skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
For those who may not be able to pierce @rjurney's smoky satire, this is indeed satire.

I have to agree with the spirit of what he's trying to convey in this comment: news.yc would be a more interesting community if a majority of the people didn't default to PG's opinion on everything in general (this is my anecdotal observation and might be incorrect) and YC clones outside the valley being of nth quality bracket in particular (this is a pet peeve since I live outside the valleY) without giving it some thought for themselves.

In fact PG himself seems to spend quite a bit of time thinking about how the valley can be recreated elsewhere seeing how he has written about it in more than one article and says:

"How hard would it be to jumpstart a silicon valley? It's fascinating to think this prize might be within the reach of so many cities."

Surely trying to recreate YC outside the valley can only help?
Carlin mused about a fridge with a butter warmer.
Hahah! Why so serious people? Tough crowd, eh?
How badly would the global warming deniers complain if everyone who was allowed to speak on the issue needed to be approved by the scientific establishment? That would be a great injustice and even I would agree with them on that one.
Poll: How many hours per day can you work with clarity of thought and high energy level?
I would also be interested to know whether this number changes much across different stages of your startup. For example, when you are close to launch, does it get harder to work?
14 hours
The Art of the Self-Imposed Deadline
Humans are involved with approving emails to make sure the user is complying with terms, general application use support, and making sure the e-mail gets delivered. Often times customers that pay less demand more from support, creating less incentive to try to lower prices. There are less expensive competitors out there.
The MBA is not going to die anytime soon. As a society, we need ways to quickly and efficiently rank people by merit. The MBA today offers this exactly the same way a bachelors degree used to offer it. Most don't really use 90% of what they learn but it helps sort out those who are not willing to do extra.

I don't have an MBA, nor do I plan on getting one. I don't see it as good use of my time but I still highly doubt that the MBA will die anytime soon.
Business schools are very self propagating. People who get them decide they are valuable and then convince others of the same which builds a bubble. There are certainly valuable skills (accounting, finance, marketing) that can be learned with experience. I have found everything could be picked up in a few weeks.

I have moderately fallen into it, getting a BBA along with my engineering degree.
The author makes the classic mistake of confusing correlation with causation: "Hmmm...banks hire lots of people with MBA degrees, and this crisis started in the banking sector. The MBA degree must be the root cause of financial crisis!"

Actually, now that I read through it again, I'm not sure it's even worth dissecting. It strikes me less as a merely illogical diatribe against business education as much as an intentionally misleading hit piece against something the author neither understands nor respects.
Actually Dyson seems to be hedging his bets on whether it is caused by man. He seems less convinced than the conventional view but accepts it could be the case. His main point is that it won't be so bad or could even be good.

The confusing part is why the global warming deniers would so instantly rush to him as verification of their views.
Well put. Looking at it slightly differently, what are the potential consequences of inaction, and what are the costs of action? Besides global warming itself, there are other consequences of inaction with respect to energy production issues that must be considered: health effects of pollutants, scarcity of fossil fuels, environmental damage in resource development, etc.

Trying to frame issues of energy production as "skepticism" versus "alarmism" betrays the complexity of the problems that we face. We cannot allow reasonable doubt to be equated with inaction, but we must take what steps we can with what we do know.
He worked as both an engineer and a "help sell things" person. He worked for an American company and a Japanese company. (I forget the order.)
Free tool to capture Conficker scans and probes
To help companies detect Conficker scans and probes on their networks, security firm MicroSolved is offering a free tool - a Linux-only HoneyPoint GUI.
Why you reading this as hate? It's a very similar model to YC - why wouldn't there be references and comparison?
Try living somewhere where there's a drought! We're asked to limit our showers to under 4 minutes (including getting the temp right!)
Lobbying IS a legitimate activity! I hate all the crap that I hear about the "evil lobbyists in Washington". They fulfill an important role.

To make an informed decision, which is what our politicians in Washington are supposed to do, not just respond to populism and mob voice, you need somebody to inform you. Lobbyists do that. That's their job. To inform congressmen and senators. What that politician does with that information, and how he verifies it's truth is another matter.

I suppose I would support your right to try to convince others to a point of view that you know nothing about. But in a better world than we live in, people would seriously question the wisdom of doing this, and talk about baseball instead.
I definitely mean no disrespect to PG, but I tire of these 'clone' programs being dumped on in every thread about them.
Internet TV vs Music vs Newspapers et al
Paul: Did you guys reviewed early submissions this time round? We submitted our application when it was only half done 2 weeks ago but have been editing and resubmitting for the past 2 weeks and there was quite a bit of change from our very first submission.

We sort of figured out that our application hasn't been reviewed since our demo url did not register any visitors yet on google analytics.
Given that picking the right startups is hard how will this increase in applications be handled over time? Increasing the reviewers will not necessarily mean that the quality is still the same. Will the number of days for review be increased in future?
I think Dyson's biggest hangup seems to be that much of the doomsaying surrounding global warming is based on computerized models, which is not, strictly speaking, science. You probably can't empirically test most of the climate models being produced.
The advanced elementary school I attended(15 years ago) did numbers. We always just saw them as a rewrite of letter grades.
Given how much we spend on entertainment and other luxuries, is it really fair to say call spending money on what is likely essential to the preservation of our species "literally stealing food and medicine from people's mouths?" Hell, given what we spend on killing each other over oil and religion, how is it that spending money on understanding and dealing with climate change is stealing? In the United States alone, we have spent over $600 billion on the Iraq war-- even a few of those billions could make the difference between action and inaction on climate change.
Yeah I used to live in Zurich. Great for parties. Just put the beer on the balcony :-)
By one-time subscription payment we mean a user paying for time-based access to a service where their subscription does not auto-renew. Weewar launched with this model on Spreedly and ran successfully on it for quite a while.

As to non-subscription payments, we don't support them in the general case, but we're currently in the process of adding support for adding one-time fees to a subscriber's subscription. So for instance if you charge for hosting and want to charge customers for bandwidth overage, you'll be able to do that soon.
How should we deal with cognitive-enhancing drugs?
> the fact that the same company can both provide a loan and then insure that same loan creates an ethical conflict of interest that calls into question their ability to objectively quantify risk

That doesn't make sense.

If I sell you a car, how does selling you insurance against repair costs bring my ability to objectively qualify the risk of it needing repair?

In pricing that insurance, there are three possibilities. If I price it too low, I'm saying that it is less risky than it actually is, so if you buy,insurance, you get a deal and I take the loss. If I price it accurately, it doesn't matter whether you buy it. If I price it too high, that price tells you that I think that the car is riskier than you might have thought. Buying the insurance is a bad idea, but if you got a bargain by buying "risk" that you're not actually incurring, you're ahead.

In short, pricing insurance incorrectly hurts Citicorp.
It looks like some album cover.
Beer on the balcony. A time-honoured tradition at Hotham.
I don't mean to say that your comment was particularly spiteful, but in every thread on a YC clone, and in the Techcrunch discussion in particular, there is much valley-hating. It gets old.
Not science? Better tell the computer scientists and the computational physicists...

Science is, at its most basic, our attempt to understand the world. As such, science employs many different tools and approaches, including numerical modeling. In particular. numerical analysis is a very well understood field of mathematics that allows us to rigorously analyze complicated problems by using one of the most innovative tools ever devised: the computer. Of course, one can make an inaccurate model as easily as one can write down an inaccurate equation or make a mistake in a derivation. That doesn't mean that the tool isn't a part of science.
What kinds of games are you playing? I was considering picking up a Touch, but I've heard that they're mostly small puzzle games and such. Those don't really hold a candle to Nintendo first-party titles, AAA 3rd-party stuff, and all the massive PS2/PSX games on the PSP.
This is exactly what it is, perhaps it will work for a while until parents figure out how to make A's equivalent to a number etc.. all the pressures and expectations will not change once they do however.
except github is down and we have various gems we need to deploy. Gonna be a late one, first [many] of many we hope ..
2001 Dissertation: middle- & high school student deviant internet behavior [pdf]
Happen to work with the author. Thought it provided some useful reminders. BTW: this doesn't point to scribd.
The thin client is back, says IBM
What they've done is define a property, tack the name "free will" onto it because it resembles some people's definitions of free will, and prove some things about it. If their math is sound, then good for them. Whether this is applicable to anything is certainly up for discussion, of course.
Here's an anecdote about skepticism towards YC that may be somewhat instructive: In 2005 after I attended Startup School and I learnt about YCombinator, I mentioned it to a well known and successful entrepreneur (who I know knows pg). The first thing he said: "Taking 5% for 5-10 grand is rape". He went on to clarify he didn't think pg is a bad guy but...

Since then, startup after startup has shown how much value the YC program has provided in exchange for that 5% stake to the point where I bet a majority of young first time entrepreneurs today consider applying to YC.

My point is the same as @lanceweatherby 's. Let's wait for the these new funds to get some results before we judge them.
During the winter, I kept my sodas outside my window sill, but sometimes it would get too cold and they would burst!
> even a few of those billions could make the difference between action and inaction on climate change.

Really? If we spent $20B on global warming you'd go away happy?

> is it really fair to say call spending money on what is likely essential to the preservation of our species

Interestingly enough, if you read the cost estimates from the advocates, it's reasonably cheap to deal with the problem after it occurs, at least compared to the total global GDP at that time.

The only way you get to "spend now" vs "spend later" on an economic basis is by using a negative rate of return.
Furthermore, the flow in the two pipes is usually in opposite directions because it's more efficient that way.
Google announces Google Services for Websites
I once tried to get a program to run on startup in Suse Linux. Guess what? After a couple of hours, messing around with 'runlevels', and no clear way of doing it, I gave up and went back to the 'Startup' menu in Windows.

This software sounds an excellent, easier way of automatically running programs.
Here's an idea for being different:

-$5K to $10K goes much further in many other countries than it does in the valley and most entrepreneurs there don't have the option of moving to the valley because of visa restrictions. Potential investors there should consider this. This is one advantage some locations have over the valley.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a current MBA student during the day and developer by night.

Its unfortunate that this article focused solely on the financial industry. I agree that some schools seems to breed more of what the author is referring to in the industry. Yet I think its a blanket generalization to all MBA programs. The MBA typically gets a bad wrap when any economic problems start to occur. Most people will then start to quote statistics that say most of the top companies do not have MBAs at the helm, so why do we need these MBA programs? What about those that have worked on Social Ventures during their MBAs? Are they guilty of wasting their time in an MBA program?

I chose to get an MBA so that I could understand the business side of things more and to build a professional business network, the latter being the most important. You'd be surprised at the background of people you meet in school. Do I think that everything taught to me in the program should be taken as gospel? No.
Speaking of data, we've been dropping probes into deep water for almost a decade now. Since the heat capacity of the oceans dwarfs that of the atmosphere, surely the temperature of the water is relevant.

What are the oceans doing? If they're getting colder, the earth may well be losing heat, even if the atmosphere is getting warmer (which it hasn't been for almost a decade).

It would also be nice to know the temperature of the earth because its heat capacity dwarfs that of the oceans.
The Intuitive Nokia Image Space
Lets be honest, the REAL problem here with the idea of global warming caused by humans is that it can not simply be solved by the market. This possibility seems to make hardcore libertarians so uncomfortable that they can only hope no such problem exist.
No... it has a different problem: you can use just a little and it'll work, but use too much and you may feel a little anxiety.
I had '5 hours' picked out in my head before I saw the choices.
New Mathematical System Helps To Cut Bus Journey Times
Skype handles more international calls than AT&T
20 Free Role Playing Games for the iPhone
There are shower control systems, purely mechanical, that regulate the temperature themselves. Those systems would automatically adjust to the changing temperature of the "cold" water.
Well they are planning on interviewing and accepting more... So that might help a little.

Paul also mused about getting the YC alumni more involved --but I read this in execution rather than selection (not that there was any indication either way).
It is weird that you point out a system with 10,000 year cycles as one where "time is of the essence".
I don't think you followed the double negatives there.

The masses generally believe the media, and the media acknowledges the possibility of non-anthropogenic warming. If you are saying that the scientific establishment is 100% sure of AGW, then you just completely skewered your own argument.
I'm one of the Shotput Ventures partners, and I'm looking forward to a great first "class" in Atlanta. We've got an interesting group of partners, with recent business hits in software and web svcs, complementary skills and backgrounds, and good networks. Check out our partners. I think we'll be excellent mentors for our hacker teams, primarily because we love what we're doing and want to help young hackers to build stuff people want and to dare greatly. We appreciate all that YC has done to innovate and evangelize the business model. I'm an especially huge fan of pg's inspirational writing and simple writing style. There are plenty of talented and determined hackers out there who need our mentoring and connections, and it's going to be a ton of fun working with them.
" Let tomorrow's you worry about tomorrow's exercise."

I've had more success in getting myself to exercise the past month or two than I had previously, and I think this sentence sums it up pretty well. Don't start thinking about yesterday or tomorrow, just focus on how good you're going to feel in an hour when you're finished today.
Rational decision making always involves assessing the (probable) costs and benefits of potential actions. If the potential benefit is small and uncertain, and the cost is large and certain, it probably makes sense to wait and collect more information.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opportunity_cost

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global...

http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/CCC%20Home%20Page.aspx
Not every climate expert has run a climate model in his head. Presumably sometimes they also just read papers about other people's results, and assign the a likelihood based on their own experiences. Maybe they are better at estimating likelihoods, but other than that, not so different from the common person in the street.

Even without knowledge in climate modeling, some things can be easily seen. For example it seems obvious that there is a debate on man made warming - some experts seem to consider it likely, others not. Credentials of experts can be checked to some degree without expertise in climate modeling, too. And so on - at every level of knowledge, it is possible to make an estimate of the probabilities, I should think.

Also, I think it is often politicians who decide which scientists get funding for their research, so in a way people do elect scientists (not sure how the system works in the US).
Of course it'd take more than $20 billion over the span of our lifetimes. I meant that within the context of the Iraq War spending, diverting even a few of those 600 billions of dollars could have made a very positive impact and would have meant that Bush was not completely inactive on the issue. I realize I phrased that poorly, and I'm sorry for that, but my point still stands: compared to what we spend on killing each other, the money that is being asked to save our whole way of life is chump change. Moreover, the issue of climate change runs much deeper than economics alone. Talking about rates of return and deferred action neglect the potential for catastrophe if we simply continue to do nothing.
You're unhappy with the amount we spend on entertainment and the Iraq war, and would like us to divert all the money towards global warming mitigation. Perhaps we could cork some volcanoes or do some cloud seeding to induce some rainstorms to get rid of water vapor. Let's take your $600 billion that you say would make a huge difference.

As we're writing the check to the cloud-seeding company, or the volcano corking company, it occurs to you, that there's a lot of things you could do with this money. You could use it to try to stop Iraq from developing biological weapons to kill hundred of thousands with, for instance. Or, if you knew more than the French, the Israelis, and the U.S. did, or just didn't think that was a problem you cared about (let him do it, it's no skin off your nose), you still might think "Wow, I could buy DDT for every man, woman, and child in Africa with this, and save millions of lives." Or, if you didn't want to do that, since DDT is evil and might kill birds, you might think "I could build desalination plants to get the water to feed hungry people in arid climates. and give them relief now, not in 100 years."

When you have the checkbook in your hand, and you are considering choosing to spend the money on volcano corking, or, god forbid, something actually foolish, you may, instead, say "Hey, maybe we should be sure before we blow this money." I think if I gave you the checkbook, you'd think a lot differently than when somebody else has the checkbook.
I find it interesting that these "new" grades are linked to statewide standards, but there are still fifty different states setting these standards, so there won't be any comparability in these grades from state to state. I'm acutely aware of such issues as someone who moved to another state (twice) during my secondary education.
Actually, the author is clearly stating the causal relationship. He is pointing out that free market fundamentalism is the cause of the crises and Business schools are the cheerleaders for free market fundamentalism.

Now, I personally do not agree with that argument, but your criticism of author's argument is unfounded.
Rare HTML Tags
The use of the word "heretic" is telling. This issue has long since taken on the overtone of a religious debate rather than a scientific one. I don't think someone should be considered a "heretic" when he has on his side an MIT climate physicist, a former director of climate science at NASA, a Nobel physicist, IPCC participants, and hundreds of other relevant intellectuals.

Whoever said "the debate on Global Warming is over" ought to be forever considered a disingenuous political hack.
I always knew that Whitehead was a pretty smart guy. Process philosophers must love this.
> These days though the latency is low enough on the cable connection in my area that I can play FPS perfectly fine.

You're not talking about the same kind of latency problem that these guys face.

It seems that this service is sending the player's input to the server, and sending back compressed rendered frames of video. So, the soonest you can see any of your actions is the round-trip time.

Current FPS's do a tremendous amount of simulation on the client. Only state information is sent back and forth, and not everything is even in lock-step with the server. It's a completely different architechture.
This would be great for a Myst-style game, or turn-based games, where latency isn't as much of a problem.

You use the cloud as your distributed-renderer, instead of relying on a single desktop, and send finished frames to the client. Maybe you do some compositing on the client.

The graphics and AI for games designed around this approach's limitations could be incredible.
Well, first we should have a reason to believe keeping them out is a good thing.

But my point is that even if it would be some advantage, the overall cost is too great. Having a bad API and a steep learning curve is a bad thing for everybody, good or bad. Even an experienced programmer would do more in the same amount of time if he had better tools.

Case in point: most good programmers these days work in high level languages like ruby, lisp, python etc. They enjoy diversity, and they enjoy power. What advantage would be if you forced them to write C++? They would still be better (maybe even more so...) then the average, but the total productivity would be way lower.