skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
> Why did they start their own instead of just supporting, say, XFCE?

Because XFCE doesn't have the same goals as they do. If you listen to the interview with them on FLOSS Weekly at twit.tv, they talk about how they want this thing to grow, and what they want it to be. The best example I guess I could give is that they are creating a desktop environment based on concepts in Smalltalk. The look isn't the important thing (at least right now). The cohesiveness of it all is what's interesting.
I am fairly sure that you are just mistaken. For example, Microsoft Windows's EULA does not, as far as I know, grant Microsoft any copyright license in your data. Maybe you can show me where I'm wrong?
In their recent interview at http://twit.tv/FLOSS, they mention that it might possibly work with OS X in the future if some issues with the linker on OS X are resolved.
"Only with law, and courts, and government power to enforce property rights and contracts, can private enterprise work. Without that, capitalism cannot amount to much--a system of economic organization controlled only by trust and private forces will not thrive."

totally unjustified. the writer is counting on the reader agreeing with this without close examination.
Because getting rid of X would be a win?
i largely agree with you that on-ground reporting is important for accuracy of the news item. But on the other hand how important accuracy is as compared to frequent updates by users. For instance reporting of a sports score or traffic jam on a highway by a user through his cell phone is still quite useful for people.

If an online site emerges that gains traffic from a city audience, do you think local service providers like pizza, restaurants or plumbers will advertise on it.
I'd like to be able to filter by region, maybe by pointing at the map. (By the way, I don't like the moving map at all, but that's probably just my personal dislike of things moving on my screen)

The second thing I noticed is that not all events are found when I search for them. There's this Black Hat DC event in Washington but when I search for "Washington" it doesn't show up even though "Washington" is literally mentioned on the event's details page.
Lame. Dziuba could probably give a fuck about advertisers in The Register. That he clearly doesn't give a fuck about writing anything but linkbait is the real critique of this article.
Change the colors?
I have to say, reading that short interview left me saying "what the hell..."
_Why the future tense?
He had RAID and was doing filesystem level backup, ie. copying over the entire Mysql DB file. When filesystem-level corruption occured, the backup script overwrote a good (perhaps 1 day old) backup file with a corrupted file, so he's backup was worthless.

The first thing that comes to mind is that he could have used application-level backup, ie. Mysql. The script would have noticed that the DB is corrupted because reads (SELECT) would have failed, and the backup script would have stopped and sent him an email to restore the good backup file.

If he used a cloud service like Amazon SimpleDB, he wouldn't have to worry about filesystem-level corruption, because that's abstracted away by Amazon. (And it's replicated.)

This is still not enough though. What if the site gets hacked and the hacker issues DELETE statements. Then all your data is deleted, and even if you have application-level backup, it will succeed (it will read the empty DB), thus overwriting your old backup.

I guess the conclusion is to keep around several copies of the data, and have sanity-checks in place to avoid overwriting good backups. In his case it was hard (given it's a homegrown application) to keep around many copies, because his DB was 500G in size.
Anyone know of any good XMPP implementations that lend well to implementing gateways? Preferably in C/C++?
I thought that was Excite? I don't recall Google becoming the default search on Netscape until FireFox. I remember that when all my friends first started telling me to use Google (1999/2000, well after they had 30 computers), we still had to type in www.google.com to get there. And I was a die-hard Netscape fan then.

Edit: Never mind, they switched over to Google in July 1999 (http://searchenginewatch.com/2167331), when it was quite possible that they still had 30 computers.
Imagine a world where IM was more like Email... every company/org has their own server and everything else is just piping.
I heard it from someone directly involved.
Scientists stop the ageing process
What if the phrase "government power" were left out? I think that 'enforcement' is the key concept here, rather than an assumption that it has to be a government doing the enforcing.
What's your metric? Are you basing that on direct experience with both, or some kind of statistics?
you know you have a great idea when other people recommend it :)
Yeah, I'd like to see a source for this too. I recall there being a big flap about how much money they were burning back in 2000/2001 with no possibility of revenue (hah).

In fact, IIRC it was Google's success at doing the "Get users first and profit will come" that made it fashionable among Web 2.0 startups. The idea was pretty disreputable after hundreds of Web 1.0 startups tried it and flamed out spectacularly.
this is precisely why socialists piss me right off. capitalism has made me a serf to the whims of the moneyed. really? pretty sure that was how it was before capitalism. In the modern age I can decide where I work, where I live, and how I spend my time away from work. Oh what's that? In socialism the government would decide all that for me to best maximize my productivity?
What then, is the difference between those pesky nobles and the state? Nobles tell you what to do so that you will best serve noble interests. The state tells you what to do so that you will best serve state interests.
socialism and communism are not new and they did not originate with Marx. It is the same old elitism that has been running since one ape decided that he was the alpha male and would decide what is best for the tribe. Communism is simply a reactionary form of elitism, reacting to the fact that humans have finally found a better way.
"Everything we take for granted was just a vague idea 50 years ago"

Hell most of it was a vague idea 12 years ago
No you're absolutely correct. If someone takes your photo (I read about this for a childrens entertainer and someone duped her account) facebook will disable the persons account and likely depending on the situation may take extra steps (I believe in the case I'm thinking of, Facebook gave a list of the IP's and times the user had accessed the duplicate account from to the police in case they believed it was potentially criminal due to the nature of the womans job and the likely hood of the dupe being made by a pedophile).

Facebooks ToS explicitly state that they respect the IP rights of others and that they will remove any infringing content, or for repeat offenders their account will permanently be suspended (presumably their email will be banned too). It also says they do everything in accordance with the DMCA. The one thing people don't understand about the DMCA is that whilst it might be evil, it also protects individuals as much as companies because every single photo, sentence or anything you or I make or write are immediately copy protected in all western countries.
The idea that VC's shouldn't be involved in companies that only require $20K to start is fairly popular here on HackerNews. Just ask the TicketStumblers, or the VirtualMins.

It seems more popular to think of VC as working capital here: start the company on $20K, prove that it works, then take VC money to scale. Hell, that's the whole YCombinator model.
It would be a cruel joke played upon us if we were to come to the end only to find out that we're the ones riding the cosmic short bus.
right but I think the author was hinging it on governmental forms of enforcement. most people take issue with the idea of private police and private courts, even though you can simply view the government as a private corporation that provides those services as a monopoly (and thus provides them poorly).
Google turns off radio ads
They may never do that, but who else might? The agreement states that the rights are transferrable, may be sublicensed, etc., which I would imagine they would do in bulk. Plus, that content is now theirs forever...twenty years from now, fifty years from now, it could still be in use.
They may also be subject to changes in the law. In the EU telco's are required to retain information for 6-24 months on any electronic message, I'm wondering if the laws are shifting for big companies too.

I wouldn't doubt if governments will be forcing FB and other social networking sites to retain data for several years to help in any police or terrorism investigations.
Ask HN: Feedback on my hacking project
Hello HN:

I am carlosrr, long time lurker, first time poster.

I created this pastebin service as a way of learning comet. It creates a chatroom for the pasted content and lets the users highlight and make notes on ranges of text.

You need to enter your name to be able to chat and highlight, but any name will do. No password, no accounts.

I am working on something related to this and this is a great way to proxy feedback to that other project.

Any comments are appreciated.

Here's a sample room:
http://caretcaret.com/room/3D1C8BBDC0C1F4885708B756F7E3C1F9

Here is the homepage:
http://caretcaret.com
Although your comment seems like you got this covered, I'd like to say it for the benefit of others...

Pick a code name and start coding. You can always pick out a domain name 15 minutes before launch.
Six Degrees of YouTube
The Taxi Driver Taught Me An MBA Lesson
Miami banker gives $60 million of his own to employees
you say that you didn't know what day of the week it was as if it was a bug and not a feature. what better metric of freedom is there than the fact that you are no longer subject to the whims of other people's schedules? And to the point where you don't even have to know what day it is. What is the week but an arbitrary way of keeping track of working time?
A Social Experiment - 6 Weeks In
This is a link to the translation posted in a forum. The original, in Chinese, is at http://blog.run2me.com/runliu/archive/2006/03/15/14311.aspx

PS: Deleted the previous submission since I couldn't edit the URL. Thanks to davi for pointing out that both links pointed to the same URL previously.
No, the solution is to open up Facebook! Interoperability is good for users!
I'm a little nervous describing myself as a "hacker", because I am not really sure I qualify for that label yet, and maybe I never will --- I'm no Stallman or LPD or JWZ or Landon Dyer or James Hague or Chuck Moore or Bill Gosper. But I seem to have more or less been accepted as at least a proto-hacker. I won't call myself an entrepreneur until my company is profitable and has expenses of more than twice my and my wife's salary.
Ed Felten: New Internet? Secure your PC first.
Brilliant! I saw a TED video on this in the past.

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TEDTalks_video/~3/289438364/3...

Amazing Stuff!
I think elitist pursuits are - just economically speaking - a tremendous waste of brainpower, because people are fickle and may move on to other things after investing the time to learn, without making use of their superior understanding.

Where things are accessible to amateurs, the benefits are far greater as a multitude of approaches and perspectives are available to advance the "state of the art."
I think his real identity is very well known, isn't it? He's why the lucky stiff. (Admittedly my Argentine friends might complain that since we don't know the number of his Documento Nacional de Identidad, we don't really know his identity. It's really hard to explain to notaries and the like that my new US passport came with a new passport number, and that does not mean that I am not the same person.)
5 Oracle Business Intelligence Applications for iPhone
Open Source means free right. People like free so why should it be any different for the government. If they can work on linux rather than spending millions on window software then that's good right loads of money saved for tax cuts or new jobs or something.

I do not quite get it though why do people spend so much time programming excellent software to only then give it away for free
How does he scam newbies? By offering advice in how to make money with their own blog/site? How is that different than the "do as we do" blog posts from 37 Signals?

Oh and I am, thanks.
I'd love that, but Facebook isn't going to. They don't stand to benefit nearly enough.

So all their solutions - like Facebook connect - will stay them-centric.
I'm not quite sure, but imagine something like webhooks but real-time. You could tell service A to ping service B over XMPP whenever something interesting happens; I think this would be harder with IRC.
Thank you, one person with sense amidst all this stupid trigger happy paranoia.
A different kind of startup post-mortem: Forumwarz, my browser-based MMORPG.
Maybe I misunderstood your comment, but I would recommend the opposite for most startups, namely company name == product name == brand name (i.e. trade name).

Why? Because it's hard enough to build consumer awareness of one name, especially with a limited marketing/PR budget. Doing it simultaneously for more than one name is even harder.
Kanjorski and the Money Market Funds: The Facts on Sept 18th at 2pm
If JC is a joke in the 'blogging community', sign me up. Maybe the people who follow his advice blindly are fools, but the lessons I've learned from JC are very worthwhile.

You take what is valuable, and leave the rest. I'm far from a daily JC visitor, but I check in from time to time in order to gain new lessons on self-promotion, marketing and creative ways to bring in money that is otherwise left on the table. All things that are important to a startup founder/hacker.

Jasan Calacanis is probably the biggest whore/self-promoter out there, and while many may laugh at him, it's worked out pretty well for him so far.
If I shoot a photo of you, it's not in your copyright (as far as I know).
The problem isn't that facebook is gonna use your stuff - it would be too much of a pr shitstorm for them.

The problem is that facebook is still bleeding money. Once they go belly-up, all their assets will be sold to the highest bidder, and the world largest collection of stock photos will likely be among the most valuable of them.

I have serious problems with "irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense)".
We've actually had a fair amount of help from VCs...it just hasn't been in the form of money :).
It's true I would like to live in a world which would care about people rights and privacy before copyrighted content; I know I'm pretty idealistic. But in this case it seems to me they are fighting evil with a lot bigger evil.
I'm not sure that the bankruptcy laws call for the nationalization of failing banks.
Then you have bigger problems. I'd start with a reliable net connection if you want to do business online.
I highly recommend the Igor Naming Guide, to anyone who hasn't read it:

http://www.igorinternational.com/process/naming-guide-produc...

(A bit surprised it hasn't been linked to in this thread already.)
I think there is an implicit assumption here that if you copy over a live Mysql DB file (I assume that's what he was doing), you get a consistent (aCid) view of your DB. This is a false assumption.

If this is what he was doing, then possibly the older 'good' backups weren't any good either.
Any possibility of supporting TLD's other than just .com? Would at least like to see support for .org and .net, if not more...
Excellent discussion. They both have great points, are well read, and, experienced in the topic at hand. Theo has some great explanations.

OT... my 4 year old just learned how to do simple addition AND can gut a chicken. A fine balance !
Can you point to a real-world counterexample -- a society with highly developed markets but without government-based rule of law?
The linked Seattle Times article, while still brief, has more specifics.
He's distorting the truth, though. What he says happened: we helped prop up banks when they needed it most. What actually happened: we gave banks money to prop them up, and they used to do things like buy out their competitors and give upper management new rounds of large bonuses.
Benefits of using FaceDoctor
Sea buckthorn (Hippophae Rhamnoides) is a spiny shrub with bright orange berries originally native to the Himalayas and Siberia. It has been a well-documented source of herbal medicines, health foods and natural skin care products in Asia and Europe. The berries are so rich in vitamins and nutrients that researchers speculate that ancient plant breeders must have cultivated the plant. Sea buckthorn is not native to the North American hemisphere, so the popularity of Sea buckthorn has only began emerging in Northern America’s health food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries in the last two decades. Canada and the USA have now completed extensive scientific research to this amazing plant, proving it does have an exceptional medical and nutritional value.

The extracted oil from the Sea buckthorn’s berries leaves and bark is extraordinarily high in vitamins and nutrients. It contains an unsurpassed natural source of vitamins A, B1, B2, C, K and P. It also contains a remarkably high content of carotenes, EFA’s, phytoserols, tocophrols, and essential fatty acids.

These natural cocktails of vitamins and nutrients contained in the oil are used for a wide variety of healing purposes. The most important functions attributed to Sea buckthorn oil are anti-inflammatory, antioxidants, antimicrobial, pain relief, protection against radiation and promoting regeneration of tissues.

The stimulation of tissue regeneration promotes healing of heat, sun and radiation burns, as well as poorly healing wounds, bedsores and any cuts or sores.

The natural antioxidants, nourishing, revitalizing, and restorative action of the oil can effectively be used for acne, rosacea, eczema, dermatitis, irritated, dry, itching skin, postpartum pigmentation and stretch marks. It can reverse the long-term effects of sun exposure like wrinkles, dryness, and dark spots and other symptoms of malnourished and pre-maturing skin.
I don't see your model as being intrinsically separate pieces. IMHO we're already at the stage where pushing out software is cheap, and can be done with zero investor funding. Scaling on the other hand, is still as expensive as ever. Your next Twitter can only go so far on a single box, and there will be a time where it's make or break - you'd have to sink some serious money into building out infrastructure to keep growing the business.
I agree with what he said about bankruptcy, but then he said banks should not go through that process, they should just be owned and run by the government, and he defended that position with nothing more than the standard "too big to fail" and calling it capitalism. Bankruptcy is a well-understood procedure, not calls to put random people in charge, even after admitting the government doesn't have anyone experienced to put in charge. Legislating this solution won't make it successful, which is why socialism and fascism don't work.
I am for the elimination of H-1B visas only if it means an even more lenient immigration policy.

Free trade means the free movement of capital AND labor.
It's understandable (if misguided) that people think that turning away foreign workers will help matters significantly in this country, but it's definitely not the answer. America does need to make sure that any foreign workers being brought into the country are being paid prevailing wages, and are not being used to help cut costs.

Of course, since I'm an American working overseas, I suppose it would be a bit hypocritical of me to support further limits on foreigners working in the States! I would like to see agreements between the U.S., Canada, and the EU to help make it easier for their respective citizens to work in other countries (obviously the EU has already done this within their member states). --That would provide more options to Americans as well as to others.
999 business ideas.
What ever happened to this Seiko prototype?

http://www.thetechbrief.com/2007/11/21/seiko-e-ink-e-book-re...

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/e_ink/seiko-high+res-super+thin-e...
> Rather, it's the legal--and responsible--outcome under normal bankruptcy law.

What is the "legal and responsible outcome under normal bankruptcy law"? Nationalization of banks surely isn't and neither is socialism.
there has been no opportunity in history for this to happen. It is only with modern cryptographic techniques and electronic banking that a true non-coercive economy is possible. seasteading should provide an opportunity to try it. If the free-market extremists such as myself are right, these communities should quickly outperform traditional governments. We'll see what happens then.
Outsourcing graphic design at 99designs.com
A sincere bit of advice from personal experience; the motivation is not "some way off"; it will not happen upon you. It's already there somewhere, so if you don't feel you have it, you are going to have to find it yourself.

Otherwise, you might end up burning a bunch of years of your life coasting by and then realize "why haven't I made any really cool stuff yet?!?"

As for hackers, I have a very inclusive definition: someone who likes to tinker with code or other technical stuff without the need to get some gainful result from it. People who code at work and then clock out and turn off completely, for example, do not fit the definition.
"have more natural contaminants"

So are they more expensive because they are more unhealthy? Common!
Thwarting an Internal Hacker
If you think that my post was "conspiracy-theorist-red-flags", you need to read more Terms of Service. That's not a "conspiracy theory", it's a factual description of what clauses Terms of Service typically contain.

Go read your credit card TOS. Go read your cell phone TOS. Go read the TOS of your favorite ten websites large enough to have a legal staff. Go read the EULA for your favorite ten pieces of commercial software. I'll wait. You'll find that clause is everywhere. I know this, because I have read them.

Not to mention I then go on to talk about why they have legitimate reasons to exist and shouldn't be considered simply as "power grabs"; I explicitly repudiate conspiracy theories, with reasons.

What more do you freaking want?
It doesn't get rid of X, it sits on top of it just like XFCE, KDE, Gnome, etc.

It's easy to say that getting rid of X would be a win, but replacing it at this point would be much more work than fixing what's wrong with it.
It runs on top of X11 just like every other Unix GUI, so Firefox, Gimp, OOo, etc will all run just fine.

They'll just look different from the etoile applications.
Like we need more ruthless, immoral executives. Not saying they don't deserve a chance, but somehow I still wouldn't expect integrity and respect towards other human beings to be high among their perks.
thanks for the feedback.

as the backend side of the team, i share these concerns. i think there's a balance between overwhelm-sion and confusion versus 'getting to places fast'. we're still working on this, so thanks for the feedback.
From what I understand, a non-resident alien (i.e. me) can't be a member of a corp in the US, but can be a member of an LLC. What other options are there for a UK resident?
> WebOS is exactly a webkit browser, and the applications one builds for it are indistinguishable from locally-run ajax web pages.

And the revolution is that these locally-run ajax web pages are in turn completely indistinguishable from what native applications on the Pre would look and feel like. The only thing they can't do is 3D and OpenGL. But then again, no Palm device could ever do that, and that didn't stop the Palm OS from having a games ecosystem.
Whoever has up-modded the hacker option is not a hacker.