skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
More melodies need at most a 2 octave range (especially in pop), which limits us to 24 choices for each melody note.

(Actually less, if you factor in the constrains of the specific key the tune is in, but let's be maximalist and get an upper bound).

Now, a melody also comes with a rhythm / syncopation pattern, but let's just count simple 8th notes in our test case (one can consider a whole note as 8 consecutive "legato" 8th notes of the same pitch for our purposes).

How many bars? 8 bars might be a good starting point (many pop verses are that, eg: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty-two-bar_form ).

So, that would gives us: 8 bars * 8 eights with 24 notes for each eight, which gives us roughly: (8*8)^24 different melodies.

Which is like, a lot, man (think 40-figure range).

In practice it could be from much less (considering key constraints which limits the notes you could use) to much more (considering higher than 2 octaves Zappa or avant-guard like melodies, durations shorter than 8ths, etc).

Another major factor is the "melodic quality" of the melody, which is kinda subjective. 8 bars of 8th C notes, for example, wouldn't be that interesting, and many people would not even consider them a melody.

Still that would leave billions of quality melodies in the millions of trillions of possible melodies.
Caltrain doesn't have turnstiles, it's walk on, walk off. It's similar to Amtrak. You buy your ticket ahead of time (or pay on Clipper) and show it to a conductor on the train.
Yep, my Facebook feed is filled with peoples' pictures of phones they bought at lunch today, even in time to snap a pic of the Space Shuttle flying over San Francisco.
Anselm Scholz – Exchange Localization Service
Anselm and I talk about his first app Bee Juice, the benefits of Cross-promotion, App Walls and his experience with Cocos2d. Anselm Scholz is the creator of Beetle Juice Game, available on the Apple App Store. You can follow Anselm on Twitter @gandolf_wizard.
They likely don't allow buying tickets on the train because otherwise people could ride for free if nobody checks.

Having a Clipper card in the situation you described is great since you can scan your card quickly and at least make the train. (You still might get screwed over if you forget to scan out, but assuming your time has a decent monetary value, it is a risk worth taking.) Personally, this is the only situation in which I use Clipper for CalTrain. If I used CalTrain all of the time, I'd get the Clipper monthly pass. For one-offs where I have to wait awhile anyway, I'll stand in line at the ticket machine.)
Complex numbers are cool, but automatic differentiation using dual numbers is even cooler.
Oyster works in 99% of these scenarios. We use it in London for:

Buses - Single Tap / Single Fare
Tube, Light Rail, Tram, High Speed Rail - Tap in and Out

This is either PAYG with fare calculated by zones traveled in or travel cards per zone. Personally I have a zone 2-3 travel card and PAYG credit which gets used when I travel into other zones at a discount.

User education is key as same as Caltrain some stations no not have ticket gates but usually swipe points by entrances.

Its all down to educating users.
When you buy a monthly pass, they ask you which zones you plan to travel in. You'll pay more for a monthly pass if you travel further. So the information is already in your pass if you bought a monthly ride ticket; when you scan before boarding, the end station should already be implied.
You would have to build those turnstiles at each station and staff each station. There is probably a break even point for a certain volume of trains where building out and staffing the stations is cheaper, but I double they have hit that
That's not the sole utility of patents. While it is part of the agreed exchange (temporary monopoly in exchange for publication), patents are also intended to encourage research and innovation. Who would bother spending time and money on research if the outcome was easily copied by competitors before you could recover your costs. (admittedly, this doesn't quite work out that way with many software patents). The publication of the patent itself is more of a side effect of the desired outcome.

Also, just because you don't read patents doesn't mean nobody does. I would guess it's more of a trickle down effect. University professors and researchers read patents and use it to expand and continue research and gradually for the good patents by the time the patent has expired the knowledge it imparted has diffused into the working participants in the field.
Shoot me an email, I might be able to help you with it.
I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

Caltrain is a monopoly because there's not another competing train running alongside it that can take you to the same place.
No, but it's very likely that would-be customers will now look at Mondaine watches and say "how cheap; they just copied the iPhone!"
Licensing terms are really hard and expensive to get, streaming services are expensive to set up/run and Internet brands are a "winner takes all" situation that make it hard for regional or niche brands to compete.

You can buy a physical media copy of a film licensed for rental quite easily through a standard-ish system (expensive, I think it's a few hundred bucks for the disc?) but there's no standard system for licensing streaming and as long as the studios are scared of the Internet there won't be one.

There's a few indie streaming services out there but they're small. Film critic Roger Ebert runs "The Ebert Club", an online subscription club with limited runs of fairly obscure older movies. I remember one for horror/arthouse stuff too, but can't find it now. LoveFilm is really big in the UK.
Learning pjax | theAdmin
I think he's referring to the bit about not contacting companies who don't work with recruiters since they don't value your services.
Do you honestly believe that "most users" use GMail and Hotmail? Most users use an ISP, but lots and lots of companies host their own mail, sometimes for good legal reasons. It would be interesting to know if Microsoft sells more Exchange licenses to hosting companies, but I don't think so.
Before it explodes quoting from the post: "It's important to remember that no one else can see your Activity Log, including your search activity"
Author here. Good points you made here. As I mentioned before, I can't see there being any reason why the agent couldn't charge at least some fee to the company as well (which would be greatly reduced from what recruiters are charging now, so their cost to hire would be lower).

I'm not sure what a company would think. If it were to become more common, it would just be a way of doing business. I negotiate most of my candidates' salaries and packages now anyway, so having an intermediary would not be a huge leap for most companies that already use recruiters. The leap would be the term 'agent', but I think companies would respect the fact that someone takes their career seriously to have an advisor. We'll see.
Nice first project Joel!

Evernote is one of the rare programs that's very much inferior on the Mac, as the Windows version DOES have a word count feature. I'm really not sure why the team can't include it on the Mac version.
We're doing this at 10x Management (http://10xmanagement.com).

Long story short, I was freelancing as a full-stack (Rails) dev, and also playing in a couple bands. Through the music scene, I met some music managers in NYC. They've been in the biz for 15-20 years (managed John Mayer, Martin Sexton, Bruce Springsteen's tours, etc.). In talking, we realized what they do for music clients would be really useful for me as a freelance programmer.

Basically, a manager's job is to take care of the business side, so the talent can focus on what they're good at. So, in a strange experiment, I hired them to act as my agent for programming gigs. They started taking care of all my negotiation, invoicing, collection, scheduling, etc.

It worked out really well for both of us, so we partnered up and started 10x Management, to do this for more people. Essentially, we're bringing the concept of a talent agency to the tech world.

Unlike the OP, we focus only on freelance work (not full-time placement), but so far the model is working very well for all parties. The talent is happy (we've been described as a "virtualization layer" for freelancers), the customers are happy (we represent the best), and we're happy (it's very gratifying to help people with their long-term career and lifestyle goals).

We're growing fast, so if you're interested in representation, or you need a badass freelancer (web/mobile dev, design, data science/viz, PM, etc.), or you just want to learn more, get in touch via our website or hit me up at altay@10xmanagement.com.
Why does a story like this hits HN front-page?
Good ideas. I'll see if I can figure that out!
While the tag-off system does suck, putting turnstiles at every station is probably not cost-effective. They only last so-long, are exposed to weather and abuse. Depending on the layout of each station, you could even need multiple sets of turnstiles for a single station. Turnstiles for the LA Metro cost $46 million for 387 turnstiles.
I like the idea behind the post (your startup idea does not come from the mouth of God, a fallacy many have had including yours truly), but it's basically just saying "do Lean Startup instead of a big launch." Why not both?

It's possible to run "in Stealth" and "Lean" and do a number of key learnings and Product/Market Fit tests ahead of time, then come out of "Stealth" with a big launch. (Case in point is Betable, where our Sheila, our Head of PR, ran a great launch). I really do think you can have your cake and eat it too. It's possible to be a Lean Startup and have a big Launch. You just need to put a Chinese wall between your marketing ("off the radar") and your PR until Launch time.

Edit: It's worth noting that what Justin is advocating that startups not do, which is a Color-style massive launch before any tests are done, is a completely valid point.
That is what I am talking about. That thing, right here, you know, where you unsuspectedly delight your visitors. That's what we all ought to aim for - delighting users when they least expect it. (And even more so when they do expect it.)
I played with this idea when I was doing an algorithmic composition project. I started with a Markov chain analysis of a simple Chopin etude, which gave me parameters, such as:
- The distance between the lowest and highest note is 2 octaves
- The key won't change, so there are only 8 notes per octave and given the first parameter, I only had 17 notes to choose from.
- The shortest note was an 1/8th and the longest was a half. Most were quarters and there were a few dotted quarters (if I recall) so there were 4 note lengths to choose from.
- The main melody in the original was 4 measures (again, if I recall) so my generated melodies were set to be that length, and always end on the root

Given all of these parameters, there were still many thousands of combinations. Applying the Markov chain limited that a lot, but that was only to make it sound like Chopin (which it did, a little). However, most of the thousands of combinations sound like crap, which is not an insignificant point. If you're willing to call some random sequence of notes a melody, then there are an infinite number
I got nauseous!
Waste of time? If you are doing more of the same, then yes. But if you are genuinely working on the problem and looking for solutions, then no. Just focus on making the software about the users (get their feedback from the start), and not about the competition.
Caltrain is a monopoly because it's effectively impossible to obtain the permits to build additional track in California.

Key difference: the lack of a competitor doesn't make a monopoly. The inability to compete is what makes an organization a monopoly in its space.
I am sure about what I said in my comment, not what you've said in yours. I said they started with free data. And indeed they started with data on the US, not the UK. Everyting begins at home. My point is Maps did not start from zero. Public data got the ball rolling.

I cannot say for sure but I would guess it is also what spurred the ideas to bring in a guy they knew who was doing related work at Stanford and also to acquire what became Google Earth. I believe it all began working with public data. They have obviously added lots of proprietary data since that time. They have a massive amount of cash to spend. Far more than the libraries and government agencies in the US who have the public data.
I don't know how you got that Tent is a competitor for Facebook. Tent goal is to be used by Facebook, Twitter, or any other social site so that they basically have an API to access the users data, so the users can have full control and ownership of the data.
This is a problem in London as well - most Tube stations have barriers but some of them don't and most DLR stations are barrier-less - so forgetting to tap costs you extra the next time round (ie for PAYG - passes are penalty-free).

A possible solution might be to have tap-in/out points within the train itself near the doors (possibly even small vending machines) - that avoids the insanity of rushing to tap-in / buy your ticket and getting charged extra if you forget to tap out - if you are at the door of a train and you can see a big, bold notice commanding you to tap out - it's hard to ignore that (you could, of course!).

EDIT: A counter-argument might be that it would create a blocking crowd near the "tap-point" when many people want to alight at a major station. Well, this can be avoided by having (a) a tap-point at all doors and in locations within the carriage and (b) accounting for tap-ins/outs correctly by determining your Clipper/Oyster state and the position of the train (ie if you tap-out in between stations, it means you'll alight at the next one).

That's kind of what they do for buses in Singapore.
I think he's asking why this is a website, and not just a simple javascript library that others can use.
IPhone 5 Changes the Balance of Power Between IT and Vendors
Author here. There are quite a few services an agent could provide, and you mention a few. Handling incoming inquiries (forward LinkedIn requests from recruiters to your agent), help maintain and build your brand (speaking engagements, set up or recommend networking opportunities), negotiate raises when you are working and salaries for new jobs, etc.
This article doesn't even touch the horrible nature of Clipper. Here is a summary of some of the worst that I have experienced:

1 - Intentionally inconvenient autoloading of a monthly pass.- They will automatically charge your CC for this but it doesn't load onto your card unless you have tagged on AND off in the specified zones. The even more annoying part is that during the beta period you could just double tag (acts like a refund) at a single station and your monthly would show up.

2- Effectively bricking their own card and making $250 worth of mistaken charges.- This is by far the worst I have ever heard about in terms of Clipper fail. I had a two-zone monthly pass autoload setup. I changed it two a one-zone. The next period they charged me for BOTH passes. I asked them for a refund and apparently this PERMANENTLY blocks your card from ever obtaining the pass type that you were refunded for. I discovered this when I changed the autoload back to a two-zone monthly.... and they CHARGED my credit card the $126 but never gave me the pass. Clipper insisted that they never charged me and wanted me to "prove it." It took me somewhere around 5 hours of phone time to get refunds and I still had to buy a brand new clipper card. The mistakes were 100% clipper's fault and it permanently broke my card. I am still waiting for that refund... should have just had my credit card block the charges!
"At first I thought this was an awful list, but then I filtered it by date up to 1995 and I felt that the list made a lot more sense. Is this an issue that it takes 15 to 20 years to get settle on what is truly worthy? Or is it an issue with the dawning of the Internet Age?"

I remember seeing the same thing on IMDB years back, where contemporary movies will appear very high on the list and disappear.

If you read the reviews (and I think IMDB lets you filter by demographics, or used to) you'll see that it's mostly young kids and idiots voting summer blockbusters as "10/10 OMG best movie evar!".

Not sure if there is a solution as it's always been the same way, there's always some hot new art, book, technology, etc. that's "GROUNDBREAKING" "CLASSIC" "AMAZING" that fades away quickly and the items that stick around for posterity aren't necessarily the ones that you'd predict (eg. Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby were initially flops on publication).
Author here. You think paying a buck or two will stop a recruiter that could make 20K? Small investment if the resume looks strong!
This was a great PR stunt by task rabbit!
Announcing the Orrick Startup Reel Contest
"Long term requires recruiters to be fully ethical or lose credibility. If I send you for an interview and it isn't the best fit for you, I'm financially motivated to try and get you to take it anyway. As your agent, I would tell you not to since you are my client."

That doesn't make any sense. My agent is still financially motivated to get me to take the job.
Author here. If you want to discuss, I'm easy to find.
I'm confused. Does TechCrunch know that the issue at hand is a (fairly recent) change in Twitter's Policy, not API?
It has a geek component - how do you program that?

It's an easter egg - something to be found.

It's cute and unexpected.

And it's a Friday afternoon/evening, and people are looking for a distraction.
Yeah I was excited too. We actually got invites, but when we ran into trouble, were never able to get a response from support and gave up.
Clickable link: http://signup.mintspaces.com/
5 lessons big-data projects should learn from the iOS6 map debacle
You're thinking of calculating touch typing speed in WPM, where the standard is to consider a "word" to be 5 characters.
Thanks Thomas.

I love Evernote, but this is one of the minor details that could be improved.
The NFL yellow line explained
Leave the octave and think about the 7 notes.
Basic notes, A,B,C,D,E,F and G and probably flats/sharps associated to those.

You said 88 keys = 88 notes but they are just same basic notes,one of those 7 +sharp/flat.
Limits of data visualization with space filling curves
you could have figured all of this out yourself by reading a few blogs (that's basically all I did)

Could have. Didn't. Was too busy building my businesses to care to do the research. Many people are like me. Would listening to Jiggy teach me about MySQL in a nice, packaged, Jiggy-does-the-work-so-I-don't-have to format provide value? Yes, clearly. You already quintupled what I know about the subject with an HN post, think of how entertaining talking for an hour would be.

These are really commodity skills though... do the whole thing for $20 or so.

You are no longer a commodity after you've successfully convinced me that you are the expert who can e.g. listen to my particularized needs and tell me a solution which will work for them. In fact, even if I were non-technical and stark-raving insane and thought that $20 was a reasonable price to pay for this, the fact of having read the above would convince me that eLancelot wouldn't have his uni-codes sorted on the cronSyncServer or whatever that was, so I should entrust the future of my business to the guy who seems to know what he's talking about who is quoting numbers closer to what I pay for e.g. insurance than what I pay for toilet paper.
All the money is in prescription drugs which isn't a 'free market' (speaking about the US here). I can't just order my generic prescription from whomever I want nor do I have unilateral control over what my doctor prescribes. The doctor may well have his/her own agenda.
And that there (probably) already was an internal log of your search history.
OP here, and that's great to hear. My idea would be to represent careers regardless of the contract or perm hire scenario. Recruiters tend to handle a lot of that stuff for independents anyway (depending on corporation status and such). In past jobs I've had consultants work for me for a few years and we managed them from gig to gig, similar to what you describe it seems. Good luck to you.
I figured, for people like me with no coding or programming background, a single-use website would be more useful than a library that people would have to set up themselves.

Plus, while I know about GitHub, I haven't really spent too much time on it to really know how it works.
So what? Once again, it's one of those posts trying to convince everyone, that whatever they do is wrong just because the author thinks he's right. I hate this, because there is no right or wrong.

> Can you get this done in time? Can you get this done in time on budget? If yes, proceed directly to GO.

Getting things done could depend on one's setup which someone could have internalized already.
My hart skipped a beat when I read the title. I hope people will read the whole article or at least your quote before going all termo nuclear.

FWIW I've flagged this, as it's really now HN worthy IMO or at the very least shouldn't have a sensational/link bating title like this.
> For example, what is multiplication by i+1? Without further understanding, I don't think such a question can be answered.

i+1 on the plane is a vector at 45 degrees and a scaling of sqrt(2). So multiplying by it scales your multiplier and rotates it 45 degrees. This is a direct extension of the intuitive understanding given.
Email essentially IS centralized at DNS. Any decentralized social network has to solve the lookup problem: how do I find people. None really do this in a way that's going to make it fundamentally different than what we have now.

I can't help feeling that the natural outcome of decentralized social networking is that people eventually start hosting them for mom and dad, then a few friends, then start companies, then we are back to facebook. Someone, somewhere is going to have to have a database of names mapped to servers.

Centralization is, in an abstract way, present in so many of our social structures, that yes, I disagree that within a capitalist economic structure (one which is optimized for sharing of services rather than individualism, ie: non-technical users simply wont do this unless the work is done for them, like facebook did) it would be next to impossible for something like this to work.

People quite simply don't want to deal with this shit, and centralization brings efficiency and management amongst many other things.
Force quotes to be in sixteenths, the way they used to be and HFT disappears.
Not only is email a successful decentralised system, it's the logical infrastructure for a decentralised social network. In Facebook terms, your "feed" is just an inbox with a smart filter and nice presentation, and your "wall" is just a mailing list to which all of your friends are subscribed.
Fireside Chat with Sanjeev Bikhchandani
Verizon finally rolling out Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean for the Galaxy Nexus
Your home PC isn't really on the Internet. It's on a crappy pseudo-network that happens to be connected to the Internet.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't be able to use it as a server - you should. However, to use it as a server, you'll need a proxy/gateway server on the real Internet (ie, in the cloud) and a pseudo-protocol by which the gateway talks to your home PC. The pseudo-protocol could even look a lot like the protocol that real servers speak to each other on the real Internet - but there's no requirement that they be the same. (I'm not sure how well inbound port 80 works if you're on Comcast, anyway.) So, when designing the real-server protocol, it's a layering violation to also be thinking about this pseudopod.