skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Nothing is Random: Book Excerpt (Winters tale)
Nothing is Random

Nothing is random, nor will anything ever be, whether a long string of perfectly blue days that begin and end in golden dimness, the most seemingly chaotic political acts, the rise of a great city, the crystalline structure of a gem that has never seen the light, the distributions of fortune, what time the milkman gets up, the position of the electron, or the occurrence of one astonishingly frigid winter after another.

Even electrons, supposedly the paragons of unpredictability, are tame and obsequious little creatures that rush around at the speed of light, going precisely where they are supposed to go. They make faint whistling sounds that when apprehended in varying combinations are as pleasant as the wind flying through a forest, and they do exactly as they are told. Of this, one can be certain.

And yet there is a wonderful anarchy, in that the milkman chooses when to arise, the rat picks the tunnel into which he will dive when the subway comes rushing down the track from Borough Hall, and the snowflake will fall as it will. How can this be? If nothing is random, and everything is predetermined, how can there be free will? The answer to that is simple.

Nothing is predetermined; it is determined, or was determined, or will be determined. No matter, it all happened at once, in less than an instant, and time was invented because we cannot comprehend in one glance the enormous and detailed canvas that we have been given - so we track it, in linear fashion, piece by piece. Time, however, can be easily overcome; not by chasing light, but by standing back far enough to see it all at once.

The universe is still and complete. Everything that ever was, is; everything that ever will be, is - and so on, in all possible combinations. Though in perceiving it we imagine that it is in motion, and unfinished, it is quite finished and quite astonishingly beautiful.

In the end, or rather, as things really are, any event, no matter how small, is intimately and sensibly tied to all others. All rivers run full to the sea; those who are apart are brought together; the lost ones are redeemed; the dead come back to life; the perfectly blue days that have begun and ended in golden dimness continue, immobile and accessible; and, when all is perceived in such a way as to obviate time.
Clearly those numbers are wrong -- otherwise a $5 loaf of bread today would've cost us about $.95 in 2002 (and about $.18 in 1997).

I believe the historic average rate of inflation in the US is closer to 2.5%.
OK, I misinterpreted their commodity-price index. However, it is a leading indicator of inflation and as that, it seems more reasonable.
No, you actually want the _other_ CPI (consumer price index).

Historical TTM: http://inflationdata.com/inflation/Inflation_Rate/Historical...
Along the same lines, "Don't make me think" by Steve Krug provides an awesome Usability foundation. (Better than Nielson, IMO.)

http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Make-Me-Think-Usability/dp/078972...
First of all, keep working on the C. It's a very important programming language that underlies almost everything. If you learn to program C really well, you'll be able to understand what's happening even when you're using languages that are much higher-level than C.

As for a programming language to learn after C: try Ruby or Python. Both are considered great languages. I'd not only recommend starting with Ruby, but if I were you I would check out Hackety Hack at http://hacketyhack.net . It's a site built by a certified (and, perhaps, certifiable) programming genius, who is trying to make learning Ruby programming into something that 13-year-olds will do for fun. If you can figure out the stuff on that site, you will be well on your way to writing a cool web app.

Creating your own website -- perhaps even a cool web site -- doesn't necessarily require much programming. You should try setting one up right away. Tomorrow would be fine. :) You need a web server program (like Apache), and a database (like MySQL or Postgres), and you need a computer that's connected to the network all the time. The simplest thing you could do is pay ten bucks for a month of service from a web host like Dreamhost, install Wordpress or Drupal (perhaps just by pressing one button), and have a website tomorrow. If you already know how to do that, and need a bigger challenge -- or if you don't want to spend ten bucks a month -- then try downloading Apache and MySQL, install them on your own computer, and get Wordpress and/or Drupal running. (Hint: if you've got a Mac, the word to google for is "MAMP".) Use Google and Wikipedia to find the docs and books that you need to read to get that done.

It doesn't matter if anyone else can see the website, at first. Play with it yourself. Figure out how to add and delete users. Add some blog posts. Change the colors. Learn how to back up your database and restore it again. Learn about XHTML, and CSS, and SQL, and DNS, and SSH, and SSL, and SMTP. None of this is programming, exactly, but if you want to build a website for a startup you will have to know at least a little bit about all of these things.

If you've got a Mac, learn about how Unix works. If you've got a Windows box, install Linux on it. Search for Ubuntu Linux and find some docs that explain how to install it without screwing up your Windows installation.

Be aware: it's not that easy. It's certainly nothing like the movies. There's a lot of different moving parts that you must know about before you can build a site like Twitter, or Facebook, or even Hacker News. But many people have done it.
actually I found a PHP script for this today at http://scripts.suramya.com/ while looking for a gimpshop debian installer. I'm not sure if it works but it looks good. its PHP...
Something I'm concerned about with nginx is that the main process has to run as root. Is there a way around it? That seems like a huge security hole to me.
Yeah, I don't get why this stuff is considered so revolutionary. It's like no one involved ever studied tcp/ip.
The CPI is influenced by the political winds (e.g. right now, it rather heavily weights technology items, and down-weights fuel and food costs, which are experiencing much greater price inflation). The commodity price index might just be a better indication of actual inflationary pressures for real people.
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Where do you live? Here in Seattle, prices on basic food items (dairy products, especially) have gone up by at least 30% in the past two years.

I don't know if my overall grocery bills are lower or higher since 2003 (on a quality-adjusted basis), but I know that my overall cost of living has increased significantly.

Also: mortgage rates have (unfortunately) little to do with the current inflation rate. It's not really fair to say that a current inflation statistic is wrong because the lenders have lost their minds....
1 Book has it all:

"CSS Mastery" by Andy Budd

You will be a ninja thereafter.
Ask YC: What's a reasonable share of equity to get as the first developer?
So there are 2 guys that have an idea for a company. Granted it's a great idea, if executed properly. They are offering the first developer (also the first employee) a 2% equity stake and no compensation at this point. Being that it's a web company, said developer will probably be doing just as much work as the founders.

Is 2% reasonable? I don't think so...I would expect an "unofficial" co-founder to get at least 10-30%.

What do you guys think? Do you have any experience in this kind of situation?
Um... no pay for working with 2 guys with an idea... full 33%. You have talent, they have nothing but an idea (everyone has ideas, they're mostly worthless), you should be treated as an equal.
Yes, everything in life is as easy as in movies!

To write web applications, popular programming languages include PHP (the most popular one, used by many companies and open source projects), Java (mostly used for "enterprise" applications), Ruby and Python. Java is a simple language but the frameworks (the libraries) tend to be complicated (enterprises seem to confuse complexity and value). PHP is used by many hobbyists; it's powerful but, unfortunately, a lot of the code you'll find will be crappy and wouldn't be a good way to learn good programming practices. Ruby certainly is a fine language but its community of users is annoying so you'll find a lot of bullshit flying around which isn't a good way to start, either. Python seems to be the way to go. Of course, nothing prevents you to look at the other ones. Quite the contrary: if you try different things you'll be able to know what is better for you.

You'll also need to learn web design (HTML, CSS), client-side programming (Javascript), database systems, etc.

The best way to learn is to learn a little bit of everything at the same time (not Python first, then Javascript, then databases...) so a good way to start would be to install a Linux distribution on some machine and start playing with web servers, languages, databases, etc. Don't try to start by creating some useful thing; it's frustrating. Just fool around until you understand how everything fits together.

Hope this helps (please note that I'm not a web developer myself; I just happen to waste my time on programming.reddit.com too much!)
Those guys are going to fail miserably.
I think that in 99.5% of cases you should start trying to monetize from the very beginning, for three primary reasons:

1. You're more likely to piss of customers if you introduce advertisements/donation requests/subscriptions later than if it is there at the beginning. People like to know what they can expect from a site when they first start using it, and they tend to get very comfortable with a given dynamic. I've been very surprised how offended/alienated people can become if you introduce monetization later...people don't seem to understand about hosting costs or time investments.

2. You get the chance to see what is actually going to work for you before you go through too many iterations of your idea. Maybe your initial focus is not able to sustain itself...being able to adjust on the fly and experiment is a key component of internet sites and your monetization strategy is definitely something you can/should experiment with.

3. People with something invested in your site beyond their content contributions (such as donations/subscriptions) are more likely to give you honest feedback about your site. You also tend to get more partner inquiries if there is a visible monetization method (versus 'labors of love'.)
As it affects the short term, that's a good point. I'd make the argument that CPI is a better long-term indicator but over enough time the two indexes should show the same average rate of growth.

Timr: just out of curiosity, what start-up are you working for in Seattle?
If thats their offer stay away from them and the next time discuss this before hearing the idea.

Probably even if you never go after this idea with others, these type of guys would even accuse you for their failure..
Agree with gnaritas. If there is no code at present, and you will be putting in as many hours as each of the others, then the starting point for your share is 33%. From there, add or subtract percentages for relative experience. If one of the founders has tremendous experience in the field at hand, and you have great experience in coding (but not "tremendous"), then you might agree to say 20%...and so on.
One of the Linux magazines (Linux+, I believe) has been running a series on using iptables for the last couple months...
The fact that they're offering you 2% for equal work/risk (after all, you lose just as much as they do if it fails) says more about them than whatever idea they're pursuing. I'd walk away.
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LispCast - a series of screencasts of Common Lisp development
Why Amazon's HaaS (Hardware as a Service) Strategy is a Winner
You can't be serious. That is less than what I was offered at my first job, as employee #6, WITH salary. Tell them to go stick it and work for somebody with ethics.
I'd say 50%, given that you're the only one building product.
I have updated an updated version based upon everyones feedback, I cut back the estimated paid accounts by half and added some additional information:
http://www.userlinks.com/officezilla-opportunity.doc
I also use DrScheme regularly.
I'd RUN away.

They don't respect you at all and they're a completely lost cause. They're likely to screw you over or replace you at the first opportunity and blame you for any failures.

Two percent is insulting for the sole tech guy on a team of three. Even if they had an absolutely BRILLIANT idea and SUBSTANTIAL experience in the given industry.
Economics of blogs
Upmodded. I've been hoping someone with more time would do something like this. I hope it doesn't die out too quickly.

I would also love to see an Emacs guru create an instructional DVD series...everything from beginner stuff up to Wizard-level tricks and tips. SLIME and elisp stuff, too. My company would pay a pretty penny for that so that we could get all of our new hires on the same page quickly...we've had to hire too many people that don't have substantial Emacs experience.
Agreed. My strategy has always been to put some small ads on the site from the very beginning, just to signal to users that they're going to be there, and see how well they do.
> Ruby on Rails, a programming language useful for making web applications

Ugh. What a way to start an article.
Inflation!
Vim and Chicken.
They dont' just have an idea. They also seem to have a loooot of chutzpah. Surely, that has to be worth something? ;-)
Not here dude, take it to politics.reddit.com
The embedded video is not about politics, it's just posted by a Ron Paulian.
2% and no compensation? If it's such a great idea, walk away and go build it yourself.
Is that even legal? Lol.
4. If you put ads from the start, you get to design the Web site with the ads in mind rather than adding them later in whatever space that happened to be left empty.
Do you mind telling us how much equity you were offered?
It all depends on their history/track record. I will take 2% of whatever terd Mark Zuckerberg pops out next, just because of the hype and what he has done so far.
Hey I love John Perkins as much as anybody, but conspiracy theories about how the CIA and World Bank is teamed up with multinational corporations to go around the world deliberately overthrowing democracy is not appropriate material for Hacker News.
well as of this morning, the global market for 1 chutzpah is equivalent to 2 matzoth balls.
This would have to be the worst place to share your idea. Amongst young,capable, and eager entrepreneurs. i would steal a good idea in a heart beat.
You didn't mention what they're putting in!! If they're putting in their time only, just like you, then you should get 33%.

However, if they're also funding it, paying rent, bills, marketing budget, ...etc, then you have to consider the amount of money they're investing in your calculations.

And, sometimes, there are other things founders can offer in addition to time and money. Does the startup require certain type of connections that they only have? Things like that should also be considered.
If they can't even afford to pay even a single paltry developer salary then a can't see what they could possibly be bringing to the table.
Yes, it looks more like Naomi Klein type material:

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

In any case, I agree: it belongs on politics.reddit.com, not here.
Rather than asking if 2% is reasonable, look at it the other way: If you had started a company and were looking at hiring these two people, would you give them 98% of the equity?
Employing people is very, very expensive. If you run a company with more than say 3 people, you're also going to be needing an office. And computers.
> Why not doing it in the first place, then?

We don't want to do it at all and probably never would. I'm only mentioning it as something that somebody evaluating risks from the other side might imagine that we could do.

> If the internals are not well-designed and not well-documented, yes. In that case, once again, why bother releasing the source code?

No, we're not going to deliberately obfuscate anything because that would be against our goals of encouraging as many people as possible to adopt our platform.

I think it's not really necessary to create artificial obstacles for us to have an important advantage. Very large systems take time and experience to understand even when they are both well designed and well documented.

Linus and Alan Cox have an advantage over newcomers at extending the Linux kernel, right? Hypothetically, if Linus, Alan, and say Rusty Russell got together and created a startup to implement a Linux kernel based idea, would it make sense to compete against them on exactly that idea?
I don't think 2% is reasonable, too.
checked hacket hack ,its amazing.

used wordpress on a free web host ,i was even getting good traffic,how is blogger to get started is it good to tweak with.

i have downloaded fedora core 7.i'll install it now.
Much improved release of Seaside (web application framework written in Smalltalk)
i am 19 right now ,am i too late and should i go back study the univeristy syallabus or do i still have time to make it big?
Facebook's New Hiring Hurdle?
Yes, but if that were the case you would expect that they could raise money to actually pay someone... These guys sound like greedy B-school type clowns. I bet the idea is pretty silly too. Probably something that is technically impossible...
Marco Baringer's SLIME tutorial screencast is quite good. Other than that, I haven't seen much else that's worth watching.

Bill Clementson's post about the movie: http://bc.tech.coop/blog/050728.html
Yes but he could pay you... These guys evidently don't have a pot to pee in. No pay means no track record.
People pay because they have to (excluding tipping), not because they want.
If they are not going to pay you how are you being employed would be my first question. I would walk away unless they offer at least 30%. I'll be honest I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole. Lets face it they might have an idea but you will not get any credit for building it and whats stopping them from replacing you at anytime. 2% of nothing is worth less than nothing.
You could use vilisp.vim[1], which will basically copy-and-paste Lisp forms into your REPL for you. If you use OSX, you can try pg's method[2] of dragging text between terminals.

Better yet, you could resurrect Slim-Vim[3] if you really want SLIME-like features.

[1]: http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=221

[2]: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=72863

[3]: http://wiki.alu.org/Slim-Vim
In north east Italy, this is what a "spritz" is:

http://padovachronicles.welton.it/articles/2004/11/08/spritz
Out of curiosity (as a Lispworks and SBCL user who has never seen this sort of performance difference between the two) is there anything in particular that you could attribute this to (eg. FFI, Streams)
Okay. I'll admit it -- I picked up the phrase from "The Sopranos" :)
At a recent barcamp some bloggers mentioned something interesting: they treat their visitors differently with regard to ads: the feed subscribers only see ads on an article after a few weeks, whereas people hitting the blog through search engines see ads from the start. Not sure what the right mixture would be, but it's something worth to think about, I guess.
Ask news.yc: Taking payments for third parties?
Hi all!

I'm considering an idea that involves taking credit card payments from
consumers on behalf of my customers.

I'd need to collect the payments then, after the service had been
supplied, send it on to the seller (by cheque or bank transfer
probably). I'd be basically acting as an online storefront.

Does anyone have an experience of the problems I'm going to encounter
here? I imagine there could be problems with liability when holding
other peoples money or issues when refunds need to be made.

I'm based in the UK so I'm mainly interested in how it works with the
laws here but I'd presumably want to expand out at some point so any
advice about elsewhere would be useful too.

All advice will be much appreciated, thanks!
Which of course have nothing at all to do with north eastern Italy:-) Your average Sicilian or Neapolitan wouldn't have a clue what a 'spritz' was in the sense of the drink.

Actually, the original term came from when the Austrians occupied the area, and imported what is still called a "spritzer" here in Austria, which is just wine and fizzy water. In the Veneto they took it and improved it by adding the bitter.

Ok, wildly off topic, but it's kind of interesting, and if you're ever in Padova or Venice, I highly recommend having a spritz in the piazza.
It depends if you have private loans or federal.

You can typically ask for 3x 6 month "hardship" deferments on Federal Stafford loans on top of your 6 month grace period after you graduate. And, those deferments are re-set if you go back to school for a semester. So, theoretically, you could take 18 months worth of deferment and then go back to school for a semester, drop out, and take another 18 months of hardship deferment.

There are also repayment programs available to you if you have limited income. At lest a few years ago, there was a type of repayment program where you could pay a fixed percentage of your income for 30 years, and then your loans were considered paid in full. I remember reading about a Rhode Island School of Design film student who got a $150,000 film degree. That's the repayment program that she was in, so she could make ends meet and still pursue her art.

Now, if your student loans are to private lenders, that's a whole different ball of wax. They usually aren't as understanding.
Forget it! No one over the age of 15 will ever make it big ;-) Seriously, you have all the time in the world. Study the hard core stuff (algorithms, data structures and maths). Experiment with the web. Seek out people who really take interest in whatever they do. Don't burden yourself with debt, expensive lifestyle or kids, so you have the freedom to jump onto opportunities whenever they present themselves.
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