skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Two thumbs up. I can already tell that Quote 10 is going to come in awfully handy on my next project ...
Sure thing. You may as well try Pyroute first, since the system requirements there are a subset of the Rana requirements (it doesn't require GTK or Cairo, etc).
Two chicks at once.
I wonder if the comments follows a Power Law (80/20 rule), or if there is a linear increase from 0 to about 100 karma points. Is there any way we could get the data and graph that?
HN: How would you target small business owners?
I'd like to try and find some novel ways of targeting small business owners, in different sectors.

What kind of search terms could I use to target realtors, restaurateurs, florists, etc.?

Are there any other cost effective and measurable ways of reaching them? I'm reluctant to start thinking about producing expensive mailers, advertising in trade publications, or cold calling.. those things feel like pouring time and money down the drain.

What methods would you try?
I don't think that's Taleb's approach. His point is not simply to put a little into things like dividend issuing stocks. These might have a very good historical long-term return, but we cannot assume this will still be true tomorrow.

The point is to be exposed to good "black swans": far out-of-the-money options, or biotech and YC companies, for instance. These could potentially give you a very large return. In theory this would be already priced in, but too many people assume models which don't allow for very large returns.

That said, his main message is not so much how to make money, but rather how not to lose it all.
When I was in the 8th grade and I wrote my first program in BASIC I came home from school and told my mother "I want to be a programmer- like the guy in Jurassic Park, but not fat."

I'd say I was about 75% successful
$ python
>>> 0 ** 0
1
>>> 0 / 0
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
ZeroDivisionError: integer division or modulo by zero
>>>
Unlike most of you, I dislike this essay. I think it is cynical, hard, jaded, and in many cases, ironically full of untruths. As a public school teacher, the part that outraged me was the following quote: "The sad fact is, US public school teachers don't generally understand the stuff they're teaching very well. There are some sterling exceptions, but as a rule people planning to go into teaching rank academically near the bottom of the college population." At my school, most of our teachers were at the very top of our college populations, ranking in the top 5% of our graduating classes. The exceptions (the ones who went into teaching because they had no other options and thought it was "easy") are few and far between. Most of us have master's degrees, and several have doctorate's. To say that most teachers do not know their subjects well is simply untrue; sure, there are exceptions, but there are engineers, journalists, doctors, and authors who are only subpar. In an essay arguing for the truth, this author has lost credibility as a speaker of the truth.
While I'm not much of a coder, I come to this place because there a lots of interesting articles and insightful comments. It's refreshing to see such an intelluctual crowd of people on the internet for once.
I especially appreciated the part about the lawyer not understanding what an email reply was.
Exactly.

This reminds me of one thread some time ago here on HN about universities claiming numbers of Nobel Prizes awarded to people affiliated with them [1].

This "$2 Trillion" statistics has the same problem - one person can have affiliations with many universities (BSc, MSc, PhD, postdoc, faculty, all can be at a different place). Additionally, a company can have founders from more than one university.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=400119
I use searchyc to put my aggregation of news.yc comments in my FriendFeed. :-)
Go pound the pavement.

My dad has a small web design and hosting business. Nearly all of his customers live within five miles of his home, he's succeeding because he knows his neighborhood, wants to see local business do well, and knows how to talk to them and build a relationship over time.

I know this is not a magic way to get the attention of small business owners nation-wide, but if there were such a thing you would know it because everyone else with something to sell would be praising it loud and long.
ING is effectively the same as PC Financial.

If the OP feels he has enough money now, why would he consider the stock market at all? His only concern would be keeping up with inflation. I'd also suggest reading "Fooled by Randomness" before talking to any investment bankers.

Never risk something you actually need for something you don't need. Also, don't convince yourself that you don't really need something you actually do need.

One might be better off buying supplies so that one could survive for a week-long power-outage, say, than playing the market, right now.

A few months ago, an apartment building near me had one of its electrical transformers blow up. The residents had to evacuate that day, and were not allowed back into their building for a few weeks. Some suites were looted.

It made me realize that I was completely unprepared for that kind of scenario. How many people who pride themselves on their retirement plans are equally unprepared for this kind of rare event?
What's even more fun is trying to upmod something without accidentally downmodding it.

I've also had the thrill of typing in a comment using the iPhone keyboard and then accidentally tapping "delete". Thank god there's a confirmation page! I usually blow that confirmation page up to gigantic proportions before clicking on the "cancel" button, to prevent further mistakes.
When I first filled out my profile at the site I didn't even notice that you were selling shirts. I wouldn't be surprised if other visitors didn't notice either.
The most promising startup pitched at Atlanta's StartupRiot! Every second of this presentation taught me something :)
Only at a great event like Startup Riot will you see great deals like WiFi Cat. :-)
I know another version of #6:

In theory, practice and theory are the same. In practice they are not.
Why not? Software should be made for the user. Any image editing software that punishes you for never having used it has a problem. It also means that there's a market for an easy image editor that effectively lets users do what they want to do. (That's Aviary's goal, largely.)
... we would call a GUI element without a functionality attached to it a bubble.
The buildup on this company was absolutely EPIC.
I was agreeing with, and I thought I should say why I felt that way. (I also just edited the post for clarity.)
Steve McQueen's character is exactly the expert fire chief I want in my towering inferno, and Rick Rescorla (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1810315-3,0...) is exactly the expert security chief I want.
agreed. more startup riot coverage - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=486925
Traders Revolt Against the Mortgage Plan
The Elements of Style (full book, 1918 version)
Censorship is the suppression of speech or deletion of communicative material which may be considered objectionable, harmful or sensitive

Quality control would be removing spam, nonsensical content or, in some cases, content that's wildly off-topic.

Considering the original T-Shirt Hell story was run here without being "quality controlled" away, it seems reasonable to accept that a followup is, therefore, not off-topic for HN. That makes the removal of said story censorship and not quality control.
I'm not sure I agree. Okay, English is not my primary language, but it largely applies to Spanish. The so called "clutter" sometimes adds expresiveness. He argues that "smile happily" is redundant. But not all smiles are happy smiles. So the word is not dispensable at all.
I would love to see a world where bands get paid in rough proportion to the amount of enjoyment that people have gained from their music.

I don't see how Pirate Bay's model helps this, though perhaps it is no worse than the current industry model.
At this point it's all about execution.
Cool Linux Desktop Themes
Cool Linux Desktop Themes , Best Cool Linux Desktop Themes
I saw the post on writing well (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=486574) and thought people might be interested in this e-book of The Elements of Style.

Some of the rules have changed over the last 90 years (I have the 3rd and 4th editions of this at home) but most of it is still quite relevant.
Voted up
I see that the notion that universities, charities, unions, clubs, political organizations, and other communities will collect donations and solicit subscriptions to subsidize news gathering and reporting didn't make the essay. Nor did the rather obvious notion of publicly funded media, like the BBC.
Here's enough information to be dangerous: http://www.sandiegopredatorylending.com/?p=33
Your mention of Kilimanjaro was too much for me to miss this one. I discovered an old acquaintance of mine recently started up a Kilimanjaro hiking company ;-) http://www.expeditionkilimanjaro.com/ - awesome guy, would recommend traveling with him.
Then tell us about your personal experience. Don't make claims without explaining yourself.

EDIT: Or you can delete your post, Teej, which said "VCs don't invest in things that are actually relevant, take it from personal experience." If you don't want to explain something, then just say it, apologize, and move on. Don't try to hide what you said.
Yet another, often attributed to Yogi Berra:

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.
Why Hulu Should Embrace Boxee
"the only perfect hedge is in a japanese garden"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stagflation
Tolerance 2.0
Do keep "posting essays" in HN. I love your comments and read http://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=mechanical_fish every day.
Your analyses regarding what Adobe does is spot on. Except your contempt for the techniques of a whole area of human creativity is below par.

Also you are right in noting that most of "those folks" had no use for learning anything about computers. But is this necessarily a bad thing?
$2m is enough to retire if your costs are low enough -- even earning a measly 1% a year you'll make 20k per year

Sure, but this makes no sense as a strategy. You could make 20K on the side pretty easily doing whatever it is you'd probably want to be doing anyway (painting, hiking, sailing, playing golf).

Having $2m in cash sitting in the bank might feel awesome but jeez, you need to use it somehow rather than for paying yourself a tiny stipend to live a life you could have lived anyway if you weren't so scared to face some risk.
The Pirate Bay isn't a model. It's a vast swath of illegal activity. But that's not going away, and frankly I think that the model in which most music is torrented is better for everybody. I never buy an album that I don't like anymore.

The solution is to figure out how to many money despite the unending piracy. The RIAA thinks the solution is to sue the pirates, which is stupid, because the pirates are only doing what feels natural. Models exist that can work alongside piracy. Take, for instance, the pay-what-you-want, model, the pay-to-ensure-release model, and the 70%-free model. Three systems that all have been earning bands money.
Yeah, I started out with Corel Draw! 3. What an app! I loved it. Pitty the Mac versions were crashy beyond insanity. I would have re-switched otherwise.
You shouldn't take that for granted. That doesn't happen so often outside the US.

I went to a top Brazilian university. I don't have any hard data but I'm sure the number of companies founded by my university's alumni is much lower than MIT's.

MIT's level might have smarter people than a top Brazilian university but I don't think that alone explains it. I live in Japan now. Most Tokyo University graduates aren't interested in joining startups, let alone founding one.
Take the Canadian Securities Course, if you're at all interested in money. I did. It's easy if you prepare. I crammed it over a weekend, and just squeaked by. I've heard of a lot of people failing after cramming, though, so YMMV.

After reading Fooled By Randomness, I don't trust anyone else to manage my money. It helps that my wife and I are somewhat interested in finance. I would definitely go to others for ideas, but not for decision-making.

It's the same kind of "Ah ha" experience that PG tries to create in young techies. You really can run your own business. Well, you really can manage your own money (assuming some minimal interest in the subject).

NOTE: about the CSC: the material is a bit boring for someone coming from an engineering background. I.e. you're supposed to repeat what they want to hear (including some dogma), rather than actually give a nuanced confidenced answer. There are quite a few calculation questions, though.
While interesting, this dream team of engineers is trying to tackle a problem that has many more commercially, economically and environmentally viable solutions.

For one, solar power may be easier to harness in outer space. But there's a problem: it's in outer space. There is no reason why we should be resorting to such measures when we have the potential to harness solar energy here on the earth's surface.

There are energy demands that must be met, and it is true that our needs will grow exponentially. However, more earthlings than ever (percentage-wise) have a sufficient source of energy, and I believe this number will continue to climb.

This is not to say that this company's efforts are a waste of time. Far from it. We need overambitious entrepreneurs to at least attempt these solutions so that we can better gauge the difficulty of the problem at hand. While this technology may not be realistically implementable, it very may well lead to a newer, more efficient way of harnessing solar energy. If this technology works, more power to them. And to us.
Good luck with your app :)
I think reliability in terms of (long-term) availability is also a big plus for OSS.
I live and work in the route 128 tech sector or the "Route 128 Technomafia" as we like to call it.

The biggest problem is it's image - it's full of large stuffy software / tech companies that cater to business and not the end consumer. These types of businesses are not likely to attract young hackers that will truly innovate. I get the feeling that (for the most part) route 128 is where good hackers go to settle down and live a "normal" life.

Another reason 128 doesn't attract the hacker crowd is the availability of public transportation. Its a pain in the ass to get to any of the major office parks / buildings out there without catching multiple busses or trains. Most young innovators don't have the desire or the money to pay for a car in Boston which is necessary to make it to the area.

So - fix public transportation first, and maybe some startups will decide to make a home out there. Hopefully that can slowly build the hacker brand east coast style :)
In the long-term, you can expect the tax advantages of ownership to be priced into the housing market. This is one of the reasons (rampant speculation is another) price/rent ratios are so absurdly high. Fair value, without the tax benefits, would be a ratio of 9-12, given the costs of ownership and the illiquid nature of an owner's position. With the tax breaks, the fair value's higher, but it still doesn't make sense to buy at a P/R ratio of 20+, especially since rents are also likely to drop across much of the country.

In New York, price/rent ratios are above 40. A $2500/month apartment will sell for over a million. It only makes sense to buy at such a P/R ratio if you expect rents to skyrocket in the near future, and Manhattan rents are already starting to turn back.
HCL B38 Laptop
Yeah, I first thought that tpb was just trying to get get media attention by declaring that the trial was a spectacle. I mean, this is probably one of the most important trials concerning copyright and filesharing today. But the prosecution really has no idea what they are doing. It's kind of funny. You'd think that the MPAA would choose a lawyer who is actually somewhat familiar with technology.
I really like the way that Boxee and Hulu are handling this. At least they are being honest with their motivations and not trying to strong-arm users with legal mumbo-jumbo.

That said, this is very unfortunate news. Just this week, I was contemplating replacing my cable with boxee/internet streams. Oh well.
1+ million in the bank you can trash your credit ratting with little issue so let your bank take the risks

Actually, with $1 million in the bank, if you walk away from the mortgage, you bet your ass the bank will come after you to collect on what they can't get from the value of the home. It's going to be hard to declare bankruptcy when you have that kind of cash lying around.
The professor may have some additional slack -- copyright law explicitly mentions educational uses under its acceptable fair use rationale, so if anyone can get away with an excerpt that runs a tad long, it's probably a university professor.
"The most frequently used categories" in appropriate time-frame, say, last two weeks. Maybe give some random members to the mix so people discover new areas and build up (depends on project of course). Do you remember Netscape's "What's New?" and "What's Cool?" meme?
From the article: "Some doubt the effectiveness of a marketing slogan, as opposed to a name arising organically, the way Route 128 or Silicon Valley seemed to do. And they question whether a campaign to come up with a catch phrase that captures today's amorphous industry will distract from the more important work of building new technology businesses."

Anyone remember "Silicon Gulch", or "Silicon Forest"?

Anyone really interested in why Silicon Valley triumphed over Route 128 should read AnnaLee Saxenian's Regional Advantage. Hint: it was in great part due to the differences in personalities and business philosophies of William Hewlett-David Packard and Ken Olsen.
Would this appear in the certificate chain as displayed by the browser? It frustrates me that viewing the chain is such a drilldown exercise; in Firefox 3, they added a bit of up front information to the address bar (upon click on the favicon) but then made displaying the chain itself take an extra couple of clicks. Yes, I'm paranoid, but I take a frequent gander at the certificate chain of sites I'm using. Particularly for sites I use frequently, I'll notice if something looks hinky.

As for http pages that request credentials (presumably transmitting these to an https URL), those piss me off to no end. To my mind, they break a basic security paradigm that had been promulgated for browser use in general: Check that the page is secure before submitting any sensitive information. Of course, I believe this only really works if you also have the https --> http transition warning enabled in the browser. I hardly see any browser installations that leave that enabled, any more. But I don't know a lot about that bit of browser functionality; maybe my understanding is wrong.
Q&A With Guy Kawasaki
Since nobody seems to really be saying it I will:

Paul, thanks for taking the time and putting in the effort to create a website I really value. I've learned a lot over the last little bit and continue to do so.

Job well done.
Ma.gnolia Data is Gone For Good
Currently at 12 years here and all still instinctive.
I haven't read all of the comments around this topic as I simply don't have the time, but might this be about Boxee not having the systems in place to allow Hulu to properly pay local affiliates a portion of the revenue generated from commercials? Or perhaps Hulu doesn't want to pay out a portion to local affiliates?

I appreciate Fred's argument re: it's just a browser, but Boxee is optimized and intended for watching on a TV. If people are watching Boxee shows on their TV, then they're not watching and/or DVR-ing the local affiliate versions which might have local advertising, etc. (true that most DVR people skip commercials, but some don't). Thus local affiliates could argue that Boxee makes Hulu a direct competitor for their local TV viewing audiences. I would argue, naively, that this is why you don't see nation-wide NBC, FOX, and CBS channels on your cable box -- because it would cannibalize affiliate revenue. But that, in effect, is what Boxee is creating.

I wonder if it would make a difference if Hulu were share revenue (or more revenue as the case may be) with local affiliates and put systems in place to allow affiliates to insert local advertising into shows based on a Boxee user's location.

This, of course, doesn't matter for CNN, for example, because all of the money goes into a single pot: The CNN pot. But that's not true with NBC, Fox, etc. I don't think. Correct?

The one hole in my theory is AppleTV -- you can buy broadcast shows on Apple TV, but perhaps the fact that they're commercial-free somehow makes a difference or gets around a contractual obligation.
Most private mortgages in the USA use the house as the only collateral, however if you put less than 20% down most banks require some form of PMI to reduce their risk. This is a large part of why the housing bust has hit banks so hard, also many of the company's selling PMI went bust so the coverage became worthless.
The Goon Train
Honestly, I've only encountered this in CS writing classes (40 page minimum requirements docs, etc). All of the actual writing classes I took used the min. page requirement very loosely. The teachers/TA's explicitly said that writing well was much better than writing more.
Don't over-think it. Put half in cash and half in 3-5 stocks you think don't suck. You would have to spend a huge amount of time on money management to get better results than that.

When I cashed out, I gave away 10%. Mostly to family, and some to local charitable projects I personally cared about. It can feel good.

Spend your time thinking about what to do next, now that you're not constrained to make an income. Start a new business? Become an international playboy? Go back to school? Up to you.
Buy lots of gold and silver! But yes, diversify (savings, CDs, stocks, bonds, etc.).
Huh? The govt doesn't "normally" take over when a company is insolvent. Even with banks, the SOP until recently was shut-down (often via sale to another bank).
I hate the ignorant idiots in position of authority on this planet.
Can someone post a summary? I couldn't understand more than about 30% of what he said - terrible sound quality.

Is this something about tracking a feline with WiFi?

I sort of got the idea at the end that it was actually a joke?

I could barely understand/hear what he was saying. Is it just me?
The best would be reach out to them pulling out their phone numbers/email from yellow pages.

Other bulk marketing options:

- Attend any events/places where your target audience gather. Eg: whole sale flower market, hotel association meeting, banks etc

- Buy ad space on possible websites they visit Eg. websites of their suppliers, hosting provider.

- Create an interesting referral scheme.

- Buy in ambassadors within the community to talk for you.

- Content based advertising on emails or with placements (there would be too much noise though)

Depending on whether the SMEs are aware of their need and a possible existence of a company like yours who offer solution they might search the internet, in which case you are lucky and search advertising would work.
Funny Headlines on the FeedBurner Homepage
A compilation of funny "My Feeds" headlines as seen on the FeedBurner homepage after logging in.
When you get the loan you can usually limit your liability to the actual house.
We're excited about moving that way at the end of the month. We followed the commuter rail out to Lincoln and Cambridge is only 12 miles away. By contrast, Silicon Valley is 30 miles long. There, cultures built and branched out. Hopefully we can all help Boston do the same! It's cheaper and the state government is semi-functional. :)
How do you calculate rent, there? $2500 * 40 = $100,000 ...