skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Even if Spotify were to increase prices, it's not bait and switch.

This article makes no sense. Duh, if Spotify goes away, if you leave for any reason (rates, terms of service, whatever)... their music goes with it. That's how subscription services work. If Netflix goes away, I lose access to the movies that Netflix was letting me stream. The fact that someone is used to "owning" their music or re-listening more than you usually re-watch movies doesn't change any of the core principles of the business model.

One album costs $10. If I listen to that album once a day for 30 days (not EVER going to happen, but I'm trying to be generous), then I'm still only filling a tiny, tiny fraction of the amount of time I listen to music.

$10 with Spotify gives me effectively non-stop new music. In 6 months, I'll have spent $60 and had the benefit of listening to hundreds of albums. Even if something happens that I stop using Spotify... are you really implying that I haven't extracted good value from Spotify as a service?

If Spotify's price increases that I don't think I can get the same or a good value.... I just stop using it and go back to life as it was before. What is the lock in? There seems to be an implication that I will have "wasted" my money on Spotify since I have no music mp3s to show for it. Did my family waste their money on Netflix despite the fact that I don't own any of the hundreds of DVDs that they've watched or streamed?

I just don't understand this implied malice at work here. Besides, it (seems) completely ignorant of Spotify's existence in the rest of the world for some time now.
Historical income tax rates
>Everything they sell is available at Best Buy

Well, I've found radioshack sells cables far cheaper than the equivalent at best buy.
That's what I'm wondering, but they are still heavily promoting cell phones like the recent HTC Evo for Evo 3D trade-in. I don't think they can be a relevant DIY shop and standard electronic store at the same time. All of the stores I've been don't have the room, not to mention the staff.
Right, and this is what has caused millions of people to panic today and realize that Google really can't be trusted with our data. If someone hacks you and does something with your account, or even if you just do something stupid, years of data is just gone like that with no explanation. Now to me Google is just as unreliable as keeping all my data on a single hard drive with no backup.
Mutual fund taurus
Mutual fund is one such type of fund. Funds are a sum of money put together for collective use at a later stage. The broad mechanics of operation of mutual fund is collection of like minded people’s money is invested across a diversified portfolio. Objective is to minimialize risks.
fine point
Congratulations, Oracle! Not only have you completely failed to eradicate that information from the internet, but you've just made arguments to estoppel 10x more effective.
Very slick, I was hooked and watched the whole first chapter and I didn't experience any issues to speak of.

As successful as the Django course might be (and it looks like it will be), I think you should also consider working on an audio-course creation application (in Django ;) and charge for that too so other people can create their own courses similar to this one.
Will they continue trying to sell me batteries and cell phones with simple overpriced electronics components?
You'd think Oracle wouldn't be this ignorant. At least an apology would have saved some face.
interesting to see such a big company fail early, fail fast... advice startups are often given (and should take)... they're not perfect, but at least now they're in the game.
I arrived in the US in 1998. Prior to that, I remember reading good things about Radio Shack. When I finally found a branch, I browsed inside to see what the big deal was. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I remember leaving very disappointed. It seemed to be all custom gadgets (PDAs, RCs, etc), cellphones, and expensive batteries. Reading comments here of what Radio Shack used to be at least clarifies why it got good buzz in the past.
I liked the part about "finding good ideas" vs "finding good people". I think this is why devs are annoyed by postings looking for someone to implement their great idea. "I have a great idea for a fantastic product. I just need you to implement it. You'll get paid when the project makes money."
Goggles was uable to load the Farmville one for me.
Here's my anecdote about the decline of Radio Shack:

I went there to get a USB cable the other day. The only normal male-male USB cable they were stocking had gold-plated ends (for reasons unknown), a big non-standard bulge in the connector at one end, and a ludicrously grandiose package, festooned with details about how this was a USB "transfer" cable, specially designed to transfer data between Windows computers.

For this reason, apparently, it was necessary to price it at $40. That's forty dollars. For a USB cable.

I laughed in the clerk's face while he was explaining to me about the "transfer cable" nonsense, told him he just lost a customer forever, and left.
The Devil and John Holmes
Bank robbery?
Nobody really knows.

We have a good idea that it would be bad (worse than if the .gov hadn't stepped in to prop up the economy in 2008) but the actual practical consequences are literally unknowable.

If you're nihilistic you may think that a disruption like this would be a salutary thing for the United States forcing us into the long overdue reappraisal of our place in the world and our ability to dictate terms to the rest of the planet. But the truth of the matter is that our far flung logistical system means that many of us are more dependent on global trade than we realise and that a sovereign default on the part of the United States of America would have repercussions that will affect pretty much everyone on the planet who has an electrical outlet in their house.

Fucking with the flow of money at that scale will certainly cause chaos and civil disorder as primary effects, but it will also disable most of the tools we have to control chaos and civil disorder.

Think of it as being like a power outage, only it's a money outage. Your bank won't be able to count on getting it's regular operating loans, your employers bank, the same, various payments into the system for housing vouchers, food stamps, agricultural subsidies, road construction contracts , all the paper that keeps our society from collapsing will stop moving. Some of it may resume, but if enough of the economy is broken...

So best case scenario: economic hardship, generational unemployment, millions of people displaced from their homes, and the US can wave bye bye to the dream of hegemonic leadership, economic or military, for the foreseeable future.

Worst case scenario: War. It is traditionally the cause and cure of sovereign default. And while we (the US of A) are currently fighting multiple colonial wars (mideast, north africa, south america) which is part of what has spun up the numbers on the debt; we have not really begun to tap our poulations war making capabilities, one of the few untapped resources we have left.
Freedom of speech is a basic human right, not a privilege granted by governments. When companies stifle speech, it's immoral even if it is legal. However, I think I made it clear that I am talking about not allowing companies to control speech by adopting a social network system that is decentralized.
I came across this Google Doc in a VC's blog, but I don't recall which. http://goo.gl/HX4KD
I've seen another document somewhere, but I can't find it right now.
Never understood what that link meant - thanks.
Beautiful placeholder page.

robsimo: What are you saying about namespaces? The placeholder does not seem to mention, say, a js library that adds a certain symbol to the namespace.
a w e s o m e
The article itself argues that we consume music in a way that is fundamentally different from the way we consume television shows and movies, thus rendering the comparison invalid.
Awesome success. Do you need to frequently publish new games to keep your revenue up? For games, do you find that customers expect updates for bug fixes? Or are the games mostly "fire and forget", the code never to be touched again?
If you're in my house and say things that I don't like, it's not immoral for me to kick you out. You can go say what you like outside. It's similar to companies allowing you to post your opinion on their service. If they don't like what you're saying, they have every right to make you leave.
Impact, an HTML5 Canvas and Javascript based Game Engine
The Twitter Client for Thought Leaders
This is the sort of platitude that it's comfortable for everybody to agree on: it's just the quality of the material that matters, so just read better stuff. Well, no. That isn't the only thing that matters. The medium also has an effect. The internet is an excellent medium for random access to specific things and a poor medium for substantial thought and reflection. It's a mile wide and an inch deep.

Tao's blog is excellent, but how does one acquire the background necessary to understand his mathematical posts? By rolling up one's sleeves and doing hard work, most of which is likely done away from the internet. And this is the kind of thing that spending a lot of time on the internet makes it harder to do. That's my experience, anyway, as well as my observation of others'.
Hopefully this is not exploited to "scientifically" explain the inferiority of sub-Saharan Africans vis-a-vis the rest of humanity.

One of the unfortunate side effects of the way that newspapers report on scientific research is that journalists' lack of knowledge of the subject matter leads to lots of vague statements that can be easily twisted around to have just about any desired meaning.
For some mind-expanding examples of the (probable) insufficiency of our concept of "universe," see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverse#Tegmark.27s_classifi...

At various levels, it's possible that our own Hubble volume ("universe") is only a small stable bubble in a much larger physical system.
Cellphones, batteries, and toys that only sell at Christmas.
Bill Gates: Was the $5 Billion Worth It?
Could it be that you picked up one of these?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easy_Transfer_Cable

Maybe overpriced but it was likely not just a USB cable if it was called a "transfer" cable.
The Basics of A/B and Multivariate Tests To Earn More with Websites
Right, and I think that's unfair. Even if it's true, it doesn't warrant the implication that Spotify doesn't provide a value-based service, or that it's bait-and-switch, or that they have malicious intent, or that it can't be a supplement to buying music a traditional way.

To look at it another way. I have, in my current library of music, listened to over 400 albums in the last 3 years. I'm not ashamed to admit that I've not paid for all of them. The heavily listened to favorites, I have, but not all. Even if Spotify quadrupled in cost... it would still be small compared to (400 * $5) or (400 * $10). Not to mention the value from offline playlist prefetching, sync-free mobile access, and access to the same library on all 3 computers and my mobile devices.
There's a good list by Megan Mcardle here.

What people don't get is that increasing US debt is a short term fix. People are going to stop buying Treasuries and the US is going to default. It's just a question of whether it happens on Aug. 2 (unlikely) or in a few years (very likely).

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/07/getting-...

- You just cut the IRS and all the accountants at Treasury, which means that the actual revenue you have to spend is $0.
- The nation's nuclear arsenal is no longer being watched or maintained
- The doors of federal prisons have been thrown open, because none of the guards will work without being paid, and the vendors will not deliver food, medical supplies, electricity,etc.
- The border control stations are entirely unmanned, so anyone who can buy a plane ticket, or stroll across the Mexican border, is entering the country. All the illegal immigrants currently in detention are released, since we don't have the money to put them on a plane, and we cannot actually simply leave them in a cell without electricity, sanitation, or food to see what happens.
- All of our troops stationed abroad quickly run out of electricity or fuel. Many of them are sitting in a desert with billions worth of equipment, and no way to get themselves or their equipment back to the US.
- Our embassies are no longer operating, which will make things difficult for foreign travellers
- No federal emergency assistance, or help fighting things like wildfires or floods. Sorry, tornado people! Sorry, wildfire victims! Try to live in the northeast next time!
- Housing projects shut down, and Section 8 vouchers are not paid. Families hit the streets.
- The money your local school district was expecting at the October 1 commencement of the 2012 fiscal year does not materialize, making it unclear who's going to be teaching your kids without a special property tax assessment.
- The market for guaranteed student loans plunges into chaos. Hope your kid wasn't going to college this year!
- The mortgage market evaporates. Hope you didn't need to buy or sell a house!
- The FDIC and the PBGC suddenly don't have a government backstop for their funds, which has all sorts of interesting implications for your bank account.
- The TSA shuts down. Yay! But don't worry about terrorist attacks, you TSA-lovers, because air traffic control shut down too. Hope you don't have a vacation planned in August, much less any work travel.
- Unemployment money is no longer going to the states, which means that pretty soon, it won't be going to the unemployed people.
> > OO languages (i.e. imperative)
>
> Why can't an OO language be functional?

Yes, I think you are totally right. As I see it, OO is about data and behaviour encapsulation, and object polymorphism. There is no reason why objects need to carry mutable state. But, they often do, and I think most authors do put OOP in the procedural/imperative side of programming.

Of course come cool hybrid languages do mix concepts from OOP and functional programming in order to have more expressive power. But most of them still map pretty closely to the Von Neumann model: a set of statements executed one after the other that alter the program's state, and hence are imperative too.

A functional program does not map it's computation to this Von Neuman model, which pretty much represents how computers work, but to an abstract model, usually based on mathematical concepts.

Therefore,

even = filter(nats[1:100], i -> i % 2 == 0)

would be functional or not depending on the underlying execution model. A functional programing language would guarantee that the function passed to `filter` is side-effect-free, so it can be free to make the computation of the result in parallel or lazily or whatnot. An imperative language would be required to execute the passed function for each element of the sequence in a defined order, as that function might very well not be side-effect-free.

But, in the end, I think that all that is a very absolutist approach to what is functional and what is not. Trying to draw that line is usually quite futile, as it really depends on very strict definitions, and, well, everybody agreeing on those definitions. I just wanted to clarify my point a little bit (though I probably failed)

> On the other hand, these concepts and expressions are used with so many different meanings and in so many different contexts, that it's no surprise that different people understand them differently. Maybe it's better to just talk in code...

Totaly agreed. Probably a more "fuzzy" definition of "functional", thus allowing one to say that some construct "more functional" than an other one, is more pragmatic. I also would say that

even = filter(nats[1:100], i -> i % 2 == 0)

is much "more functional", or declarative, than

even = []
for i = 1 to 100
if i % 2 == 0
even.append(i)

And I would even say that Python's list comprehensions are even more declarative, even though it is an imperative language too:

even = [i for i in range(0,100) if i % 2 == 0]

Code FTW!
Thank you for the analogy. I think I overstated my case in a way that sounds too general. I disagree with Google's terms of service. They impose restrictions that could limit productive discussion. They have control over identity I think is unreasonable. The concepts of social networks, online discussion, and identity seem like too big of a deal to let particular companies control them.
But if you've already designed the program, and you want to make a semantically minor change that requires linking formerly unrelated parts of the program, an impure language lets you do it without modifying half the program to keep up with new signatures.

I'd rephrase this slightly.

If you want to make a semantically minor change that involves linking formerly unrelated parts of a program, an impure language permits you to do so without thinking through the effects this might have on your whole program.

In contrast, a pure program forces you to walk through your code and replace "a -> a" with "a -> GameState a" in every single function that might have broken. This includes the functions you might have forgotten about.

Now lets look at how this would explicitly work in your example of dancing enemies. In a pure functional language, your game logic is probably something along the lines of GameState a = State GameWorld a, with GameWorld a type describing the state of your world.

To add the dancing koopa troopa logic, you'd merely need to modify the GameState object and include (MusicTrack, MusicTime) as a field. There would be very little messing around with type signatures - the function advanceEnemyState: () -> GameState EnemyState is already expected to vary based on the world.
It's fine to get excited about strongly relativistic arguments but I don't think they have a place in talking about events at distant celestial objects.

The amount of distortion you can have between distances and times is bounded by the amount you let your reference frames differ. Between stars there is not all that much velocity, so time is a relatively stable concept. Sure it'll wander a few percent but nothing nearly as drastic as having no sense of 'now'.

Don't forget that when you bring relativistic speeds into the mix you can't agree on distances either. Are you prepared to argue that it's actually one billion light years away?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect

It's astonishing how many companies try it. I love the Internet for things like this :)
I got one 2 months back, and I'm loving it. Flashed it with CM7 the day I got it, and it's perfect for reading books (EZPDF), browsing (Opera Mobile, Dolphin) and news consumption (Greader, Pulse). I also occasionally watch movies on it (Rockplayer) and videos on Youtube. And, of course, Angry Birds on the big display is fun.
Matropolis: Scientists of the World Unite (aka "The Matlab/Python wars")
Www.siy158.com
Sure you can.

Pick a vector.

Any vector.

You can create an observer moving at this velocity and it'll give you a different idea of simultaneous from an omniobserver at a different vector.

Oh, and before you ask, no there is no 'unmoving' vector. They're all relative to each other with no reference frame.
What I mean is that when this site launches you are going to want a good username. There will be a land grab.
I suffer the same thing.

I wonder if it's just finding the right project to code.
There is no such thing as we consume music in a way that is fundamentally different. Previous behaviors does not mean natural law.

The entire argument only shows a lack of careful thinking on the matter.

We consume music many different ways.

Radio, pandora, on the tv, in the mall, in games, cd, gramophone on the disco, live music and so on.

You could as easily argue that the spotify model shows that access beats ownership. If anything the way the music industry want us to consume music is what is fundamentally different and out of date.

The article is so shallow and can only be on the front page of HN because spotify is is new in the US.
Cascading default in state, local and foreign governments along with the end of a largish chunk of firms, ending with a series of currency unpeggings that make the end of Bretton Woods look carefully choreographed.

There may be riots in China. Wars are a distinct possibility. Depending on how the back-end is handled on letters of credit, international trade could grind to a halt. See riots in China above.
to paraphrase larry summers: "post-lehman on steroids"

think what you will of the guy, this is a good description of the most probable scenario, i think:

http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/11777

(at ~ 4:10)
To me, that's no excuse. I have a better idea: sell a regular USB cable for $2, which is what they should cost, and design your OS so computers can talk to each other without having to build gold-plated $40 SuperWindowsTransfer versions of commodity cables. It's outrageous to me that such a product even exists, outrageous that it was $40, and outrageous that Radio Shack, of all places, could not carry a reasonably-priced USB cable. I would have even been ok with a certain price premium; I don't expect a retailer to match Monoprice. But $40 for the only USB cable in the shop? Please.
Not as interesting as this smoking gun from Andy Rubin.

This is pretty damning evidence of willful infringement on the part of Google.

One of the most interesting passages in today's order quotes from an October 2005 email by Google's Android boss Andy Rubin back in 2005:

"If Sun doesn't want to work with us, we have two options: 1) Abandon our work and adopt MSFT CLR VM and C# language - or - 2) Do Java anyway and defend our decision, perhaps making enemies along the way"

If a jury sees that statement (and if there is a trial, then the jury will see it for sure), Google has a very serious problem. And "very serious" may be an understatement. Moreover, a statement like that showing up in publicly accessible court documents now may cause significant concern among many of Google's Android partners (including, but not limited to, device makers).

http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2011/07/judge-orders-overhau...
All the paperlinks ones scanned almost immediately (redlaser here, could use a better one if anyone knows any). The rest usually took some jiggling and trying for a minute or so. And the Disney ones were just too small.
The assumption is there is no good reason for the US to default, as it can always print more dollars and pay debt with them. In contrast, Greece can't print euros by itself.
It's not likely to happen (sorry for bypassing the answer).

Simply because the international impact would be too big. Too many international trades rely on the US dollar. Until the Yuan takes over (speculative(!), if it would, in the next 50 years) the US is pretty much safe from defaulting.

If it really did, it'd be the end of the global keynesian economies and throw us back in pre-globalization.

Most economy would pull back from global exposure (that's non-realistic). Although we're seeing this on a small scale (when France refuses to adopt more EU policies for example, or when all EU goes pissed at Greece (particularly Germany)), it just won't happen.

What's going to happen, is massive sweeping under the carpets, "deal with it later", and a whole bunch of plans to lower debt-creep and keep face publicly.

Think of it as, bumping a massive bug to "next version" in the understanding that everyone already knows about it, and it's can of worms that would require too many structural changes, to the point that it would change the nature of the software itself.