidents occur through SQL injection, exposed data files, plain-text user data being e-mailed around, etc... And you'll never know about it. Having proper security and encryption processes, rules, etc... makes a BIG difference.

I'd also argue that for you and your 6 co-workers having the building burn down is a bigger deal than the data loss. But for your 100,000 customers having to deal with potential CC fraud and identity theft issues, is a MUCH bigger deal. Many cases of identity theft and associated credit and collections issues take YEARS to fix, if ever, and cause a great deal of hardship in the mean time. Your business can be up and running quicker than that.
cool, glad you found something. for the sake of completion, here are some details & videos on the puppet show i mentioned: http://hailpixel.com/puppetshow/
IPhone 2.0: The glory wore off in wash
There's a good idea under all that fluff that got in the way when you tried to reconcile it with trying to make the world a better place.

Here's a thought: (I hate saying this btw, but you need to for your idea to work) To hell with the consumer.

The consumer wins when they sign up for the exclusive card and get 0% interest or points or some other crap "benefit". Even better, make the offer available only to those with $5000+ spending a month or whatever, and make the card yellow or green or some other stupid colour and market it as "exclusive".

Then, you take all that data from high spenders (big time consumers) and sell it back to retailers in some way by exploiting the same gimmicks - exclusive, premium retailer offers. Give them a way to track purchases to advertising campaigns, etc. Hell, you can probably remove 99% of the anonymity and give retailers access to individual consumers.

The biggest problems I see is trying to find 1 card company out of 4ish that will go for this, and to hope by chance that they aren't already doing something like this.
I read the post and was left waiting for the punchline... Where is the argument for startups having run out of ideas? I mean there is not connection between the PG paper (a list of submission topics he would like to see) and the title of startups having run out of ideas.

Anyway, it's just a very shortened talk about PGs paper. Does anyone find anything in the post actually interesting?
Ask YC: Thoughts on our Startup Weekend Idea?
We started work on CorkShare, a visual representation of a corkboard on the web. You can read about it at http://corkshare.com/.

I was wondering what you guys think of the idea, and does the homepage clearly explain everything that we hope to accomplish? Thanks!
Canadian cellphone market poised for shakeup as spectrum auction ends
there's a difference between correctly sanitizing your inputs and reformatting everything you take in.

you don't restrict all things to the same conditions. if you need to take in text that shouldn't be escaped, don't escape it. just make sure you deal with it correctly.

edit:

if that doesn't help and you still are wondering why you should sanitize inputs, read up more on xss and sql injection vulnerabilities.
What would a 'getting real' phone look like?
Wanna be a useless blog, everyone knows that BSD is dying. (Just a pun, okay, I use OpenBSD as a secondary operating system on my laptop).
Tecnically, an XML file/stream is a form of database. Just not a relational one.
It's an interesting question of web services. If you depend on Amazon for your file storage, big table for your database, yahoo geo, etc then your uptime is figure is a product of the uptimes of those services.

This means that using 4 services that have a 99.9% SLA actually gives you an approx uptime of 99.6%. It doesn't sound like much as soon as you include something like Twitter you can really see the the whole uptime graph skew.
Everytime you upvote this link, God kills a kitten.
No mention of how it is different from other services just like that.
Joyeur: Cloud Nine: Specification for a Cloud Computer. A Call to Action.
i agree that the ui in the 2.0 firmware has gotten slower. it occasionally screeches to an abrupt halt that lasts for up to ten seconds.

i'm still on the old original 2g iphone, so i have to assume it's the software, not the hardware.
Forgive my density, and it's true I haven't had this problem in ages, but what in the world is the "chicken and egg problem" that dating sites presumably have? Would you please clarify a little?
Space Hackers - Italian brothers track sputnik (1958)
In order to put data into the output format you have to have some form of tag soup because that's the only way to put information and display logic into HTML.

The question in my mind is more, are you a developer or web sites or a developer of tools.

Something like .net components or JSP taglibs allows the developer to off load data/widget to a tool developer by just calling a widget.

The two problems I see with that a) historically the people building a lot of those widgets produced markup that _sucked_ b) it's kinda inflexible
around here? functional programming
Hackers Jailbreak the iPhone 3G | TechJaws
Like a Rolling Stone 43 Years Later | TechJaws
Amazing what these guys were able to accomplish. Torrent is avail - hour long documentary.
CherryPal Mini-desktop Saves on Power | TechJaws
I think he makes some really good points.

However I, personally, would add one more.

#6 You can't be a ninja at both front and backend

Following on from 2. if you focus on the skills to do the backend you are never going to learn or keep up to the date with all the intricacies of browsers quirks. Vice versa if you spend all your time dealing with browser quirks you may not pick the best architecture.

It's not that we aren't capable of doing either, it's more that you can't be amazing at both at once.
CouchDB sounds interesting, but the wiki thing is the opposite of a "killer app" -- I'm sure it's a nice demo, but MediaWiki is a seven year old app. As a PR exercise, it just serves to enhance Erlang's unfortunate reputation as a great language for writing prematurely optimized code that ships late. If you want some positive PR, rebuild Twitter, and do it before 2010. Better yet, build something new, or something profitable, or both.

They say this thing is "faster" than the current Wikipedia, but they don't really say how much faster. Benchmarks are deceptive. Where's the cost-benefit analysis -- you're asking me to have one of the world's top Erlang hackers rearchitect an app in a language that only a handful of expensive, talented people can understand, and for what? Will the Wikimedia foundation save $10k per year? $100k?

And, when Wikipedia's competitors start adding features, will the foundation discover that the cost of modifying their super-optimium Erlang app completely outweighs the savings in server hardware? Wikimedia isn't in the telecom industry: They don't have a monopoly, and their specs might have to change more often than once every decade or two.
It will. Flagged it.
They didn't implement a Wiki. They implemented a distributed storage backend in which the Wiki pages are stored.
But, you have to be careful that you don’t end up with a shop full of oddities that even you don’t understand anymore.

You always have to be careful of this, regardless of what language you're working in. It's a problem with complex code in general that has nothing to do with macros or Lisp. Indeed the problem is worse in lower-level languages, not higher-level ones which have more tools available to combat obscurity.

I realize you're only quoting; my dispute is with the quoted point which gets repeated a lot, usually along the lines of "macros are powerful but complicated, so they're risky". This just isn't true, except in the trivial sense that they seem risky to people who aren't familiar with them.

Macros do introduce some complexity. You have to understand the difference between macro-expansion time, compile time, and runtime. You can't just pretend that macros are functions. But the idea that macros yield code "oddities" that are complex and hard to understand seems ignorant to me. Macros abstract away repetitive noise, leaving only the unique stuff that the code is doing. Almost by definition the resulting code will tend to be more readable, not less. The point is to make code simpler, not more complicated. Why else would people write it?
Super Monkey Balls: Balls Being The Operative Word
Yes, but in a system where information is asymmetric and there are governmental statements to invest in one's country, the message of risk is often drowned out and even intentionally so in some unfortunate cases. Consider how the subprime risk was downplayed for years!

A banker who does this though? Yeah, no right to complain.
Idea validation?
Ok, so I have yet-another-idea and trying to research whether it makes sense to continue with it (yeah, I already started it and spent some time and money on it).

I am researching it myself on the internet and by talking to people, but I would love to hear your opinions about it.

So here we are.

I would not be able to disclose certain details I've developed that could be a kind of competitive advantage, but I will try to provide as much information as I can do.

The fundamental idea is very simple: you assess your level of wellness (the state or condition of being in both good physical and mental health) and your location on the globe (unless it was specified by you in your previous assessment, of course) and this assessment is reflected on an overall "wellness synoptics" map (i.e. all assessment are synthesized in some way and all you see is some map with transparent colored overlays).

Basically, that's all. A global map that tells how do people feel at different locations.

Of course, I have some features-to-add and some promotion/monetization strategies in my mind (I do really enjoy this project), but I'd really like to ask you guys, what do you think about it?
Interesting as I have never actually seen good quality pictures of it until now. TheRegister is plotting a map of its travels. You can see this map using the link below, plus read more comments about it from others.

The Google Street View car - spotted!:
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/digitalcontent/2008/07/the_googl...
I've been having the same troubles on my iPod touch running 1.1 firmware. I assumed all iPhones were like this but perhaps not.
My only question is what problem are you solving? It would no doubt be cool but who is the target for this, who is truly in need of it?
We're trying to differentiate in terms of being community-based. Each 'CorkBoard' will be a small private discussion between friends on each item posted. Hopefully our SWC presentation comes online soon, because I think the presentation explains it much better than our intro page can for the time being.
Thanks for the reference. I think I'm going to grab it.
my possibly wrong understanding isn't that this is law, but that consumers boycott phones without this "feature"
I am trying to make some people at least a bit happier — _at least_ by understanding that they are not alone (note that I said "at least")

Different people might need it:

* those who feel bad

* those who want to validate some area's "wellness climate" — like "where to go today?"

* those who want to express their happiness/wellness somehow
Inside the Cloud: 9 Sectors to Watch
Richard Gabriel also tried to explain Y:

http://www.dreamsongs.com/NewFiles/WhyOfY.pdf
You've got a point about the name, but the filtering is opt-in and when a site is blocked by a filter you get a message explaining why. You can use it as plain old free DNS if you're looking to avoid the ad-filled failed lookup redirects that ISPs have been pushing lately. All the extras are completely optional.
Most projects that use a template based approach to layout end up looking like this. The example in the article is relatively straightforward, in my experience. Things get even uglier when your hot AJAXy javascript gets tossed into the template.

We ended up here because for the past 10 years the imagined process for web app development was that you had a programmer working on the "back end" and this back end spit out stuff to some templates, which a "web designer" could modify when you wanted to change the look and feel. Rails is a project started by people coming from the web design world, so the default approach is to use the typical division between back end and templates.

The workflow which splits things into back end + html templates, with differently skilled people productively contributing to each side of the app doesn't exist in reality. You'll eventually need some logic in the template. The web designers don't want to modify a template filled with logic, so what happens is the programming team gets "wireframes" from the designers, and then modify the templates themselves.

If you're a programmer, and you prefer to generate your html programatically, there are many tools that do this. A few have been mentioned already: seaside, markaby. This approach is great if the programmers have control over the development process from the back end to the front end. However, if you are working with an existing team, you've got 10 years of process inertia fighting against you. Thus, as is the usual answer on Hacker News, your best bet is to start your own company where you can apply the tools and processes with which you are most effective.
Preferred Stock: How Liquidity Preference Impacts Investor Returns
They're also great for carrying around to meetings where you just want to jot down notes and not do any serious work on your computer.
Speak for yourself.

If you want to be a technical genius get a grant and grow a beard. I want to use the skills I have to support my family and enjoy life at the same time.
DevCentral Daily
DevCentral Daily - July 21st, 2008
In order to attract users you need to have plenty of users, hence, how do you do the former without the latter?
Good thing we USians aren't so silly as to try to regulate away stock declines. Um, but wait, what's this...

http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/beat_the_press_archive?mo...

===

Why Should We Fear Plunges in Stock Prices, and Why Can't Reporters Ask?

USA Today reports on the SEC's success in slowing short-trading and reversing price declines in several financial stocks. What the article never explains is why the government has an interest in preventing sharp price declines in the affected stocks.

Has the SEC assessed the balance sheets and growth prospects for the affected companies and determined that they are under-valued? If so, will it share this analysis? If not, then why is the SEC intervening to prevent the market from determining the price of the stock of these companies?

Why do we have any more reason to be concerned about a stock's price being driven down by irrational pessimism than being driven up by irrational exuberance? Wasn't it a problem when a junk company like Priceline.com carried a market valuation of more than $150 billion? Why didn't the SEC intervene then?

Most of all, why aren't any reporters asking these questions?

===
I'm totally going to make use of this service. I have a file cabinet full of old documents I need to keep around. I meant to scan them all into PDF myself, but I have a slow flat-bed scanner which makes it too painful. This looks to be a life-saver.

Searchable PDFs + OS X Spotlight (or any comparable search) is a dream combo.
You only need to look to the past to see what sorts of tricks were and are possible.

As someone once said, "what's old is new again".
Just to clarify. I told the fire story as an anecdote. Most startups should have neither a large HQ or 100k credit card numbers. But even if they did, there are more risks to the business than just hackers. The primary one is probably that nobody likes your product.
Wouldn't you just get an overall feeling of wellness that is skewed negative though?

I mean, if I'm happy, I'm not really too concerned that I don't live in a "happy town".
No such issues here yet, I'd suggest taking the phone for a checkup.
And how is this story related to Hacker News? I wonder where Hacker News is heading to.
From their security page:

"All the mailed in documents are scanned in Pixily facilities located in USA.
All the authorized personnel who scan your documents go through necessary background checks. Under normal load circumstances all the documents you mail are scanned and sent back to you the within 2 working days."

Doesn't seem any more risky than IronMountain, the local garbage/recycling company, or anyone else taking your documents.

And honestly, especially now that they're in startup mode, the staff is likely to have equity and be real believers in the business. They are much better off building the business and not snooping on some of the thousands of incoming sheets. I'm sure they drop a stack into a sheet feeder, and drop them into an out-going envelope when they're spit out.
Most languages are like a Home Depot. You have big pieces in the end and you assemble, usually in predictable forms. It's easier, but not as flexible.

Lisp is more like a machinist's shop. It takes considerably more skill, but the system is much more customizable.

Most projects can be done with either, but some are easier or more efficient in one or the other.
___

I would have posted on the blog, but it seems to have some error with the commenting system. :)
http://www.jitterbug.com/Phones.aspx
that's a very reasonable and important point; it is a challenge to motivate happy people to assess their wellness level.

So what I need is just to get this information without trying to motivate them much ;)

As per my initial efforts to get some real sample data, that seems to be quite doable by household/street polls performed by either volunteers or paid buddies.

Further plans include some extra methods to get this information but as for now self-assessment and some kind of polls seem to be feasible and be a reasonable way to get more or less balanced information.
Encrypt Your USB Stick With Truecrypt 6.0
It's a logo. What does an apple have to do with Apple Computers? Exactly.
I feel like if you have the capability to create this, then you also have the capability to create something else that will actually improve people's state of happiness not just something that will show people that other people feel like crap too.
Is PostgreSQL dead at Sun?
Wow... This sums up my experience too. Everyone is touting the iPhone as the next app device, and that might be true, but it's got a ways to go. The UI is so slow and unstable that it's breaking my "I can tolerate a computer crashing, but never a phone" personal rule.
Does anyone know of something similar for Python?
Thank God. Now if only the CRTC would drop those stupid foreign ownership rules we might actually get service that is reasonable.
pardon me? I am not sure I understood your statement completely.

though yes — you're right — only showing people that other people feel like crap too wouldn't help them much; but in order to add some features/services that might actually help somehow, I anyway need this map first, right? just as a thing to start at.
Research in Motion (RIMM) Sell-Off Overblown, Apple (AAPL) Not a Threat--RBC
The global economy is at the point of maximum danger
I'm not sure what he means here "You probably built your app using managers right?" Does anyone?
been looking at giving clicky a shot, anyone else have experience using them?
LG KC550 (Unlcoked)
LG makes available the cheapest 5 Megapixel on the market with the help of a little refinement of their design. This 2G Tri-Band phone features a compact body and at 110 grams this is a very light phone with very little in the way of confusion with this phone.
Fortunately, with Dropbox you still have the latest version (pre-AWS crash) on your machine. It's much more usable in a crash than web-only services.
yeah I don't watch those... personally I opened the page and all I can think is... what exactly does this do for me?
Well, this might be a good example for PG's request #3: "New News".

My initial inclination is to deride the Guardian's obvious lack of ideas -- it's easy for me to laugh at this me-too article, because I'm a news.yc reader already. But from the point of view of a Guardian reader who has barely heard of PG, this might be a very good article. It certainly reflects my opinion that journalism would be better if it spent more time linking people to good content written by credible experts and less time misquoting them, jeering at them for being mere "bloggers", or trying to pretend that ignoring them will make them all go away.

But, yes, the title makes no sense and is obvious linkbait. Amateurish linkbait. The Guardian's editors need to hire some linkbaiting consultants with Digg experience.
Surely this approach means it's impossible to discuss XSS attacks on a forum-style site running that filter?
The Hidden Cost of Hidden Costs
A decent server-side programming environment will provide protection against SQL injection by default - if you're using a database library that requires you to glue strings together and escape arguments manually, stop using that and use something that does safe parameter replacement (you can write a function to do that in about three lines of PHP, for example).

XSS is pretty easy too - use a template mechanism that escapes all output by default. Django has thankfully been doing that for quite a while now; I think there are Rails plugins that will do it too.

CSRF is the scary one, mainly because most developers still don't know what it is or how it works. Look it up online and spend some time implementing a decent mechanism for adding hidden tokens to your forms that are derived from your user's cookies. Django has CSRF middleware but it's a bit of a cludge; Rails has a pretty good solution for this as far as I know.
Interesting use of Google Charts and Imagemagick
List of features removed from Vista that were in older Windows versions
Article would be improved by omission of tasteless stock photo.
being able to easily share and search the documents are to very important aspects on using a web service instead of a scanner myself, I think..

also, don't understimate the power of 'I can do it later'. If you'll have to scan your stuff yourself, you'll fatally end up leaving it there forever... At least I do :-)
Thank you for this link. I have a relative who is partially blind and I've been planning to look for a phone just like this.
I used to live in Sweden (I'm American). Sweden is supposedly one of the most immigrant-friendly nations in Europe and even they are getting worn down by the non-integrated immigrant population (1 million out of 9 million total population). Swedes speak English exceptionally well which is the only foreign language most foreigners know (no one comes in knowing Swedish). The extra layer of language barrier is an issue (for Swedes and immigrants).

For a highly trained (grad school+) immigrant, being limited to one small nation was a big limitation (this was before the common EU passport).

As far as preparation for world business, I can't see why any Chinese student would want to learn anything but English.

No idea how immigration status changes post-graduation. Universities were free (or if you prefer, included in everyone's taxes).