skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
That ignores that the first beneficiaries never paid in. Also it has little to do with what you put in. That is why Gore proposed the lockbox. All the money We put in this year is already spent.
Have a look at: http://vpschoice.com/ They have a list (page bottom).
Recent research has tended to show that most skills tend to be learned through practice. Few people are naturally good and few people are naturally bad. Those who practice, excel.

Programming has the property that those who wish to practice today have almost unlimited opportunities.

This might explain the wildly different levels of skill that the poster observed. Perhaps programming would be best self-taught in a workshop setting so folks at different levels don't get in each others' way.
>At that age, you're just starting to get your name out there and want to be noticed, so it's not a bad thing.

Yeah, that's a part of what I'd like to accomplish. The more I get my name out, the more people I meet. I'm also saying (in the spiel/rant) that it's not the ONLY thing that one should be doing.

>$10bn is an admirable aspiration, but it's not quite a goal (or even a stretch goal). Usually I see the aspiration as the end of the race, and the goals as the individual, clearly-defined steps taken to reach the finish line.

Thanks. You're right—my fault for confusing the two :)
Well, since middle click has the same behavior even with @target="_blank", I couldn't care less if they enabled it or not.
Define "make it work". It worked in that we sent out checks every month and we got referrals, but it turns out the number of referrals were miniscule compared to the time we were spending on the program. In addition, once we stopped it we continued to get the same referrals. People tell other people about our products because they like them, not because they are going to get a dollar from the sale.

(50% of the affiliates only had one sale... to themselves).
Whoever is simulating us (and this universe) probably will deploy a patch that will make sure that that won't change things one way or the other.
Pardon me? There is nothing malicious in this statement. . . why the downmods?
Oh, sorry. Good for you.
SuperBytes.net is in Canada and they are really good for VPS hosting
I kind of wish I would have tried theater or band in High School, just for the experience and interaction with other people. Just to do something I normally wouldn't.
I played with Eiffel for a time, but found that Design By Contract was a bit overly restrictive for amateur programming. Now that I'm doing more professional stuff, I think it's worth looking at again. There's also a lot of Eiffel influence in Ruby, so moving over from Ruby is not so hard.
Is it still being used at all? I would be interested in it, too (and I don't think Erlang is very similar to it at all???).
Third Millennium Problem-Solving
Learned it without any books, just looking at the documentation from Sun. Just get started with a simple project, I guess.
There is a flaw here too though.

Regulators could game this system by taking their lump sum and not
doing the work involved with sniffing out fraud. If there's no fraud,
they win, and didn't have to do any work.

If there is fraud, maybe they can squirrel some of that bounty into an
offshore bank account and sneak out the back door like bernie madoff
was hoping to do.

Darn.

This is a hard problem.
Bootstrapping my new company
We have a small and agile team, who can innovate quickly and often. We don’t have red-tape to slow us down and we cut through the bureaucracy to get to the underlying problem. We don’t have investors, so we can make decisions quickly. We have low overheads, so we can take risks our competitors dare not.
Nvidia bids to dislodge Intel as rivalry gets ugly
I like the look and feel...are you using rails?
http://gandi.net - totally recomended, located in France
Very nice. The logical extension would be to allow easy blocking of certain bugs and/or blocking all bugs on certain sites.
A SENZ hurricane-proof umbrella, seriously this thing rocks: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQxaS0zmH4U

Also I'd like an iphone to try my hand at iphone development, a nice 21-24" monitor, and a python book.
Dell Precision (650?), dual 2Ghz Xeons, 1GB ram, win2k, 2x17" LCD, Tektronix TDS3014 (!) to the side. Sun Ultrasparc 60 server in the floor.
You know, I was a little harsh since I ignored what you have accomplished. You're already in the top 10% for sure (I'd guess top 1% but you can't tell over the Internet), so I left out the compliments (I've got to remember to not treat social interaction like manipulating those little microcontrollers).

Anyway, good job.

Try to follow KISS more. Back when gas first started to go over 99 cents, gas stations couldn't charge that much because the computers in the pump only had cents. They would have to buy a new $200 computer to do it. However, my grandfather's friend came up with a simple circuit for $5 to let the owner's charge $1+ and he made millions selling the little things. As a kid, little local companies will share lots of operational details with you because they don't find you a threat. You could use that knowledge to serve the market using your skills. I usually started on something simple like setting up computers to gain trust before moving up to more valuable work.
Ask HN: Can someone explain to me why all languages don't try to have the same syntax?
Why does every language need its own syntax? Why does PHP need to use crap like echo and all those dollar signs instead of something more universal?

Why can't all those projects come together and figure out a single universal standard for writing syntax? So that writing code would be exactly the same, no matter what technology you choose to use. At least for the simple stuff.

Why do programmers need to waste time remembering 20 different ways to write something as stupid as a Hello World application?
Thanks. Nah, I use Rails on apps, but for my personal site it's just overkill. Just using simple PHP. (not the updated one either, which is why the contents are kind of lame, new - http://files.markbao.com/newstuff.jpg)
Congratulations, bootstrapping is both exciting and honorable.

But also remember, some of the best things about bootstrapping are also its biggest challenges. For instance, if you are paying employees in equity instead of salary realize that the long-term benefits of a successful startup may be precluded by more immediate revenue streams.

Additionally, we as bootstrappers tend to be less likely to ask for or buy help when it would truly help our business. We prefer to do things our way but many times we re-invent the wheel in the name of entrepreneurial spirit. Not a bad thing, but worth remembering.

Good luck to you! I've had a great time and learned a ton so far by bootstrapping.
A better question is why doesn't everyone in the world speak Esparanto.
So you just make jpegs of your logos by hand, no CSS?
Hi ardell,

Thanks for the well wishes. :)

I shall remember your advice - I'm sure I'll need them in the years to come! It's pretty exciting and scary at the same time. However, I think that's why so many of us (esp at HN) become Entrepreneurs. The lessons to learn and the fun to be had are truly intoxicating.

Keep the commments coming. Would love to hear from everyone here what your personal experiences have been like so far.
The problem with standardization is that you iron out all of the innovations. Certain language constructs are simply better for certain tasks. Lisp is built for recursion so it's great with lists. Object-oriented languages in theory are great for modularity and maintainability. Granted all these aspects have a lot to do with the coder in addition to the language.

If all languages required you to manage memory as in C I'd wager we'd have many fewer entry-level script hackers. Sure, every program would be lickety-split fast, but the App Store certainly wouldn't have 10,000+ apps.

And if every app were written in Java everything would be very portable but also quite slow. It's all about trade-offs and picking the right tool for the right job.
It's been 15 years (eep), but 11th grade was not a total waste of time. My public school was large enough to have the full remedial, general, advanced, and honors class spectrum so I could avoid the dumbest elements of society. Granted honor classes where still boring but least they tried to speed things up and my classmates where mildly interesting.

Anyway, I was classified as Exceptionally Gifted (IQ 160+?) / Learning Disabled which basically meant they had no idea what to do with me. I did the whole state science, math, and chess thing so I spent time around people who where focused and intelligent in high school most of the extreme cases seemed broken. I don't feel that having children jump through more and harder hoops leads to a happy healthy life. I would have have loved a shorter more focused school day, but I don't see the value of trying to cram more facts into high school. Adding a course in investing, speed reading, or other useful skills would have been nice.

PS: I don't know if I fear success, but I don't know how I could have coped if I was profoundly gifted and everyone around me had seemed even dumber.

http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/underserved.htm
Try Hacker News OnePage for Greasemonkey. I love it so far.

http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/30512
If they did have the same syntax, would they be different languages?
Interpreter, redux
Did anyone else think this was going to be about playing games in class? I certainly played all the classic calculator games in high school.

Interesting ideas though. I've been meaning to pick up a Clayton Christensen book.
Seems to come back to the question of whether you can hold the whole program in your head. If so then it's simple to figure out what needs to be tested and what doesn't.

One ancillary benefit of TDD is that it increases your confidence for a release. Confidence allows you to release and promote your code without fear that you'll be up all night fixing bugs.
Not necessarily, but in practice, usually.
Different semantics
http://www.gplhost.com / http://www.gplhost.co.uk

Singapore, Australia, Israel, Spain, France, UK
Because syntax is one of the features of a language.
Because people have different syntactic preferences? Because some people hate c-style brackets while others hate python-style white-space? While it would make life easier in the short-run for those trying to learn a language who have pre-existing knowledge of the standardized syntax, it's quite possible that some other syntax would lead to wildly improved programmer productivity or, at the very least, much more readable/aesthetically pleasing code.

In general, there seem to be a plethora of values which can be considered in choosing the syntactic form of a language: aesthetics, productivity, tradition, etc. Having different syntax between languages allows different niches for languages within these values not to mention allowing the possibility of great innovations which could improve the experience of programming. Seems unlikely that any current language has the optimal syntax with respect to maximizing all these values and hence it seems foolish to cut off innovation.
worthwhile comment by jonathansnook: "The problem with the current state of HTML is that it’s elements for interactivity are quite limited without JavaScript. We have a limited set of form elements and then we fall back to the page request/response of old.

This is a problem that SVG does not solve. Sure, it might make certain presentation elements easier to create but that’s more of a CSS issue than an HTML issue.

This is something that HTML5 is trying to address with additional input types. We’ll still need JavaScript though to mimic more common complex desktop interactions like tree structures and tri-state inputs."
Same syntax, different semantics.. that does not sound easier to me. At all.

Also, why don't we all just use one operating system for everything, have one kind of coffee, and eat one perfectly balanced meal all the time?
> People keep calling social security a ponzi scheme, but it's not. For the simple reason that it's not trying to make a profit - it's trying to give back to people the same amount of money they put in.

No, it's not. If it was, people who cap out for years would get roughly the same return on their "investment" as people who do the bare minimum. Instead, SS gives a much higher return (on investment) to folks in the latter group than it does to folks in the former. (It's almost a decent investment for the minimum folks, while it's a crappy "investment" for the cap-out folks.)
A City That Shopped Till It Dropped
Obligatory Paul Graham essay link, which I think I added the last time this same cartoon was submitted to HN:

http://paulgraham.com/hs.html
Is there somewhere that your company's products, genre, or otherwise is explained?
Considering the standard has been in development (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svg) since 1999 (10 years ??) this is a sad state... the future of app development?

The article thankfully mentions IE exactly once. Microsoft does not officially support SVG, you need a plugin.

Even Chrome does not support the SVG 1.1 standard fully, as per the wikipedia article.

Browsers need a standard, natively supported graphics library sigh...
check bugmenot.com for a workaround
> The MS bashers have done a great job spreading anti-Vista propaganda, but few can articulate any real problems with the OS.

What benefits does Vista offer the typical user? (Other than the need to figure out how to turn off indexing so their new computer is usable.)

The 64 bit support is nice for some applications, but it's hard to believe that it couldn't have happened within the XP framework.

In short, Vista broke lots of things and didn't offer any significant benefits in return for the still ongoing problems. (No, DRM support isn't a benefit.)
well, i played around with it for sometime. it is pretty good e.g i really like the new (and much improved!) template mechanism especially meta-programming abilities, variadic template arguments, contracts for enforcing class/function invariants, function-literals, dynamic closures etc.

the issue that i have (imho ofcourse) is that of 2 incompatible standard libraries phobos and tango, which makes it quite painful to work at anything significant/non-trivial. iirc, there was an effort to have an stl kind of thing for D, not sure how far (or in what state) it is.

also, it seems to me (i can be wrong about it) that D is being marketed towards corpo-drones doing win32 (c++) stuff, rather than to linux C devs. most likely, they (corpo-drones) are moving towads C#/.net and i doubt that they are interested...
We've setup our website, at http://mobiusly.com which briefly describes who we are, what we do, our company credo and commitment to the Company/Customer Pact.

You'd have to wait till Jan 2009 for our product launch. I'll try over the xmas break to prepare a blog entry describing it, but that might depend on how much beer I end up consuming.
great advice. will try to fail as early as possible, to start again..
Doing something in a new way is not an important accomplishment, doing something in a better way is. If a new way of doing something is scientifically designed to produce crap, it's far from an accomplishment. It's a waste.

Having a large group of people vote on a movie is the easiest way to ensure a result that is mediocre for its budget range.
An interesting comparison about the mirrors. I find it an interesting analogy for how these derivatives work.
This question can not be fully answered in prose. It can only be answered with a challenge: Learn four or five diverse languages reasonably well, then try to create the single syntax that works well for all of them. You'll understand when you're done... or perhaps rather, when you find you'll never be done.

I will give one example of the tens upon tens of issues you will encounter: What's the one true syntax for a type declaration? Then, once you've answered that, how does that one true syntax manifest in Python/Perl/Javascript?
He doesn't have an argument, in my opinion. There is nothing to refute. It is as if somebody was saying "look at this green spot, it is obviously red".

I guess the only way to "refute" it would be to create complete theory of human language and use it to prove that he isn't actually saying anything. But that doesn't seem very effective or promising as an undertaking to me.

Rephrased, maybe the problem with the chinese room is that it uses the fuzzy notion of consciousness, appealing to the vague emotions of it's audience rather than on logic. In so far as philosophy aims to clarify language, perhaps the chinese room could be useful as a bad example.
If you think that's harsh, give me 5 minutes with Michael Bay.
It seems you're disagreeing with a statement I never made.

The question was "If they did have the same syntax, would they be different languages?"

I replied: "Yes, they would be different because their semantics would be different"

I never said it would be a good thing. And by stretching your analogy to the territory of food it only becomes weaker (with food diversity is a goal by itself). Also it can be argued that using the same operating system for the vast majority of tasks is desirable.
mac pro + 30" cinema display, apple wired keyboard, and the kensington expert mouse trackball, running windows vista x64 almost exclusively. thinking about getting something with a 1600 horizontal resolution and running it rotated 90 degrees, like http://flickr.com/photos/blakespot/2371594617/in/set-7215760...

and for portable use, a macbook air also running vista x64.
Nah, I do both design and CSS. Didn't get a chance to XHTMLize the file.
Rumors of Upcoming Microsoft Cut-Backs
There Will Be No Web 3.0
Part of the problem is that the discourse on methodology is mostly conducted by people who don't themselves do the work. Imagine a bunch of managers working out a "process" for, say, mathematicians. They'd be laughed out of the room.

I think good methodologies may eventually be worked out for software, but it will take generations and they won't look anything like what people (especially project managers) expect nowadays. Agile was actually a step in the right direction by comparison with what preceded it. But it's decadent now, having inevitably been overrun by consultants and vendors.
Famous Sed One-Liners Explained, Part II
If every language had its own syntax, how would we make jokes about LISP programs which end with a page of right parentheses?
PG presented a definition of useless that set the bar too high; I (in another comment) presented a more reasonable definition of useless which accurately applies to most of philosophy--something is useful insofar as it answers questions asked by other fields (want empirical evidence of this? consider the number of references to philosophical papers on papers from other fields, excepting those related to cognitive science, which will, I believe, probably be the last field to split off of philosophy). There, thus, is no question of whether or not I understand a philosophical work; it's utility is measured by reference of other fields, regardless of my personal attitude upon reading the work. This definition accurately fits what is typically meant by the term useful, and meaningfully explains why, for example, an incomplete proof, or a result a given person doesn't understand might be useful.

That empiricism doesn't apply well to ethics is part of PG's point; he does not believe that the philosophy of ethics is useful. From my definition, I would say that the philosophy of ethics can conceivably be useful, but rarely is in practice.

In vague support of argument one, you might try turning your other argument on its head. Philosophy and science (and, before science, engineering and early health care) developed in parallel over the course of human history; one of them primarily studied abstract problems and tried to make them more useful, one of them studied uses, and worked toward abstraction. Until the 19th century, it appears that abstract study was better for developing new fields, and concrete study was better for development of technology. After the mid-19th century, philosophy lost its firm grip on most forms of abstract study, and became (for the most part) the field that it is today; now other fields tend to be the starting point for the spawning of new fields, and tend to be better for the development of technology.

With regard to your counter-example, I will continue to present my counter-counter-example: mathematics.

Your final sentence is nicely ironic. If, as you've said earlier, you need bad philosophy in order to determine what the good philosophy is, yet PG's work is useless, then PG's work must not be bad philosophy.
I've been using RimuHosting (http://rimuhosting.com/) for years - they're in a few data centres around the world and the service is A1.
He asked why we need different syntaxes, not languages. Most of what you said doesn't relate to syntax at all.
Pretty much anything on norvig.com and I'm also particularly fond of "The Hundred Year Language" (http://www.paulgraham.com/hundred.html)
Twivia - Twitter based Trivia Game
Dude needs a blog. Microblogging seems like the wrong medium to tell a full on story...
I think it is for the same reason that not all cars are shaped the same. Also, to crack wise about lisp.
Gah, I get really annoyed by the "money means that you have to hire lots of people and spend money like a fucking idiot" mentality (popularized by 37Signals). Having money and careful money management are not incompatible (while we're at it, working more than 30 hours a week doesn't mean you spend your time inefficiently, either).

When we raised our Series A, we didn't spontaneously start having long meetings and we didn't start hiring VPs. And we haven't had to appease our investors ONCE (but we have gotten some exceptional-- and optional-- advice from them).

I'd also encourage the author to have a better marketing strategy than "Twitter and blogs". I can't count the number of entrepreneurs (YC companies and others) who realized that this strategy does not work and then started learning about SEO, adwords, and (gasp) sales and marketing. There are plenty of shiny exceptions to this rule, but they are so remarkable exactly because it's so damn rare.
That's not the argument I'm addressing.
I'm not entirely sure why the company is being so sheepish... nothing that was described sounds illegal or really that unethical... The CEO's statement is also clearly bullshit - they knew what they were doing, and are only back pedaling because they got caught.
Feel free to link to it from the Web app :)
See Valley Guru Michael Malone's "Washington is Killing Silicon Valley" in the Wall Street Journal for more on this. Be sure to consider all these new outside forces. Some factors are better than ever, but others are worse than ever.
How about the fact that a significant portion of your machine's resources under Vista are devoted to DRM monitoring?

http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/02/drm_in_windows...

There's something seriously wrong when so much engineering effort is put into monitoring and crippling rather than enhancing your users' hardware capabilities. It goes against the very ethos of engineering.

Add to that onerous licensing terms specifying that you don't own your copy of Windows, Microsoft does, allowing Microsoft to remotely disable the OS and install or delete software without asking you. Add to that onerous DRM requirements on third-party hardware manufacturers that drive up prices and reduce overall driver support and availability.

Vista was Microsoft's bid to become gatekeeper and tolltaker of an OS-level iTunes-like digital content distribution channel. But that's not something Microsoft's customers wanted, a fact that has resulted in arguably the biggest software release failure in Microsoft's long history.