skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I can relate to the benefit of slowly transforming highly used software. Recently, we did a massive upgrade to our forum software (the most used part of our system), changing the look, some of the feel, and some of the functionality in one fell swoop, and with the instant change, there was quite a revolt from the userbase.

Luckily, were able to quickly revert much back to begin incrementally making the changes to little effect. Had we kept it like that, given the response from the users, we could have lost some long customers.

It was our mistake for making such a huge change in one massive patch, but we've learned from that mistake.
Can someone explain what was so stupid about his answer? I don't understand.
I didn't think Facebook could be used in Cuba. Aren't computer services part of the embargo?
This is my favorite headline ever.
Rome was a notoriously unhealthy place to live in the middle ages. The surrounding countryside was depopulated in the disasters of the late Empire, and a lot of the farmland reverted to malarial swamps.
I think it is wrong to draw parallels to Japan.

i agree. when japan entered their deflationary period, they were the world's largest CREDITOR, and consumers had large savings accounts to fall back on.

we are entering our deflationary period as the world's largest DEBTOR, and our populace is equally indebted in their personal accounts.

unlike japan, we will not emerge intact
Japan has its own issues that have kept it in a virtually stagnant economy for the last 10-15 years. The entire country's natural tendency is to fold back into itself and create pockets of isolation from the outside world

???? when japan hit the skids in the 90s, their corporations were the envy of the world (and were well integrated into the global economy) and they were the world's preferred lender (and they loaned to everybody)
Some more peace monuments
A lot of people took it as coming off very arrogant.
The execution is key, not necessarily the idea :). Ideas often change drastically once you get started.
Certainly - it had its ups and its downs, but continued to be somewhere, and still is now. I would bet on it still being somewhere in another 2000 years.

My point is that housing technology is nothing compared to demand for good locations in terms of its affect on prices, and good locations have a lot of staying power.

BTW, those marshy areas in Lazio have been fairly marginal for a long time:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agro_Pontino
That was (briefly) mentioned at the end of the article.
Learning from history seems to be very hard for people. We seem to repeat our mistakes somehow allowing ourselves to be under the illusion that it is different this time around. A lot of people don't seem to believe what she is saying is true and actually believe in the contrary that the current crisis is because of free market capitalism.

What most people don't know is that we didn't have one in the first place. Fannie Mae was a Govt. Sponsored Enterprise, started by FDR, and is one of biggest problems in the present crisis. Various Senators and Congressmen were pressuring Fannie Mae to make these horrible bets on the real estate market. This is not an isolated case, the government has been interfering in the market a lot more than it should have and in a bad way.
This article isn't so much content-free, as conclusion-free. It's like the key word in the headline is "may." It says "at the helm of the good ship Apple, all seems well", then 2 paragraphs later says the stock has fallen 51% so far this year. It goes on to talk about how big a deal the new macbook pro cases are, only to compare to to the Next cube ("Metallurgists were impressed; prospective buyers were not).

Personally I think the new MBP is a misstep, and my 17" is still the best MBP available.
ghjwlorhjnzdfogfd
Good question. The only answer I can think of is to discourage competition with your own offspring.
The whole article seems to be building towards that—along with the notion of smart lawmakers writing the necessary laws to make it happen just right—but ends rather abruptly.

Talk about painting yourself into a corner.
Mike Leach is by far my favorite personality in sports (though I was raised in Lubbock). He really is crazy like a fox.

"The Madman of West Texas":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqRz9gQfYr8
It's like back in the day with eBay and their updates. The users were used to their yellow-ish background, and the company was looking for change. So while revamping their design, week by week they would alter the hex value from yellow to a grey color. Without the users knowing, they dynamically changed and improved the layout as a whole.
My premise isn't that we'd be better if we did exactly what our ancestors did. My premise is that evolution has shaped us to deal with environments of scarcity and hard work.

The issue of light is a big one. Even with all the lights off, some street light comes in through the windows.
There's a bill called the Community Reinvestment act or something like that, except that the minorities who got their mortgages through that act have a <i>lower</i> rate of default than the general population.
Sounds like a sign of great things to come.
Yeah. And yet, for some reason, the Wii still has awful third-party support. The games library is nothing compared to the 360 and the PS3 has better non-Sony games than the Wii has non-Nintendo games. I've never understood that.
First off, the topic of this article is pretty misleading and kind of divisive. From the article's own admission, Google only allows monetization of start page gadgets that user's manually ad. The meat of the article was spent talking about the merits of a left UI navigation for Google's start page. (Personally, I think it should be a setting since I am on the laptop a lot, and it really kills screen space, but I'll live)

Further, I have a very hard time hating Google because they provide so much value to my life. They store all my e-mail through GMail, all my RSS feeds, all my documents, and now I have all my company internet assets managed through Google Apps.

I might get flamed for saying this, but I'll gladly click on some Google links on their start page or anywhere else, a few clicks of a mouse is definitely worth more than what they have given me. In fact, I'm pretty sure I'd subscribe and pay a monthly fee to keep Google alive, if they asked. People should be grateful for what they receive for free.
Rambling Thoughts on MVC, LAMP, and Data Flow
Is Alexa a good representation of the web traffic?
How many of you really have downloaded Alexa toolbar (I have never)? Of the people who do, do they represent a sizeable web-demographics?
Cool. Firefox add-ons in general is the reason why I temporarily used Chrome but went back. The fancy each tab is its own process is cool, but I love Greasemonkey, Delicious, Firebug,Adblock,Flashblock,Noscript...

Basically, by blocking all the offensive scripts to begin with, my browser doesn't crash as often as it probably ought to ;).
Don't you just love argument by metaphor?
I am typing this on the new Macbook.

I completely agree with the conclusion of this article, after using this Macbook for a week, the changes from the previous generation are phenomenal. The whole case is made out of one piece of aluminum which means that there are no screws anywhere, and that provides for a much more durable and robust case. The integrated GPU is AMAZING, I am getting 40-60 FPS in World of Warcraft, that is better than my previous Macbook Pro. The keys are awesome, the screen is brilliant, battery life is stellar, this notebook is 3-4 years ahead of its competition in almost every way.

If you just look at Apple's history, the iPhone is the best smart phone on the market, no other smart phone even comes close (look at the multiples of user engagement on the iPhone vs any other phone). OS X is so much better than Windows, look to any review or any user of OS X. And now, even the Macbook is leaps and bounds beyond its competition.

Like I said in a previous comment, surviving the recession is easy: make good (or for Apple, the best) products, charge for them, you'll do very well, recession or not.
The Life of the Queen Bee: Superb Macrophotography
People have been trying to raise money for distressed debt funds since mid-2007. One of these times they could get the timing right, although investor cash might be drying up for them.
Home built CD changer / duplicator
Got any example searches that are notably better on Yahoo? Just curious.
Why is Mathematica in italics in this piece? Is it a work of art? If it is, can I see the source code?
No, I don't think David's book is what you're looking for. It's more of an argument that anarchy is a plausible and desirable arrangement for society given the current state of microeconomic thought. He offers a theoretical basis for private law enforcement and law making, as well as other functions that are normally performed by the state.

On the empirical side, he does have a very nice chapter on Iceland, which went without a public bureaucracy for a few centuries. Law enforcement was essentially a private business for awhile. It's a good read.

I know that one of the big Public Choice guys did some writing on the feasibility of anarchy (Buchanan, I think). However, I'm not sure if it's the kind of work you are looking for. There's been few functional anarchies on this planet that we know about, and it's not a topic that gets most economists published. I'll let you know if I find anything.

If you're looking for information on the problems of collective action, then the Public Choice guys are definitely the place to start (Buchanan, Tullock, etc.).
And here I thought this would be a photoessay on girls in middle school...
How to Tell if You're Rich
It's awful. Quantcast is much better.
Nailing the nominals
I know 95% of what Calacanis writes is garbage or just promoting himself/Mahahlo, but these were some great tips.
Well, no - that's not quite right. In regards to "gladly clicking on some google links", I'd say it'd be more appropriate to be willing to click on their links, should they make them relevant. And that's what google has done so brilliantly! They're not asking people to please click on the links, or to be grateful for their free services, they're taking advantage of the natural self-interest people have, and making it to the individual's benefit to click.

I'm certainly right there with you as to the utility of Google, replacing them would be very dear indeed!
It's interesting that anecdotes about Obama have entered into the popular consciousness as parables in the same way that was once reserved for stories of Jesus or Buddha.
Yea, I'm curious as to what he would add to this list for running a startup in a recession
Not exactly. Never heard of "Deschooling Society" article, I'll check it. The inspiration was the necessity to find a teacher to help me with RubyOnRails. I remember what a mess that was and I just thought I wish I had such a service to help me.
When under attack, plants can signal microbial friends for help
I suppose you're right. However, public opinion has been largely formed by the opinions of the regulators. I have never known a regulator to want less power, so libertarians are fighting a lost cause. That's ok, we're used to it.

As far as the rest of the world goes, European economic courses focus on the evils of the market and Marxist models of class struggle, so they're pretty much a lost cause too.
I agree with the CentOS or Ubuntu sentiment. The only piece of wisdom I'd like to add is to pick a distro that you know well. If and when the shit hits the fan, you'll be glad you know how to quickly and properly assess your bottleneck.
Lets face it, he was probably thinking about his Apple shares when writing this article.
Anna seems to make contradicting statements in the article. On one hand, she seems to be a proponent of avoiding "moral hazard", i.e. the government should let financial entities which made bad decisions fail. On the other hand, she appears to support Paulson's original proposal to buy up the toxic assets.
Handango to Offer Paid Apps for Android
People need to stop taking TechCrunch seriously. Michael Arrington is fed by venture capital firms and their portfolio companies, and has far too many conflicts of interest to be credible. Most of his posts are extremely biased and tilted toward the current thinking of those feeding him information. You gain no competitive advantage from reading this nonsense.
I was thinking Dolemite.
Morse.rb
Two Ways Google Is Trying To Juice AdSense: Ad-Only Search Boxes And Syndication Pages
It's probably the place I first hear about most new startups. Can you think of any other source that's better for that?
It's not anonymous this time.
Most of these make sense, but I don't really see how a 2nd monitor can save half hour a day. Also the $3000 espresso machine might be a little expensive when you can get one for $500 that's pretty decent.
Completely Unplugged, Fully Green
Game companies did not bet on the Wii.

And it takes a long time to develop a modern game.

So, it's a lack of foresight, more than anything else.
the list mostly consists of 'spend/buy this and that (mac, 2nd monitor, aeron, espresso machine, etc) to save more money further'

those seem to be in direct opposition to the epitome of startup: steve wozniak

"All the best things that I did at Apple came from (a) not having money and (b) not having done it before"
I find the idea of doing meetings over lunch horrible. The point of lunch is to switch off and recharge so that you can get going again in the afternoon.

Plus having an hour to recharge is more effective than 30 minutes. You may save 100 hours a year on lunch, but what do you lose in productivity and morale?
What an Awful Ending and what an awful article in general. Ok, Ok, I might get voted down but common I can express opinions without being hated?

He says that it should not be a democracy, nor should it be a dictatorship, so what should it be then?

He states that the long-term self is wiser, but also that the short-term self might be wiser, so which should we listen to?

He misses the point completely of the Miligram Experiment and of the "other" experiments of such kind, I presume Zimbardo. If anything they show that the self is a continual construction, not a rigid personality which exists consistently, but that personality is fluid, it changes, it is made on the spot.

It is an interesting read somewhat, but it is a prime example of everything that is wrong with psychology.
Maybe you're thinking of the boring sort of meeting that has an agenda and 20 people there. Just eat lunch with people you work with and talk about work stuff.
What I like about these tips is that they are mostly about buying things that are one-time costs, and avoiding the recurring costs.
I would say that's an underestimate of the value of a 2nd monitor. If you're a programmer, get a second monitor if you have to buy itself. It's worth it.
It's fairly well known that multiple monitors increase productivity.

Here's one study: http://research.microsoft.com/research/coet/multimonitor/chi...
Wedding Best Man Has Two Left Feet | TechJaws
"1. Buy Macintosh computers, save money on an IT department"

# tail -f /var/log/messages

Oct 15 15:45:47 mike-laptop Bullshit detected.
If he's trying to save money, why is he using the word "buy" so much?
IUpHigh - iPhone Aerial Photography
A funny proof of concept iPhone application
Sunday is a good day for debating on the internet... So, here's what is probably an unpopular thesis, but one I believe is true: Libertarianism is a convenient fantasy but nothing more.

Libertarians somehow believe that "free markets" and "regulation" are antonyms, as if the market is something other than a regulatory creation. Think: Would a free market exist without the force of government backing contractual obligations? (I'll exempt the anarchist libertarians here, who lack this willful ignorance, although their vision is hopelessly rose-tinted.) What about regulations on activities like insider trading, or lying on balance sheets?

The fact is that, just like in so many other things, individual self-interest is often at odds with the continued existence of any shared enterprise, including the free market itself. Without regulation to create and sustain it, the market wouldn't even exist.

So the question is really that of "which regulations" rather than "no regulation"; libertarians conveniently pretend otherwise, forcefully claim an absolutist moral high ground, and in doing so badly distort policy debates and decisions.

(Even if we buy what anarchist-libertarians are selling, their vision is essentially yet another utopia and like all utopias, there is no clear path 'there' from 'here'.)
She says that the basic problem is that we don't know how to value these toxic assets. If we value them at the current market price, it would mean many banks are insolvent (euphemism for broke).

So buying up toxic assets is not incompatible with letting banks fail; if we pay market price, purchasing these assets may reveal a number of banks who are broke by removing unknowns from their balance sheet.

By switching to recapitalizing (euphemism for giving them money), we make no progress in removing unknowns from the balance sheet. This is why we're hearing about banks who are hoarding the capital instead of lending it -- they still don't know if they're broke or not.
I'd say for a young company like YC which seems to be getting plenty of attention from blogs and the overall startup community, 10% doesn't sound very impressive.

In comparison, YC news readership must have grown a lot more then 10% in the last year.
Neither of these are new, they've been doing this for months if not years.
I feel like this taints his motives. Prior to this post employees might have felt that Calcanis really cared about them.

"Working at Mahalo is sweet. We get Aeron chairs, 2 monitors, free food, free coffee, and free sodas."

It's still a sweet deal, but it just doesn't feel as nice when you learn that he was doing these things more for the bottom line.
It is not the stupidest question in the world. It's a terribly important question. But I don't think it's the most important question facing Twitter right now. Twitter has yet to cross the chasm to mainstream usage. It's not immediately obvious to anyone why they should use Twitter

See this is why I have a problem with the "get big and everything else will happen" philosophy that so many in the valley share: It's twisted logic.

If a startup can't make money now, then yes, it's possible that they might make money later. That's sounds more like trying to win the lottery twice though. Odds are it won't happen. In fact, Google is the only time it's happened that I can think of off hand.

Now, if a startup can turn a profit from the start (or soon enough) then it is pretty much guaranteed to continue making that profit no matter how big it is. In fact, it doesn't even need to get bigger. It can if it chooses, but it doesn't have to.

Why do people continue to focus on the bubble mentality of trying to profit from popularity alone? Even when it works, it isn't sustainable.
The really fun part is when you have to maintain code like this that somebody else thought was a good idea.

Adam's refactoring is actually quite clean:
http://refactormycode.com/codes/513-morse-code-encoder-decod...

Refactoring code is about making it clearer, cleaner, and easy to adapt in the future. Not this.
But why does the government need to get involved then? Let the market determine market rates which is only determined by actual transactions. Most likely someone in the market will buy the toxic assets, but not for face value. Because of the uncertainty, someone may only pay $0.10 on the dollar. The financial firms, however, are waiting to see if they can get a better deal/hand-out from the government.

If the government made it clear that these businesses were on their own, then they would be forced to sell the assets at market rate, i.e. the amount the market is willing to pay for them.

If that's not enough, then as Anna implies, then they deserve to fail.
I wouldn't be interested in doing business with people like these. Odds are I'd insult them in some way I didn't realize down the line anyway.

Aside: these people are always the 20%, IMHO.
Right. Making a game for both the Xbox 360 and the PS 3 isn't a big deal. You probably have to code a lot of the same things twice, but you don't have to fundamentally rethink much of the game's mechanics. The game is pretty much the same to the user.

The Wii's controller makes it very good at different types of games. It's kinda sucky for the old FPS or fighting games. Plus for anyone who has both a Wii and an Xbox or PS3, you're going to buy games like Madden on the one that offers it in high-def.

So the gaming companies went with what they knew. And they certainly couldn't have guessed that the Wii would have sold more units than the other two combined. I think now that they know that, they'll get a little more creative.
My experience was pretty similar. I found that you either have to spend hours a day on it, or it's just no fun at all, and who has that kind of time?
I'm hoping Chrome innovates on script-sharing... if it were easier to see/edit/share scripts for a page you're visiting, Greasemonkey would become an entirely different product. Also, if GM scripts could expose API's to each other.
Hulu also recently premiered their first-ever movie exclusive. Nifty idea, though I'm sure you lose something of the experience.
The first thing that popped into my head was: Asperger's?
Yeah. I got bored of seeing so many things on News.YC described as a "hack". Then I had a few minutes this morning during breakfast, and decided to check out News.YC for the first time in about a week.

This was the second story I clicked on, hoping to read something that was actually, y'know, revolutionary. Even if it was football.

This "hack" nonsense has got to go. Using it indiscriminately -- no matter how much you justify it afterward -- doesn't make you look cool or sexy or clever.
When you already run a startup like we do, you do not have much time to submit, you code, so the deadline sneaks up on you. I would say you can not read much into the submission date.
Ask YC: How do you market SMS-based services?
For the past few weeks, I've been trying to market my SMS chat service, with absolutely no success. Facebook ads are costing about $5 per new user at best, AdWords has netted exactly 0 users, and AdMob blew through 100 clicks in 4 minutes with, again, 0 users.

This has all proven to me that web ads, be they on a computer or a phone, are miserable ways to get users for a text messaging product. So, I was wondering if anyone has any experience marketing an SMS service (or any other mobile service) and would be willing to share tips.
I have a demo because my startup is allready in operation for months. But what is a demo? The technology I demo is very special, but will Ycombinator spot that in a minute? I doubt it, it needs a person presenting the demo. If it is very obvious how good the technology is (it is!), we would not need to apply anymore.
Doonesbury on Blogging
Who is going to honor the promise to goofy when his life-long friend gets hit by a bus and some random next-of-kin (who could probably care less about what may or may not have been promised) takes over?

Goofy, you're taking a tremendous risk. If your friend really is one, they will care enough about you to get the legal stuff out of the way so that you're not screwed should something happen to them.
Calacanis calls time on the internet 'me-toos'
Those things aren't mutually exclusive, they're actually quite complimentary. Nice working environment = happy, more productive employees = better for the bottom line.

Also, I wouldn't want any employee working for me that thinks to themselves, "Gee, I thought this company was being good to me but it turns out they're trying to make money." It's the whole point.
So a Model T was greener than a modern car?