skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I think it's sheer ignorance to believe that this current economic situation is just going to "blow over" like the last recession we had.

We're not just going to spend and leverage our way out of this one (as we have with previous recessions) because the trust and confidence in credit is extremely shaky. The last 30 years, since about 1980, have been fueled by a ridiculous amount of credit and the bills are coming due.

It's now an issue of people and their confidence. The whole system of credit works because of trust, and with each bank failure and company fallout confidence is going to drop. This isn't just consumer confidence too, but also confidence on the part of foreign countries to believe that we'll make good on our insane level of debt.

We haven't had a negative quarter or high unemployment yet because 2008 just marked the significant beginning of this erosion of confidence and the revaluing of the massive bullshitting of on-paper "value" created by abnormal demand (fueled by credit). This "confidence crunch" is far from over.
I see your points, and agree. You hit it on the head when you pointed out that it seems obvious to us nerds.
I am inexperienced, and I probably wasn't ready to be the CEO for this venture.

It seems that a lot of people here took my posts to be me just blaming my partners, but that must be a light reading because I definitely talk about my own shortcomings, and I take responsibility for what ultimately happened. I've been looking in the mirror constantly for the last three months, and posting here is part of that process of reflection too.
True, Microsoft is an example, Gates went out and bought what would become MS-DOS, AFTER he made the deal with IBM. However, this has to be looked at in context - he had the money to buy it from someone else.
that's a great little video that nicely summarizes failure.
I suppose it's good for the greater community to be able to read this. But really, what good are you accomplishing here for yourself? I read this and think, "Well, I should probably steer clear of that guy."

My startup has its ups and downs. Lately it's had several downs. C'est la vie. People are always telling me I should be blogging about this stuff. I don't see how it would do me much good until I'm at the point where my product is doing what it needs to do. Otherwise I think I'd just be telegraphing to people to steer clear.
Well, I don't disagree that things can be done that way, but I do not think it is the right thing to do, for several reasons. Why learn to design/program just to pull a total suit move and sell vaporware/vaporproducts? If that is what you want to do, then just fake sell as you said, and then hire a few coders from India who can put whatever together for peanuts and then call that good (I would not be able to sleep at night ever after however). Also, those kinds of maneuvers are best left to suits - who are good at those kinds of things - instead of tech people, who are normally better at building things as opposed to pulling marketing maneuvers.
FREE Subliminal MP3 Download ,Too Good To Be True?
I thought subliminal messaging was banned / illegal!? These guys don`t seem to think so, theyre giving away a free album, does this stuff actually work?
Why is that the same unicode character, in the same machine, can has two (or maybe more) different designs? Check this screenshot: http://i38.tinypic.com/2pqqntj.jpg

(FF, Windows XP)
National Debt Clock runs out of digits
How Companies Use Twitter to Bolster Their Brands
I very much appreciate what you wrote and am very glad it's available. There are lots of great take-aways for my company and, surely, for a lot of people. I'm in the middle of a major release or I'd respond more-- yet, I'm perplexed to come here and see so many people being negative regarding the post. It takes a lot of guts to work on something feverishly for so long and then put things even more on the line afterwards for a post-mortem. It's nothing but good information for people to take in and learn from.

Kudos to you for sharing.
I don't really think this is fair, but I can see why it can come across that way. I wouldn't step down as CEO to keep a team together that did not want to be together. This is not to be confused with being unable to step aside for someone who is more suited for the position. That wasn't what was going on here.

I placed a great deal of trust in my team for nearly a year and some of that came back to bite me. Yes I did list a lot of flaws, but they were not flaws that everyone had in common, they were the things that stood out to me as being problematic across the length of the venture and, well, I thought I mentioned a lot of things I thought I should do differently. But I am open to hearing more.
If that person does not exist, then one needs to be hired eventually, as it would be better to wait than to have a person not adept at the task doing it wrong.

I am sure that some are better than others at networking, my point was (minus my admittedly harsh figurative description) that high intelligence and knowledge are best applied to something that mandates intelligence, as opposed to something that does not mandate a high level of intelligence and knowledge. Those kinds of activities (networking, sales, marketing) do not mandate exceptional intelligence, from what I have seen those mostly require innate skill and experience. Many people can network, sell, and market. Not many can code.

Now, I mentioned more than coding when I referred to what I believe creates value, however I will respond to your point by saying that
1) creating value is conducive to attracting attention IMO
2) I did not state that there should be no networking/marketing/promotion at all, I wrote that it should not be done before a product is ready, and that it should be done by someone adept at it (usually not a propeller head like me, for example, although I am sure some guys are skilled at those activities as well as tech work)
"I wouldn't step down as CEO to keep a team together that did not want to be together". You use this word "CEO" as if it means something. It doesn't.

In a three-person (or two-person, by the time this particular piece of drama came to a head) company, there is a team, and there are players, and if the team is running well there's a team lead --- who's there because the team believes they'll function better with a leader. If the team wants to sound "all grown up", they'll call the leader a "CEO". My team still doesn't call Dave the CEO.

Using the word "CEO" in this situation is a "tell". Think about what you're saying.
"Yeah, my e-mail address is tom at indifferent-snowman-wearing-a-fez.net"
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Well, if it's doing some good for the greater community then I must be doing some good for myself. There are going to be a lot of people that disagree with what I'm saying in my posts and probably would want to steer clear of me. Then again hopefully there will be a few interesting people that I get to connect with through this that I wouldn't have otherwise, and that is worth it to me.

I think you should be blogging :)
How about, if you think about something all the time, you'll be thinking about it when it's relevant, and so it'll influence your actions. If you don't, you won't be, and it won't. And one thing we think about a lot is certain past events.
Even if you're a top-notch developer, it still takes an order of magnitude more time to develop an actual product than to put up a product description and a few mockups, and you can still expect 90% of your products to fail. You can easily spend years of development time on products that nobody wants. Why waste all that talent?

I had/have the same aversion to selling things that don't exist that you have. But honestly, I think that the next time I do a startup, I'm going to do it that way. I get really sick of speculatively building things that nobody wants. Why not make sure they want it first and then build it?

Plus, two of my favorite startups - DropBox and RescueTime - both used this approach (though perhaps with a little less dishonesty - they clearly marked it "demo"), and their products are better for it.
Agree, networking is over-emphasized. We did a lot of networking at the outset, with no particular plan or strategy, and it doesn't feel like time well spent.

Not sure I'm saying "my kind of networking meets X times per month", but I will say this: we organized monthly meetups for the professionals in our market (computer/network security), made it as all-inclusive as we could, and it's been far more valuable to us than the vanity networking we did early on.

Isn't this one of the major recurring criticisms of valley culture? That all those people do is go to parties with the same people every night?
See the last 1 minute of Tim Bray's FOWA talk: http://events.carsonified.com/fowa/2008/london/highlights/ti...
At text size it looks more like BADGER TRIUMPHANT.
Unlike Ruby.
Ways to drive traffic to your blog
Life is like being a reinforcement agent in a large world. We just need to raise our epsilon on our epsilon-greedy decision processes if we hope to learn from risk.

on a related note: AI is damn cool
use this link, click on YouTube and you are away
http://www.soaleaders.com/index.php
use this link, click on YouTube and you're away
http://www.soaleaders.com/index.php
Eyealike Sets Its Image Recognition Technology On A New Target: Advertising
Name Recessions After People
You are making baseless assumptions. I was born in a very poor country, to parents neither of whom could afford to finish high school. My worldview was shaped by a world where debt was just not an option (think loan sharks & 300%+ annual interest rates when inflation was in the 10% annual range) and mortgages simply didn't exist. If you got into debt that you couldn't repay, you got thugs at the door to collect.

So I am already used to much worse circumstances than the worst that is likely ahead in America. Having said that, what lies ahead for America is going to be very painful economically, even more so because Americans by and large have no recent memory of such economic pain, so lack the "inoculation" that lesser societies have built up due to periodic crises. Deep structural changes are inevitable - and such changes in the economy end up having profound cultural and social impact, some of which is unpredictable.

I would personally do fine both because my personal balance sheet is in fine shape and because I have a lot of inoculation. Can you say that about the average American?

These are the things I said we should be afraid of.
It's very interesting reading through your blog. I'm surprised I hadn't come across it before, and I'm glad you put it out there.
that's a huge step back for computing.

The point of recursion is that it makes really hard problems simple to solve.
The problem I see in this is that it only addresses how to deal with false rumors and barely addresses those which are true. If I have a foolproof system for disproving all false rumors, I still have a problem in that any true rumors will immediately be confirmed by me because I do not disprove them.

1) IF it is False THEN I will deny it.
2) I did not deny it.
C) THEREFORE, it is not False.

A No Comment policy, or similar, allows you to treat all rumors identically, or at least allow scope for addressing the most blatantly false while ignoring most (true and false) so as not to tacitly confirm those which are true.

Perhaps the policy depends on an individual's character. If there are no truths I fear, disproving all rumors will work in my favor. If I have a lot of truths to hide, disproving all false rumors but only false rumors will set me up for disaster.
"Can't have control without responsibility". LOVE IT. AMEN.
This isn't surprising at all - that it would be more likely to port code from the iPhone to the desktop OS than the other way around. There are more constraints on the iPhone - especially memory, so anything that runs on the iPhone should run fine on the desktop, but not vice-versa. Moreover, it may not make economic sense to tune a piece of desktop code to fit into a small bit of memory, but if you have code that was so tuned to run on the iPhone, why not replace the untuned desktop code with it?
I do see your point.

I think that the objective is a market study, for which I believe there are some tried and tested methods, although it occurs to me that in this field those may not apply as so many other things, however if that is the case, then I believe "how to find out what the users want without selling vaporware/other questionable tactics" is a worthwhile problem to tackle in and of itself.

Selling vaporware is to me similar to using users as unwitting beta testers, I don't believe in it, I think we should be upfront like the examples you cited: if it is a beta let people know, if it is vaporware, let people know, if it is a demo, let people know.
Quote of the dsy: “In science, the most exciting expression isn’t ‘Eureka!’ It’s ‘Huh?’”.
Right, I remember reading something to that effect once . . . that event sort of proves both opposing opinions doesn't it? Yes, you can make money by selling vaporware, and yes, it is evil and abominable people/companies that do it (which is why I won't do it)
Andy's got a very popular blog, but your site is extremely well-known, and TechCrunch is a journalist site above all trying to get page hits.

Thanks for the link to Brendan's blog: I've never come across a social sciences blog that's this fun to read.
I thought, perhaps, that your googlefu was not up to par so I looked myself. I couldn't find them, either. Damn.
that's certainly a different takeaway from mine, but I can appreciate it.
What's a lifelong realtor to do in this economy?
This isn't me, personally, but a family member of mine is a lifelong realtor who has found himself unable to sell enough houses to support the way he has lived for the last two decades.

Can anyone suggest something else he can do for work? Are there any thriving sales markets? I'd appreciate it greatly, as will he if I can offer up any reasonable suggestions.
I got the impression you thought you had a good thing. I guess my key question would be this: Given everything the startup had going for it, do you think the conflict points (networking, time commitment, and a few others) were sufficiently important to stake the startup on?

On the one hand you could feel in retrospect that the conflict points were important enough that the startup could never have succeeding without the direction you were pushing - so you were lucky it ended swiftly. On the other hand if you think your startup had a good chance of success even if you hadn't won those battles, then you may want to look at your conflict resolution.
Sorry, I was unclear. What I meant was (at least from waht I gathered from your post) that you're skeptical of vanity networking and that you favor less formal gatherings done in the spirit of meetups.

I'm with you on that.
I think that the target is at the first group, though I agree: most people have some form of slide-editing at hand. Then again, I thought the same about Google Docs, but some people use it obsessively. I think that not having to worry about file transfers back and forth was a biggie for some people.
Should I use Ruby or Drupal to build my web app?
I am planning to build a web app that allows people to easily build and manage their own websites. My site would need to have people sign up, build a site, deploy it (at a subdomain of my site), and then manage the content and design.

My question is this: should I build this from scratch, or should I use Ruby on Rails or Drupal? I haven't built an app in either, so I'm not sure if one would work well in this situation. Any advice? Thanks.
I also was glad he posted, and didn't find his entries as annoying as some here. Tough crowd, I guess.

However, it may be worth noting that tptacek and SwellJoe both have (fairly) successful startups. I don't, and neither do most of the rest of the people here. So when they say something, it's probably worth listening to.
Ask HN: Can you truly get behind an idea that's not your own?
.
I thought you might have been, but I just wanted to plug the idea of organizing market-specific meetups to network with customers, prospective employees, and partners --- people who can actually help your business --- do this!

SXSW trips not so much.
I think it will largely depend on the reputation that Android builds with consumers in its first month out. If it appears to be an also-ran of the iPhone, or a Symbian redux, then I think it's going to have a tough fight ahead of it.

However, if it is deemed appropriately "Googly", then I think it will end up being very successful.
By YC standards, my startup sucks: three years in, I'm nowhere close to retirement.
No, the conflict points that are being discussed here a lot were not sufficiently important to stake the startup on at the time when we were faced with having to walk away. The real point was that by the time we went to Boston to meet with PG and get some advice, my partner had decided he could no longer trust me or my judgment and wanted to leave, and I felt the same way about him. While I wish that could have been avoided, I don't think anything that could have been done at that point would have changed the ultimate outcome for this team.

After spending a few months thinking "okay, so how did it get to that point, and I didn't even realize it" I wrote my reflections. I still think the startup has a good chance of success, but not with the dynamics that were at play then.
Makes me a bit sad to see this poll because I don't actually think about it-- when you enjoy being productive it doesn't really sink in that you're "working" quite so much.

Doing some back of the napkin calculations, I work ~80 hours a week on average. At least 60% of the time it's doing things I enjoy a great deal, though.

We're launching a new version of our service this week, and maybe I'll be able to cut some of that down a bit for a little while. It's hard, though, because there's a lot of stuff that needs to get done.
Generating Web Traffic for the success of website.
Web Traffic can be increased by submitting your site in search engines and also by gaining back links from the site which are older. By this way also we can easily gain the web traffic.
Is a SAP certification a good idea for switching carrers?
A material manager who likes to code: it is true that after the short SAP course you are all set for a job as a consultant?
Maybe he should consider the possibility that his lifestyle is unsustainable. The housing market was in a bubble, so his past income were an accident. Just as programmers can no longer expect to get so rich so quickly after the dot-com bubble popped, he need to face up to economic reality.
Where names have doubled up, I've used the most interesting surname or middle name. This has prevented three Recession Williams (a tip when choosing the next cabinet).

This titling system makes conversation so much easier: "Well, I survived Recession McAdoo, but Recession Andrew was a doozie! If they ever name a Hurricane after that guy, I'm outta here."

1797-1800	Recession Oliver

1807-1814	Recession Albert

1819-1824	Recession Crawford

1837-1843	Recession Levi

1857-1860	Recession Howell

1873-1879	Recession William

1893-1896	Recession John

1907-1908	Recession George

1918-1921	Recession McAdoo

1929-1939	Recession Andrew

1953-1954	Recession Magoffin

1957-1958	Recession Robert

1973-1975	Recession Pratt

1980-1982	Recession Donald

1990-1991	Recession Nicholas

2001-2003	Recession Paul

2008-	Recession Henry

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_Unite...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_the_...
Peter Schiff Predicts Housing Crisis in 2006
Too emotional, talk too much. Try addressing those, update us in a year.
Clouds, Networks and Recessions
There is plenty of foreclosures and auctions going on right now, and many of my coworkers are itching to get in and snatch a really cheap house or two. The problem they face is that while they have money (or access to, anyway) they don't know the intricacies of how auctions work. It's possible to buy a house that has liens(?) against it, and so it's important to understand what is it you are getting into. He/she can just charge hourly consulting fee and live off that.

Basically, I suggest being a consultant to bargain-seekers.
Here's the thing. If your company isn't over let's say 10 or 20 people, you aren't a CEO. You just sound like a presumptuous amateur. I could tell where the article was heading just from the number of "CEO" instances. And the title of course.
Honestly, it seems like you treated "your team" more like employees than co-founders. I think this was your critical mistake.
I work about 100 a week, with probably 20% of that spent in semi-down-time (i.e. reading news.YC and other tech news, editing Wikipedia, etc.).

100 really is doable if you like what you're doing. I don't really get the "you can only be productive 40 hours a week" people. Really? You can only be productive with less than a quarter of your time? Seems suspect. I can see it being a fair limit for work an employer, but when it's your own baby, if I'm not working, I'd probably rather be. You end up wearing such a variety of hats as a founder that it certainly lacks monotony.

I do try to take at least one decent block of time a week to unplug and go out, usually dancing. :-)
Damn it. I wanted to name this one "Scoble" or "Le Recession".
Second the "mad with power" vibe.

Wow-- I think the OP failed to learn a few lessons. The biggie is the seeming lack of empathy for his partners and his apparent belief that he's in charge.

At this level, it's a partnership. As a CEO, it's not your job to lead and have your partners follow. It isn't your job to make unilateral decisions on how you spend your time (networking versus coding). With a small team, you can be a cheerleader, a tiebreaker, and a buck-stops-hear guy... But for the most part-- it's a damn partnership.

And it's pretty clear to me that the poster didn't treat it like one, which is a shame.

I think he's very right about the team needing to have the same level of commitment... His deeper commitment is probably why he felt entitled to "lead", even when PG suggested that that might be the problem.
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Absolutely. I was sold on the tech behind my old startup and was given the opportunity to contribute my own ideas to improving it, giving me a sense of ownership. This was key to my devotion to the company.
Yes.

As long as you enjoy working on it why not? Besides, once you start working, the idea changes anyway. Very few ideas stay true to form the whole way through. I think the problems arrive when the people "behind" the idea are completely unwilling to change it at all.
Back up. Proxying thru my slice right now.
Yes, you can get behind an idea that's not your own as long as you have a consistent vision or intent with the person who generated the idea.

As an extreme example, if I were passionately committed to solving world hunger and the guy running the start-up I worked for found a solution, commitment to that idea would be possible.

Ideas are about Strategy - and Vision / Personal Intent are more powerful than Strategy.
Such a browser was tried, and rejected. It violates Apple's "policy" on duplicating built in functionality.