skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Is it possible for a member of the US military to refuse to participate in an armed conflict that is not being wage in defense of the US Constitution?

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 11 (the Wars Power clause) grants congress the right to declare war and Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1 gives the US President the title of commander in chief.

The legitimacy of military power in the US derives solely from the US Constitution. If war is waged in a way that does not support the Constitution, I would imagine it should not only be every soldier's right, but duty to disobey an order.

The Armed Forces Oath even suggests that should be the case:

"I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

The Oath states that they are to defend the Constitution, not Congress, not the President, not Wall Street, etc.

When soldiers take the Oath, are they also required to learn the Constitution in detail? If not, how are they to know whether or not their actions are in defense of it?
List of Profitable Web Apps
A friend was asking about traits common to profitable web apps, and I realized that my own list was pretty short, and was unable to dig up any decent lists.

Our criteria is web apps that are profitable by virtue of users paying for access or accounts; apps that were free until MegaCorpDotCom bought them out and grossed the creators a hojillion dollars don’t count.

Any thoughts?
Because the iPhone developer can start with an existing userbase, and the developers of the web versions can now offer an iPhone app.

I run http://weekplan.net which is in a similar space and many people ask me for an iPhone/Android app. I have made a mobile stylesheet but a native app would definitely be a Win/Win/Win (iPhone developer / Users / Me)
Just a warning - GoDaddy will automatically charge your credit card to renew current domains. You have to remove your payment information or delete the domains.
YC demo day is a private event hosted by a private organization. As such, YC has the right to determine the kind of entities that are allowed to be present at the event.

And YC / pg have determined that the kind of companies that would support SOPA are unlikely to make good investors in YC portfolio companies. No censorship, just a business decision.
Hey, whatever you think about Mongo... it can probably work well as a read-only key/value store. Which is all that is needed to publish data from Hadoop, because you've already batch processed it into presentation form.
Liberation by software - free software enables a radically democratic future
If my memory doesn't fail me, Namecheap gives the option to either keep the same nameservers or switch to Namecheap's nameservers.

Unless you host your DNS externally (and you have GoDaddy configured to use those), you will have to switch to Namecheap's nameservers and I believe reconfigure your records.

For a smooth transition, you could change your nameserver configuration on GoDaddy before transferring, and then have Namecheap keep the settings.

EDIT: Just noticed another commenter mention that you can export your zones from GoDaddy.
Unless they're different people in the organization, which is likely the usual case. Not that I disagree with the sentiment.
Censuring for sure. Censoring? No.
As noted elsewhere, it's the hosting plans that they make their money from, and so that's what I'd aim to transfer. So I've got a two-part question:

1) How does one transfer all the DNS information, including the A and MX records (anything else I need?)? Is this all provider-specific? Or can they just port in the existing data?

2) When I'm ready, I'd want to set up a web site, and especially a mail server. Any recommendations? (I know this has been asked plenty in the past, but this seems a good time to make a list excluding GoDaddy)
Some of these companies are just so random... Why, for instance, does Adidas, L'Oreal, American Apparel, Rite Aid, Pfizer, etc. even have a stance on SOPA? I was rather disconcerted to see that Elsevier was on this list :(
The jQuery tmpl plugin has been deprecated / put "on hold":

http://www.borismoore.com/2011/10/jquery-templates-and-jsvie...
Those donations put a pretty big dent in that evaluation, he may be near the clear.
From the point of view of the Sun, some satellites with short orbital periods might appear to move back and forth as they run around their planet. Earth's Moon, on the other hand, never moves backward from the point of view of the Sun.

That still wouldn't make the Moon a planet though.
Poll: How many have read the SOPA bill
SOPA is getting really popular around the Internet and on HN, but I feel most of it is based on third-hand interpretations. There is enough Pro-SOPA FUD out there already but I'm worried that we starting to see a new wave of Anti-SOPA FUD as well.

Find the official bill, amendment, and summary here: http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/issues_RogueWebsites.html
I don't know and/or don't care
I've seen enough quotes and snippets to get the basic idea
I've read some or most of it
I've read it all but I'm not so sure I understand the legalese
I've read it all and feel like I have a decent grasp of its actual provisions
I've read it and I am a lawyer or law student
I disagree with that since the reasons are not purely political. PG believes that supporting SOPA shows a very flawed understanding of how the Internet works. Since many YC companies are web-based or rely on the Internet in other ways I think this makes sense. You can't knowledgeably invest in something with a very flawed understanding of it.
Researchers Create Living ‘Neon Signs’ Composed of Millions of Glowing Bacteria
Here is the one directly from the SOPA .gov site:

http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rouge%20Websites/SOPA%20Su...
Find the official bill, amendment, and summary here (now with link): http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/issues_RogueWebsites.html
Censorship is using legal force, physically if necessary to shut you up. It isn't simply refusing to provide you a platform.
One of the problems in my AI class was to solve this was using genetic algorithms - which seem a perfect way to solve such problems because the intended goal is already known.

A similar problem (with lesser constraints), is :

Given the digits 0 through 9 and the operators +, -, * and /, find a sequence that will represent a given target number. The operators will be applied sequentially from left to right as you read.

which is explained at http://www.ai-junkie.com/ga/intro/gat3.html
Mastercard (and Visa) are both on the PDF I linked to above..

http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rouge%20Websites/SOPA%20Su...

EDIT: Just realized this was the same as the GP link.
Converting SVG visualizations to PNG with node.js, d3 and ImageMagick
Well, it would have been weird (and impressive) for people to market technology against a law that had yet to be written.
URDU SEX STORIES: Pakray Gaye
We need try and start to route around companies that are damaging the internet; and start figuring out who their collaborators are and route around them. This is a great first start, but we need to get companies like google to refuse to allow the MPAA & RIAA to use any of their value add products (gmail/calendar/etc).
Because they lose money to counterfeit knock offs.

There are people who would sell their country's freedom for a handful of cash. I consider them un-American traitors.
may be we should stop watching the movies of the supporting studios (and giving them money directly or indirectly) - much harder to do, but would be quite effective
Will this simply ring hollow in Washington? I mean, as big as Paul Graham is here, will this mean anything where it matters? (And, in truth, I hope it can.)
PG, thank you - this is one of the best stances against SOPA yet.

Frankly, this is a badass stance.

And this line, as also mentioned by others, is fantastic:

"If these companies are so clueless about technology that they think SOPA is a good idea, how could they be good investors?"
SOPA isn't just about copyright: the blacklist is also intended to be used against foreign product counterfeiters, and fashion, drugs & shoes are among the most counterfeited products.
Probably because they want to use SOPA to shut down websites selling "counterfeit" merchandise.
I agree the title is misleading (I should also point out that this isn't my slide deck, but one done by Dmitry Vyukov).

> Since go has/needs mutexes

I'm not sure it's really fair to say Go needs mutexes, just that they are available for you if you need the performance.
"natural interface" means precisely nothing.

Like I said, it means using touch, speech, and gestures instead of using these arcane mice and cursor metaphors. The computer mouse only exists because they needed a way to activate the UI controls like scrollbars and cascading menus. Once you eliminate the desktop UI controls, most uses of the mouse aren't necessary. Instead of a mouse, you use your voice, and a tablet/touchscreen device beside your keyboard. Keyboards will probably stay around for a long time. But what I'm specifically saying is the traditional desktop we've been using for the past 25 years is most certainly going to go away.
Happy Holidays
Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays ,
Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays ,
http://www.psdmate.com/2011/12/22/happy-holidays/
, Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays , Happy Holidays ,
Smart move. This is a clear way to send a signal to SOPA supporting companies: supporting this bill may cut you out of some of the best investment opportunities in the world.
Erlang takes another approach to many of these problems of concurrency. But I don't think you can argue that one is right while the other is wrong. Rather, right and wrong depends on your perspective and view on things.

Also, I am not sure there is one solution that fits all problems. It depends on your problem what is easiest to use. I mostly program Erlang, but I am following along on the Go-path since it is an interesting language - a modern C is my view of the language.
Introducing nginx-perl
Our startup, HireShot.com is. We are in the middle of a build and expect to have first version to beta users in January. Sign up is on the site if you're interested. http://www.HireShot.com
I actually prefer the amateur stuff....wait, what are we talking about again?
AskHN: Is machine learning mature for business?
Hey,

I'm working with an (brand) new startup, and our business concept would be much, much better if we could implement machine learning and prediction.

We are mostly working with python, and although language is not (IMHO) the biggest challenge for implementing ML some simple libraries would be a huge time-saver for us

However, there are some limitations.

1) I haven't actually learned all the math I need to read something like the Artificial Intelligence: A modern approach or other texts that deal with this topic

2) I am missing fundemental knowledge of statistics

What I'm asking is:

What are my chances of learning this in a short-ish timeframe?

What do I really need to learn to implement machine learning and estimation for, f.x, the stock market?

With regards to statistics, can you recommend me any books or resources similar to "How to measure anything: Finding the value of intangibles in business"?

When it comes to that point, how do I interview someone who is better at these things than I am and make an informed decision about who to hire?

Thanks. I apologize if this is not the kind of topic usually brought up here, or if this is unwelcome.

Edit: Added "AskHN: " to the title. Is that the correct approach?
I do not see how this is relevant. Perhaps you could explain that to me.
Then how, in his right mind, is he pushing for this legislation to go through as written?

This is a rhetorical question, sadly we already know the answer.
Some interesting discussion in the previous submission (18 months ago): http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1499738
One funny thing is that the counting example has a really simple and very fast solution in Erlang. Shove the counter into an ETS table and use ets:update_counter as the call to manipulate it.
So, who is the congressional staffer who can't spell rogue?

http://judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rouge%20Websites/SOPA%20Su...
If that is the case, then the organization is ill. Best to stay away from it, in case it happens to be contagious.
Thanks for the link. I found that the congresswoman representing me is Anna Eshoo (D), who was part of the 11 member bipartisan group speaking out against SOPA last month [1]

While this means that I don't have to call her office to "change her position", I will still call to thank her / her office for being a vocal opponent of SOPA.

edit: Also, thanks to the HN users who have posted in other threads asking others to call the offices just to voice their support for their representatives, even if the congressman/congresswoman is already against SOPA. Without their words, I wouldn't be calling my representative today to say thanks.

[1]
http://eshoo.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view...
I love how Xerox supports SOPA.

I mean, their entire company was founded around a device that facilitates copyright infringement.
> I take for granted that during a show he says bad things only for the sake of entertainment.

Indeed. In the Beacon Theater show, he tells a story about an asshole kid in his childs class, and about shaking the kid up a bit when he was volunteering at the school one recess. During his AMA on reddit, someone asked him if there had been any fallout from the school/parent on that, and he simply replied that the kid in the story was entirely fictitious.

He's also apparently said before that when he tells the story of a stupid person he meets (like the guy on the airplane who gets pissed off that the internet, something which the guy had only discovered minutes earlier, was broken/slow - an example of fast entitlement), he's actually talking about himself.
So name.com are jumping on the SOPA bandwagon too, but instead of clearly voicing their protest against SOPA they simply say "piracy is bad, freedom is good" (some form of non-apology[0], apparently) and hope everyone is so outraged by GoDaddy that they give their money to name.com instead?

I am sorry, but that's just spam/advertisement and not worth a HN submission.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-apology
>judiciary.house.gov/issues/Rouge%20Websites/SOPA%20Supporters.pdf

'Rouge websites'... Really ? How about figuring out that spelling thing before trying to pass legislation...

Or did we miss something and all this SOPA fuss is actually about misspelled counterfeit cosmetics exclusively?
This is pretty awesome indeed.
Ask HN: A new submission dead on arrival?
Hi,

I just tried to submit a new post from Guillermo Rauch's blog - 'A String is not an Error'[1] - but it was immediately dead.

Any ideas why?

Edit: Here is the post in case anyone can or will unkill it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3383346.

Thanks.

[1] http://www.devthought.com/2011/12/22/a-string-is-not-an-error/
>If a problem seems hard, its because you don't have enough information or aren't seeing all possible solutions.

Unfortunately, you are incorrect. There are problems that are impossible to solve, simply because there exist mutually incompatible definitions of "solve" among interested parties.

""Wicked problem" is a phrase originally used in social planning to describe a problem that is difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often difficult to recognize. Moreover, because of complex interdependencies, the effort to solve one aspect of a wicked problem may reveal or create other problems."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem
Curious: Aren't ISPs and payment processing companies also private organizations? Are DNS "name servers"?

I don't disagree with PG's stance here and I don't think it is censorship, but you must admit that these are "just business decisions" for these parties as well (possibly even Congress)
Wow that was an interesting list...

I had only heard of 5 of those companies, but this one stood out. Tasc.com

Checkout one of their services:

Cyberwarrior training

http://www.tasc.com/capabilities/cyberwarrior_training/

"Cyber security requirements have changed: hackers have started working full time for criminal syndicates; spammers and adware/spyware developers are now using the same code as worm writers; and organizations are increasingly on the front page news for losing customer data. You need to protect your information now.

The sheer complexity of the Internet makes it difficult to understand and defend against attacks. You may be unaware of vulnerabilities that affect your network.

Modern day computer systems, comprised of millions of lines of software code, are wrought with bugs and exploitable weaknesses. Education is your best defense. While understanding how computers and networks operate is important, to defend your network from attack you need to understand how attackers exploit weakness in your system.

TASC is a leader in IT security for the U.S. Government, Intelligence Agencies, and the Department of Defense. TASC offers the CyberWarrior Course Series to teach you about the latest computer network threats, tactics, defensive measures, and certification and accreditation processes.

The CyberWarrior Course Series will give you the skills you need to ensure you are practic"

While the brochure makes it sound like standard netsec training... I find the wording of a "Cyberwarrior Training" program to be... surreal. Further, I think it is pretty sick to market such services to a government that clearly is clueless about the internet in general. (not the defense industries - the political arms of the government)

The reason is that it is probably easy to market this service to politicians who want to appear savvy:

"Look, we need more cyberwarriors on the net - we need to block the firewalls of the cyber criminals. This is the next fronteir in protecting our nation!" --- *For the low cost of $150,000 per cyber warrior. No guarantees apply. Check you state for local restrictions.
> They even had a "witness" at the first hearing

Mastercard's VP Linda Kirkpatrick was the only witness at that hearing who testified with any semblance of being not 100% pro-SOPA at that hearing.

> As noted yesterday, Visa is actually officially against these bills, which makes this one at least somewhat interesting, because the story we'd been hearing was that MasterCard was in favor of them. But Kirkpatrick's testimony is actually kind of surprising. While we expected it to be very pro-SOPA... it turns out that she's very concerned about the massive compliance and liability costs of the bill. Kirkpatrick explains how MasterCard works, and goes to great lengths to say it's against the company's policy to use its cards for any transactions that break the law. And it already has an existing anti-piracy policy, which allows law enforcement and rights holders to bring such infringement using its cards to the company's attention. It then explains its investigation and notification policy. This is all very interesting... and basically makes an anti-SOPA point: given that MasterCard already does this, why does it need SOPA?

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111116/00035716786/look-t...
Is Amex the only card association (well, sort of) left? Visa and Mastercard both are on the list.
This is true, and important for anyone transferring today.
There is SICP.

For distributed systems I'd read Lynch's book on Distributed Algorithms.

For stats Michael Freedman's book, Statistics, is a good simple introduction. Someone mentioned Calculus and Statistics (http://www.amazon.com/Calculus-Statistics-Dover-Books-Mathem...) here on HN a couple of weeks ago. I had looked it when it came out and re-reviewed it with that thread -- I really like it a fair bit more than I remember and a better text for those looking for a more rigorous treatment than Freedman -- although probably still too simple if you're reading Foundations of Statistical NLP.

There's also Scott's book on Programming Languages, which is worth reading.
What SOPA is, what it does, and how it works
While the idea of moving kids from pizza to salad is admirable, I am confused why there are less efforts to move kids from pizza to, say, applesauce. You know, things that are still palatable, but less likely to kill you.
1) Transferring DNS is a bit of a pain indeed. Luckily GoDaddy lets you export the zone for each domain from their control panel. I would just send this to your new registrar and they can import the settings. Some registrars also give you an option to add DNS records when starting the transfer.

2) This might be helpful for email / website / blog hosting: http://iwantmyname.com/services – these hosted apps and services can all be used with your own domain.

(Full disclosure: I'm a co-founder at iWantMyname)
No, I think the appropriate word would be "advocacy."
A status update on SOPA from Washington
Under one iteration of SOPA, the copyright holder could file a private action to have the infringing site shutdown. Alternately the copyright holder could file an action with the US DOJ to have the site shut down. In either scneario the first action is to shut down the site, then notify the site of infringement.

Since SOPA has not been enacted into law yet it’s really an open question. If you trust the supporters of the law you have absolutely nothing to worry about because magical ponies will ensure that the law only is enforced against evil nasty "foreign" web sites.
Great post. We're in the process of transferring 50+ domains from GoDaddy.
We do. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moons_of_Saturn
Terminals - 2 Beta 4 Release
It doesn't feel right to call it a moon though. It's a natural satellite, but it's not that big.
You only think that you are not logged in. But Google doesn't forget you and tracks your footprints everywhere.
Take a look at the front page of the committee's web site:

>Markup Shows Strong Support for SOPA (12/16/2011)

>SOPA Has Strong Support (12/15/2011)

>Smith: Critics Continue to Spread Lies about SOPA (12/14/2011)

This is about as divorced from reality as you could possibly get. If this country is not the definition of a corporate oligarchy I don't know what is.
This isn't entirely accurate. GoDaddy has both auto-renewal and manual renewal. I'm not sure what the default is these days, but you can set your domains to manual renewal and let them expire. Be warned: you're going to get a ton of email notifications from GoDaddy as your expiration dates approach.
In politics especially, it takes a constant struggle to keep in mind that words have actual meanings. They're not just matters of opinion, and "authoritarian" isn't just a gussied up way of saying "ewww gross!" about a political matter or position. It is a real word with a real meaning and a real history.

Consider, for instance, the Kirkpatrick doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirkpatrick_Doctrine). It's possible to debate the plausibility and soundness of it as a foreign policy principle, but that's because authoritarian has a real meaning beyond "ANTI FREEDOM!! (TM)". It has to do with how the center of political power interacts with its opposition, particularly in contrast to how totalitarian states do so.

Note that the countries which had the greatest amount of government intervention in the economy and actually did take a bunch of guns from people are very explicitly not authoritarian: they're used in contrast to the authoritarian states of (mostly) Latin America, which were hardly high-tax or anti-gun.
Inkodye - permanent, light-sensitive dyes
Something will be centralized, a weak point politically. I'm surprised how quiet DARPA, CERN and Verisign have been so far, as they are very important. ISPs and Godaddy don't matter as much.