skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
There seems to be two types of "local" web startups: events and businesses.

Event listing sites are a very small market basically trying to take over the flyer and newspaper advertising. There's no money there. And in the past couple of years Facebook has stepped in and basically made all other event sites obsolete, for now.

Business listing sites are trying to tap into the Yellow Pages market. Yellow Pages were/are huge. This is why people continue trying to get in. The problem is that unlike physical Yellow Pages, which have a regional monopoly, the barrier to entry is very low. This leads to fragmentation, and any single local business directory isn't very valuable. Combine with extremely spotty coverage and out of date listings, and online directories themselves are pretty useless. Even Google can't stay on top.

It gets worse because you have to cold-call small businesses to sell to them. New ones are always starting up and old ones are going out of business. They also don't want to pay very much money and suck at paying their bills.

Then there's the effort to drive traffic to the directories (or in some cases specific businesses listed in them) via AdWords or other advertising. This can work but is hard to pull off, most who try screw it up.

Don't forget that in addition to Google, Yelp etc. the Yellow Page companies themselves all have online directories, and massive existing sales forces and lists of customers. And they are still struggling to turn a profit online.
That's the whole point of bitcoins. Anonymous, hard-to-trace payments. You can't get that kind of "freedom" without also being really attractive for illegal uses.

Bitcoin is designed to be subversive, and subversive means illegal as far as the government is concerned.

This is the main/only reason I'm not making any long term investment in Bitcoin.
Can anyone give some examples of big companies that were solo founders? I think Dropbox was.
ah thanks for your reply, it seems a sensible system.

A last question (since when I tried to wrap my head around multimethods, OOP and modules for my toy language I always got lost and you probably have an answer).

Suppose I want to define a method local to an object in my main module, for example I want to have Dates#weeks use a custom #singular method.

For sake of polymorphism, I would expect that dispatching on my object should still invoke my method, but weeks is always referring to its own, I understand.

Do you believe this trade off (killing a bit of late binding, akin to having un-overrideable "private" members in java/c++) is necessary, or you just feel this is a good enough solution?
I would think that online poker players or other gamblers figured this out a while back.
I've been using the Couchbase server alpha for a good while for a few reasons. _replicator DB has made a lot of things a lot easier for me. I get a pretty good reduction in file space as well (my wikipedia database is about 25% smaller, for example).

So far, there are only mac builds (because I'm building them and that's what I'm deploying on), but Linux should come shortly and we should stop calling it alpha.

If you've got a mac and want to try out some new stuff, do this and complain to me about anything you don't like: https://gist.github.com/951106
Caveat: This works in B2C and some B2B. In some B2B, RFPs are reduced to checklist / price, no matter if they need those features, think they need those features, or have no interest in those features.

As always, know your market.
Please don't deface Indian web sites. No one cares - esp. govt. sites. At max. you will be helping the corrupt get even more rich by giving them an excuse to allocate more funds.
micmcg, The wordpress blog is simply a pre-launch blog and not the official version of The New Student Union, which will launch in the next few weeks.

Roundtable debates, an editor reporting from the Middle East, craft brew reviews, multimedia & video journalism, regular interviews, Q&A with professors, and investigative reports are just a few of the features that other student publications lack that we will pride ourselves on delivering at The New Student Union.

Not to mention, our writers will be coming from campuses all over the country bringing a wide variety of backgrounds to the table. They will have less creative constraints and be paid more than they would at a regular student publication. Answer your question?

-Another Alex involved in The New Student Union
Daniel Zarick is amazing.
latinoup, HN for southern guys
After hijacking some HN posts, we, in the southern part of the continent, saw the need for a locale path.

And here it is: http://latinoup.org/

It's pretty wannabe at the moment. Feel free to submit HN-like news in English, Spanish or Portuguese.

We hope that latinoup will help to concentrate our local hacker community in the same way HN does it.

Feedback wanted, if possible.
Ycombinator, get busy.
What sounds fishy is that the Scrum Trainer has to keep paying money to keep his certification.

Certifications are a joke when it comes to programming anyway, much less when it comes to programming methodologies. What if someone came up to you and told you that they are a certified Ruby Way Master?

Yet it seems like certification matters to some people (otherwise there would be no point in paying someone money to retain it). And it's obviously in the interest of the Scrum Alliance to make people believe that it matters because it lets them sell it over and over again to the Scrum Trainers. So it seems like they build their hierarchy to put themselves in a position where they profit from the lie that certification matters.

Moreover, they also added another couple of layers of people who also want people to believe that certification matters (Trainers and Masters because they want to make back the money they paid for their cert). While this is not exactly a pyramid scheme, there are some similarities in that money gets passed up and people are trying to convince everyone of a lie.

I think certifications might make sense for things where it is impossible for other people to tell whether someone knows their stuff. I don't think Agile is that hard conceptually.

I also think re-certification makes sense in an area where the state of the art is constantly advancing, so that if someone is certified you know that they are really up to date with the latest developments. I don't think Agile changes that much.
I think this is a really strategic move for e-bay. They are now catering to the whole eco-system by providing a e-commerce platform (magento), payment integration (via paypal) and complete fulfillment back end via GSI commerce. If executed well they have a good chance at attracting a lot of customers. The biggest advantage is they have huge auction based commerce platform ebay itself to provide cross channel capabilities.
Long-Awaited Forrst API Helps Connect Developers
SAS?
Makes sense; Bitcoin is a monetary system outside of the control of a government. It's likely to be favored for transactions that are outside the control of a government. They're sure to not like this.
After hijacking some HN posts, we, in the southern part of the continent, saw the need for a locale path.

And here it is: http://latinoup.org/

It's pretty wannabe at the moment. Feel free to submit HN-like news in English, Spanish or Portuguese.

We hope that latinoup will help to concentrate our local hacker community in the same way HN does it.

Feedback wanted, if possible.
I think what Produce means to say is that many of our institutions and cultural facets are made up. There is very little natural backing for many of the laws and customs of human society (human rights? ha.) Invoking natural law to make a point about the utility of an abstraction makes no sense in context of all of the other abstractions that we use frequently in our lives (eg, property).
I think you need to read up on cyber crime and cyber criminal groups. Your thesis is correct but only accounts for those who are not independent from the internet. A professional attacker wouldn't ever use the machine and network they were accessing the Internet from for anything else other then their attacks. No compromising search terms, emails, chats, page visits, internet billing, etc. I'm talking a machine totally devoid of personal information or anything that could potentially reveal the identity/location/details of the attacker. Now imagine this was scalable and you constantly were changing your point of access and machine. Actual cyber criminals (the ones cleaning out credit card companies, banks, high level blackmail, stolen secrets, etc, the shit you really only ever hear rumors about because it's too dangerous to leave executive circles at companies.) especially in Eastern Europe have access to an almost unlimited supply of cheap machines, false identities, "tunneled" networks and connections inside major established institutions and companies, and strict criminal group rules, make it almost impossible to identify anyone. Don't be naive this shit goes on everyday.
Being a cash-only business is an annoying disservice to your customers. It's a sign that you're not interested in the value of convenience. It's a regressive attitude to lean on cash, and oftentimes a sign that you're not interested in keeping honest books.

If you're not willing to pay what is almost universally accepted as an operating cost in modern society, you're setting yourself up to be left in the dust, and quickly. People are about to start paying for everyday transactions using their phones! If you have a problem with payment processors biting into your margins, then pass the buck onto your customers (even as a credit card usage fee), but never take away a payment option.
Step 1: The site looks identical to reddit, even in branding?
Someone previously linked this on a discussion on copyright, and I think it's also relevant here:

http://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/lawpoli/colour/2004061001.php

All money is not created equal - there are host of laws related to taxation, tracking, and legality that apply to real-world currencies. Bitcoins are great because they have none of this baggage, but bitcoins are also a political non-starter for the same reason.
OS X Lion: all the details only $29.99 from Mac App Store
Ask HN: Does HN list promotion posts now? (Listia post)
What's up with the HN post currently on the front page that you can't interact with? It looks like an AD for the ycombinator company Listia.com. Did HN start doing promotion posts? Did they always do this?
It just says "Listia is hiring developers to build a marketplace using virtual currency (listia.com)". I can't vote for it or comment on it as those links are missing. Is this a new kind of HN ad? Or a promotion for ycombinator companies? Or maybe just a bug?

Maybe I just missed an announcement about this? Thanks -
There might not be a formal, publicly-accessible market, but two-party short-selling contracts could already be active. This is what an unregulated and anonymous currency feels like: you have no idea whether I have purchased half of the bitcoin market over the last few weeks just to unload all of it at once, in small chunks, before the market can adjust to the reduced value. In fact, you won't even know if that has already happened; you will just see a "market correction" when I sell.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_manipulation
Not being too familiar with the Tor network, how hard will it be for the government to shut this site down?

I mean, it will have to be problematic if they can't even get an IP, right?

And they obviously can't get Bitcoins directly...
I didn't know about livelycouch. It seems to be a great idea. Thanks for mentioning it.
According to John, the customers always returned. This coffee shop is not located in the center of downtown, but rather sits nicely next to the ship canal in Ballard. The people who come through are very often locals and they value their ethics and reputations, thus return to pay back. A buddy of mine, who lives 30 minutes away, once forgot his wallet and had to pay $2.50 with the IOU. He returned a week later and payed back. This approach would never work in Manhattan, but Seattle folks are much friendlier and value small businesses over large chains.

In terms of baked goods, they weren't low quality, they were just home baked. John used to work with a local bakery, but no one particularly cared to get their slightly above average quality.
Although I haven't used any of the software, I greatly prefer the pagekite website to either localtunnel's or showoff-io's. Thanks for providing a depth of well-organized content. That said, you could benefit from simplifying your quickstart page and featuring it more prominently.
Yes, it is a subreddit: /r/latinoup
And looks like it backfired:

"Someone just sent over $7200 worth of BitCoins. Whoever you are... thank you... Balance: 7853.35 USD #Speechless"

http://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec
Show HN: Synoptic - a console application framework for .net
If you do, let John know that he's becoming a local superstar!
Show HN: Android GUI Mockup Template for Nexus S & HTC Incredible S.
IE9 isn't cross platform so it's a non-starter.
I am really glad to see you people sharing your thoughts and comments. Every comment comes like a new idea to me. Thanks!!
HAHA this sucks for bitcoin, too bad this has been going on since the internet first started. In fact drug selling was one of the first activities on BBSs. Too bad for bitcoin, services like Pecunix have been harboring this kind of stuff for years.
That is the main/only reason I am making a long term investment in Bitcoin. Given the volatility I think the people speculating in Bitcoin purely for financial gain are nuts.
I'd be surprised if this gets you in, but it will get you at least a conversation.
LulzSec Hackers Post Sony Dev. Source Code, Get $7K Donation
listia is a YC company, they've always been allowed to post job postings here. from what i remember pg saying, they initially post to the 4th position and fall off the page as the day goes on.
YC companies have always been able to post job ads. I don't know whether other companies can post job ads.

No idea why comments aren't allowed.
This should be amusing - the rage of anonymous vs the complete apathy of the Indian state.
This is the equivalent of Anonymous purposely hell banning itself.
When you Tweet, Are You Writing Or Talking?
If you find something wrong in Wikipedia then fix it, otherwise it is your lazyass fault for not fixing it.

Wikipedia is a great source to start learning about a topic and a good place to find references. An idiot would make Wikipedia their only and final source.

I've noticed that a very high percentage of new text that was later removed because the new text DID NOT have a citation reference. Don't whine because you are lazy.

If you really want to make contributions to Wikipedia and make them stick, then edit articles that few people are editing or haven't edited in a long time. Newbies should avoid articles that have a lot of current edit activity.
Might work, but most likely wouldn't. IOU isn't about the transaction, it's about the human connection between the buyer and the seller. People don't trust technology, they trust people. my 2c.
Bitcoin is ideal for the 3 P's: Porn, Poker, and Pharmaceuticals.
I agree that's the perception, but the reality is that bitcoins are not inherently anonymous, in the same way that normal net traffic is not inherently anonymous.

Sure, you can use Tor, launder your bitcoins, and effectively become untraceable, but how many people actually do this, and do this correctly? Even Lulz Security, who presumably have a reasonable degree of technical expertise, didn't bother to use Tor when talking over IRC.

Also, Silk Road is kinda ridiculous anyway, because despite all that security and anonymising, in the end you have to give out a physical address that you'll visit in person.
Now would be a great time to build a new FOSS e-commerce platform that runs on commodity hosting.
It's simple. I will monitor your networks and if I see somthing that looks like TOR(omg) I send my police buddys to shoot you in the face.
I use big-A Agile to talk about the codified and sclerotic form of Agile taught by cookie-cutter consultants. Somewhere there is a sacred text, an Agile Leviticus, containing ceremonial forms that people adhere to with religious faith. Even if the forms fail and are adjusted or abandoned at one company, they will be revived in their original form at the next company, citing success at the first company as proof of their power. Thus Agile never changes no matter how often it fails, which is why it deserves to be a capital-A proper noun.

Little-a agile is a characteristic of software development organizations that programmers and managers strive to achieve, pragmatically adopting the processes that help them achieve it.

The Agile Manifesto can be used in service of either agile software development or Agile the consulting religion.
The Perfect (Elevator) Pitch
Interesting. Magento is the WordPress of commerce software: feature rich and popular, but not particularly well written, and tied to PHP/MySQL. Like WP, it is based upon a questionable custom framework.

I'd love to see a well done, customizable, open source ecommerce system for a language that I'd actually want to use. For best hope of popularity, Django or Rails makes sense. Last time I checked around for Django ecommerce projects, I didn't see anything grand.

I'm going to be working on stuff like this over the summer; anyone have a suggestion for a Django or Rails project to improve or adopt?
Last I checked they were alive and well. As for them supposedly being Amateurs, no... no they are not. The attacks they are pulling they could get away with if they kept the secret. But something is motivating them.
It's satire. s/lawnmower/Netflix login/.
Um, the title just links to this HN post. Not terribly useful.
Show HN : Social Books - let your Facebook friends know what you're reading
Both currency and 'intellectual property' only have value because they are backed by the government. Currency is very hard to reproduce without a substantial investment and has a lot less anonymity when being used. IP, on the other hand, can be redistributed in mass with a 5 year old computer you pull out of a dumpster almost completely anonymously. Piracy just isn't going to go away without public sympathy to the cause. Its like why everyone throws a fit when you violate an OSS license but actively encourages downloading a track from the latest pop artist. The public receives value from the one and has it extracted from them by the other. People are smart and can tell when they are getting screwed even if they cant sufficiently articulate how its being done.

In my opinion the only feasible way to fix the system is to bring copyright duration back to a reasonable time period, like maybe 10 years or so, with a way to extend that duration for high value properties. One way would be to declare value on that particular property, paying property tax on that value, and limiting the liability of infringement damages to that declared value.

I'm not saying that piracy would go away totally at that point, but certainly more legitimate business models would emerge and even illegitimate ones would make the transition to reduce risk. Cost of enforcement would also go down as the volume of infringements decreased and those resources could be concentrated and directed along with a greater public support and sympathy. If the public can actually see that they get value out of protecting copyrights they will. If not they wont. I have zero incentive to protect the latest pop artists music if it will never go out of copyright in my life time, but if see that I can do whatever I want with it in 10 years, then yeah, I'd stick up for them and so would a lot of others.

The big label/studio/publisher companies dug themselves into this mess with a money grab and pretty much lost all sympathy from everyone that they cant buy off. Their only way out of this is to either be more open with their content or go back to fair laws. Other wise, the rest of us will go on without them. It also comes down to culture. Like it or not, music, movies, books, games, software, or whatever are our culture. You just cant reasonably expect people to not not have access to their culture forever. Its fair to have to pay for the latest and greatest, but as it is now, there is pretty much zero free access to anything since 1927 and that system just doesn't work. Now with technology, people just circumvent the unfair system like they should.
Jobs on the Seed of Apple's Innovation [2004]
Mac OS X Lion: Coming In July For $29
Nope, you're not missing anything. That's another valid workaround, which undermines the practical advantage of untyped languages yet a little bit more.
Credit card usage fees are a good way to a) make your customers mad and b) be blacklisted by your CC processor (possibly sued).

Nearly every processor agreement stipulates that this is a no-no.
I'm troubled by certification as well, although that is somewhat orthogonal to whether I value Ken's training... I personally took the training to improve myself. The "certification" didn't mean much to me one way or the other.

In fact, I would tie it back to what I said above and suggets that the certificate is a product just as a the training is a product, but the certificate is not the training and the training is not the practice. If the training is one step removed from Scrum, the certificate is two steps removed from Scrum!
All of them are officially endorsed.
When I find errors in Wikipedia articles, I add a section to the Talk page explaining my reasoning, citing sources if I can. Then more "established" people can make the edit.

As far as sourcing errors goes, think about it from the perspective of a generalist. For any given "correction," I think it's fair to assume that the change is more likely to be wrong than correct. The generalist who curates many pages is probably not qualified to determine either way, so the safest thing to do is revert back to the old version. Hence, sourcing corrections can give them confidence that the change is more likely to be correct than the original.

Yes, this is difficult. But I think that's it's inherently difficult. That is, providing a vast source of knowledge covering many topics digestible by non-experts is inherently a difficult endeavor.
I get the impression that the supply and utility of Bitcoin are both still far too low to be used for serious money laundering.

Laundering isn't particularly difficult anyway. You're probably still just better off buying a bar and pouring vodka down the drain.
Exactly. It would be exceedingly difficult to locate the silk road server, but trivially easy to find someone who was going to it
You can't shut down a Tor hidden service without compromising or shutting down the entire Tor network. Same deal with Bitcoins.
I think you are missing a very significant point: without doing these things, he wouldn't survive. The article suggests that he couldn't afford the new cash register at the time, so he made the best of his situation.

Future-proofing your business is great, but if you can't hold on long enough to even exist in the future, then it's premature optimization.
I check for the Visa/MC stickers on my way into every establishment I visit. People tend to ignore them, but there's a vanishingly small percentage of stores that take credit cards and don't have the stickers.
I love reading books, and always want to know what my friends are reading to help give me new ideas. Built this Facebook app to make it easier to post what book you are reading to your wall.

Keen to hear ideas on how to get an initial bunch of users to get feedback from and help develop the idea.