skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I'll take a contrarian point of view, just for fun:

> But economists who debate certain issues about the perfection of markets are not debating, say, whether prices give incentives. Almost all economists recognize the core benefits of the market mechanism; they disagree only at the margin.

Sometimes, though, you wonder how marginal the 'margins' are. For instance, information asymmetry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry). In a modern, advanced economy with complex products and services, who can really judge a product just by picking it up and looking at it? Even something so simple as the food we eat might be grown with toxic weedkillers, and we can't tell that just by picking it up and looking at it.

Not that I'm actually anti-market or free trade... far from it. I just like to push back, at times, it's healthy to question things.
No, I don't lisp, but I know you can nicely embed HTML directly into your lisp code with macros. I saw an example here at YCnews earlier and was struck by it, that was beautiful. No doubt, you can do that with SQL too, although that's just a cosmetic change. Even if your code looks lispish, you still think in DB terms - tables, relations.
Google Acquires Zingku Mobile Social Network
Paul Graham can divide by zero.
Except that + takes two arguments, not three--unless you've altered the definition.
Paul Graham is always a single argument.
When Paul Graham hacks, the Rocky Theme Song starts playing.

Paul Graham can find Waldo. Always.
JRuby Compiler Is Complete
Isn't that what Microsoft does?
Jajah Now Does Click To Call For Anyone
I really think we need a good micro payment system. I cannot believe that reading an article should forever be conditioned on having a movie play right in my face. I have no issues with google's text ads. I wouldn't bother to block them. But those flash movies right in the middle of pages are ridiculous. They will be blocked and they should be blocked because that's the only way to make the industry work on better solutions.
5 Tips To Spot A Hot (or Not) IPO
I'm voting up only to draw attention to this obnoxious clutter trash in hopes that it will be moderated. You stupid fucking fanboi's...
I like s-expressions. But this guy makes a slightly odd argument that doesn't help his cause at all. He basically says XML is too complex, but s-expressions are really simple if you are an experienced lisp hacker. Otherwise, so he says, "this is going to get really hard really quickly".
>The solution is openness. Almost all government CCTV feeds should be open to public view, for example.

Second that. Just put them on the internet, how hard is that?
"never attribute to malice what can be explained by math" -pg

people usually found companies with their friends
peoples friends are usually of the same sex
less women in technology
thus the number of founders will be around that small percentage squared

I forget what PG essay this is from, anyone?
Paul Graham is a homo sapien
I just kept buying PR people and raising money at bubble con without doing anything else... and made billions. Didn't do anything else except buy a couple superbowl ads to win the game!
You can't really do anything about it, so may as well join the good fight and make the system work for you.

I've thought about it a lot, and it seems like bad hygiene to give such powerful tools to the government. But if we can't stop them, we may as well make them work well.

There is nothing to stop private companies though, and they have a bottom line interest in tracking you. See Cory Doctorow's short story about the day Google turned evil.

...which was a few years ago :)
What is the right ad when I'm not looking for something to buy?
People aren't writing those to suck-up to PG. It's humor...try laughing. Do you honestly think that people write jokes about Chuck Norris because they're Chuck Norris fanboys? It's just for fun...get over it.
To what prices are you referring? Computers, VCRs, air travel, refrigerators, TVs, dishwashers, books? People today can buy more of almost everything than they could 20 years ago.
"Ideas for Startups" (http://paulgraham.com/ideas.html)
It depends how much effort your startup requires. It also depend on the intellectual effort required by the other part job. If it's a manual job, you will be able to plan what you do the next time you work on your startup. You'll make better decision and you might even become more efficient than some working full time for its startup.

If the other part job his intellectual, then it will be much harder, especially if you can't well split activities.

Finally what is really important is how much perseverance, motivation and will you have. The other factor will just influence the amount of difficulty you have to overcome.
XML is for documents, s-expressions (or JSON or YAML or ...) is for data.
XML is supposed to be a human-readable platform- and language-independent format for data and document exchange. The article just shows that you can do all kinds of cool stuff with s-expressions if you happen to use CL.

Just as if a smalltalk enthusiast proposed exchange of serialized smalltalk-images as the universal solution for data interchange. Because XML is just to complex to parse.
So an entire HTML page is a document whereas a fragment of a page retrieved via XHR is data, right?
If you're just going to shove it straight in the page, then it's part of a document.

It's the difference between

<p>here is a <a href="http://example.com">link</a>.</p>

and

<name>bct</name>
<dob>19xx-07-03</dob>
<address>...</address>

One is markup, the other is something different.
I see what you mean but I'm not convinced that this difference merits the use of two different representations. And the difference gets blurred if you consider that XHTML makes it possible to include basically any kind of data in the document, not just elements meant to be document structure.
I raised this problem earlier on HN and never got the answer to this question:

Let's say I hate XML and I love S-expressions. I'm willing to replace all my XML with Sexp now and all I need is a clearly defined syntax with charsets, escapes and all, so that I can write generators and parsers. That spec would probably fit 2 or 3 pages, but someone has to do it carefully. So where is it, the Sexp syntax for representing tree structures everybody's talking about?
Mmm, design patterns for humor. There are so many of them (lightbulb jokes, snowclones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowclone), variations on Monty Python sketches, etc). The real challenge is to come up with new patterns, not to use existing ones.

I wonder if it's specifically a geek thing?
Ten Businesses Facing Extinction Within ten Years -- is There a Contrarian Play to be Made Here?
Do you suffer from brown tongue disease over there? We're currently suffering the first cases of it in the UK. Could be quite a problem. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/uk/7018205.stm
This is a recurring theme with cutting-edge software. Arc is probably exercising parts of the mzscheme code that haven't been exercised before. Bugs will be fixed and things will be better.
Also, if the market for your idea is very very good, and the company is offering a service, then this might work. You are already selling the service by now, within your limited time, and the competition doesn't care much as there is such a huge market for your idea. But these are not the conditions in all the cases...
Oh, I don't think there's anything wrong with using XML for data - it's just that these "XML sucks" rants always seem to assume that's all it's used for.

I know that a JSON version of my XHTML fragment up there would suck pretty hard; would a s-exp one be any better? (honest question)
tohu-wa-bohu
As another poster mentioned - guess what happens when you try to block things and the blocking becomes common. Think spam or popups. If there are financial incentives, the advertisers getting blocked will just get more creative. Its the usual arms race. Text ads just haven't gotten annoying enough for most people to block.

I do think Google's advertising model can't last forever. Just like the old "pay per view" model mostly died out on the web, the "pay per click" model will die out too. The obvious next step is pay per sale. Yes, it's hard and has problems. But if somebody finds a good way to make this work, this could potential steal away some of Google's business.
Why would the JSON version of that fragment suck pretty hard? I don't think there is any rational argument for XML, JSON or s-expressions solely based on whether something is data or a document.

I think to make that judgement, we need to consider things like when do we really need namespaces? How often is a particular expression written by hand, how often is it generated automatically? How important are different character encodings? Does it have to be bandwidth efficient? Is this a type of data that might actually morph into a program or is that something we want to exclude for security or complexity reasons? Are there existing tools that help us to process one or the other representation more easily?

All these things depend on many more aspects than just data or document.
You might pay for a few services you use frequently, but a lot of your time is probably spent on a "long tail" of various sites you're not going to pay for.

Advertisements are de facto micro-payments and they work really well. We don't even all have to pay (shhh). They're a small price to pay to keep the web growing the way it is. I think an arms race and eventual truce is the most likely result.

I think startups focusing only on things people want to pay for directly would reduce the number of startups dramatically. Having eyeballs as a currency which can be exchanged for money is unbelievably powerful.
Yep, exactly correct.
For my sites I use Valueclick, Adsense and I am always trying something new.
You will also find that the best network varies on the placement on your page, so try a few combinations out.
You might check out pubmatic.com, I have been using their ad server and it is great for someone who is getting started with ads.
Didn't read the article through to the end, but I suppose, if you can use an XML parser to read a document, you might as well use a S-Expression parser.
I know YC likes to see ideas with big potential markets, but I can't help wondering if there is a sort of herd mentality that goes along with startup ideas. Obviously, social networking is par for the course.

Is there a play to be made on ideas that are not in favor? Perhaps ideas that are on the way out? For instance, based on this article, would there be a business model in, say, creating custom vinyl records based on user's MP3 files and cover art?

Since these are declining businesses the huge numbers probably aren't there, but they might make a nice place fora bootstrapper to go -- perhaps a little safer than competing with the majority of investment money.
Very, very hard actually.

justin.tv was happy about 14000 simultaneous feeds. How would you make the data transmission backbone to accommodate something 1000 times bigger?

The big push for automated surveillance is in fact a response to network usage. It used to be that you record onto tapes. Everyone thought that stunk, so they started recording to DVRs. But then you need to transmit lots of imagery to central servers. It would make more sense to put some intelligence on the camera end and only transmit when something interesting is going on. For example, reliable motion detection would only send video when there is something new in the scene.

But either way, yes, everything should be online all the time.
Unit tests are the way to separate assertions from your implementation code to avoid messiness.
That's true, they weren't a publicly growing web app.
Google Presentations Live
Pretty sure he must be laughing itself out right now reading it. PG, you're a hero for many people, you know? How about you giving your own contribution to this list?

By the way, I just noticed that there is no way to recover a password if you lost it?
I don't care for it either, and wouldn't mind if it disappeared, but you lost me with the gratuitous insult. That sort of thing isn't part of the sort of community I want to belong to.
"won't be able to do"

You should have nothing to do with any start-up until you premanently remove those words from your vocabulary.

Seriously.
Best way to do PR/Marketing for your new start-up ??
IDEAS WANTED : How to create Buzz for new Start-up?
We have a female co-founder, but she's not really a hacker. Where she lacks in programming skill she more than makes up for it in other areas though, which is why she's on the team. Don't be fooled, she runs much of the show..
I knew there was a code/data divide, but not that there also was one between documents and data.
Paul Graham is so good, he regularly comments on Hacker News.
I'm not sure that the "pertinence" of the field is what's important for a start-up. I'd be more concerned about the need for something (unless that's what you meant by "pertinent".)

If you have to look for something to do or ask for recommendations, you'll probably never have the passion needed to see it through.

OTOH, you probably already have what you need. What really bugs you? And others you know? When's the last time you said, "You know, someone really ought to make <some thing>." THAT'S what you should be pursuing.
The trouble with these ideologic arguments is that the hard questions are never debated.

For instance, my own opinion is that it is good that you can get rich by creating things that others need. On the other hand we know that inequality of income creates inequality of opportunity in the next generation. Which means that not everyone has the same opportunity to get rich by creating something that others need.
If your product is mainstream, no. Your competitors are too strong.

However, in vertical markets it only depends on how hard is to develop your version 1.0.
How can you say prices have stayed the same or gone up? In 1996 I paid $2300 for a 486 with 16mb of RAM. A month ago I paid only $1700 for a Core 2 Quad with 4gb of RAM. Seven years ago a 50 inch plasma cost $10k.

Even outside electronics, which experiences persistent price deflation (and hence rising volume), prices are not rising as fast as wages. In constant 1990 dollars, gasoline cost $1.10/gal in SF in 1987. This rose to $1.66 (1990 dollars) in 2007. (http://www.mtc.ca.gov/maps_and_data/datamart/stats/gasprice....) Median wages in the same period rose from $14,498.74 to $23.962.20. (http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/COLA/central.html) $1.66/$1.10 = ~1.51 ... $23,962.20/$14.498.74 = ~1.65. Even gas is getting cheaper.

As random anecdotal evidence on food. My dad told me he started his career 33 years ago at $4.10/hr, and finished it in 2006 at closer to $40/hr, at the same company, without climbing into upper management. When he started, a week's worth of groceries cost him about $25-30. Now, they cost around $75-100. A threefold increase in the cost of food, but a tenfold increase in his income.

Sure, the sticker price may go up, but over the long run in a growing economy, wages increase just as fast, if not faster.
Former IBM CEO on why Americans are bad at math
They would probably sound terrible because of the relative low fidelity of lossy mp3s. Reminds me of a commercial where a guy digitizes his vinyl collection while his girlfriend is out of town. It always makes me laugh because she must've gone for a LONG trip if he had the time to encode all of that. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zalRmNEoVE4

Anyway, I think you have a point about not trying to do what everybody else is doing, but I'm not sure targeting dying markets is going to be a winning strategy to achieve that.

Lastly I think the article is pure trash.
They bought "Paul Graham's tears" options. Paul Graham doesn't cry.
In general your start-up should provide stories that people like to talk about.You can use some ideas from
http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2007/07/what-people-tal.html as start point.
I don't think xkcd just jumped the shark...I think it's kinda an ironic commentary on Tim Berners-Lee's comment about "stupid and immature" geek culture.
I hate to say it because i only wish that it was not true, but women seem to question authority a lot less.

Maybe a YC for women would work better to attract female founders.

Another difference I find is that women tend to gather more information before making a decision on something, maybe a YC that was better focused on this would help women cross the gap?
Paul Graham is an 8 foot tall beast-man who showers in grain alcohol and feeds his baby shrimp scampi
I highly recommend reading http://www.madetostick.com/ book.
I have recently quit my job to start a startup. I've chosen to maintain my health insurance plan through CORBA. It costs me about $400/month and can be extended for 18 months. Since I've done all checkups and am generally in good shape, I might consider this as a replacement that could save me $4k over a year.

One thing that is missing though is coverage of catastrophic events. Can anyone suggest a low cost (presumably high deductible) catastrophic insurance ?
Bjarne Stroustrup once tried to look upon Paul Graham, but was driven mad. Thus was born C++.
That looks like a great book. I'm going to check it out the next time I'm at a book store :-) Which seems to be almost daily these days ...
Paul Graham needs no forks to dine with Philosophers.
What happened to the feature requests thread?
I was going to ask for a 'hide' button in the wake of the "pg facts" threads.
"As a producer and creator of content, the Long Tail is basically spelling out my doom."
You're right. I can have all the time I want at Fort Knox.

Anyways, this is part of thinking around the problem.
I know it's off topic but I feel like an idiot now. I posted a link to this a while back: http://micropledge.com/projects/music-mash without knowing that this had already been done by a YC startup. On one hand, I'm really glad to see that someone has done this idea. On the other, I'm upset that it wasn't me.

At the risk of sounding desperate, I often wonder if I will ever get it right!
No, + takes any number of arguments.
I would also recommend reading Buzz Marketing: http://tinyurl.com/3bzxyw
Facebook CEO visits Seattle. Microsoft schemes
Starting a company? Your value could be pretty high...
Valuations for company's raising their first round are at an all-time high since the peak of 2001.
A deep solution is better in my situation than scratching some random itch, since anyone can do the latter. So, to rephrase my question more exactly: what are the deep underlying problems of the web that need the type of strong theory I can learn at university?

In answer to your last set of questions, something that really needs to be made is an aggregation service for all the web 2.0 stuff out there. People want an integrated, secure, and trust based work/socializing platform, and my current research interests are geared towards solving this kind of problem. Facebook is trying to do this, but I don't think they have a good mechanism yet for integrating apps.
Stealing VoIP: "So Easy a Caveman Could Do It"
Markus also had the benefit of a lot of lead time-- he had several years of growth where the spammers hadn't evolved to their current level of effectiveness, and while his site wasn't as big a target, so a lower eradication rate while he developed his solution still wouldn't affect the majority of his user base.

Hot or Not was instantly a huge target, and coming up with a workable solution overnight to a problem of that scale is not easily done, no matter what the headcount.
Paul Graham when quined is Paul Graham when quined.
Leo Strauss would say otherwise. He has a whole book about Aristophane's take on Socrates, highlighting the crucial tension between the philosopher and the rest of society - the reason Socrates was killed. According to Allan Bloom, the whole enlightenment project can be explained as an attempt to solve this problem by displacing religion with philosophy, through science.
"Random itches" sometimes grow to be "deep solutions".

Hotmail was started because 2 guys didn't want to leave an email trail on their employers' systems.

Ebay was a hobby to help a guy sell his girlfriends stuff.

OTOH, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon were intended to be "deep solutions".

Sounds like you have the passion. No substitute for that.
After a few iterations, Rule 30 draws a picture of Paul Graham
Paul Graham can write an essay entirely composed of sweeping generalizations.
Check this out?

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=55556
Check out this thread as well:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=55556
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=60357

As one of the original couple that posted a PG fact, the intent wasn't malicious. Just found it creative, and if anything, good for a little chuckle that originated in the community.

That said, I'm a programmer, and have a background in EE and CS--I see myself as a hacker, though I'm always still learning. And I posted a comment supporting the change from startup news to hacker news, lamenting how I was sick of reading facebook and how to get VC money articles. So I was a little bit surprised by your comment, and made me reflect on my comment.

I think it's very easy to not read your feeds and just rely on hacker news. But then you end up reading what other people think is interesting, and that's a problem if it's not aligned. I agree with rms in this thread. I think if you want it better, you can always submit things you find interesting. That's what I do, and from my list of submissions, you can see it's usually tech things and programming issues.

http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=iamwil

But not everything gets upped that I think is interesting--for example, the Software Radio, and it's something you just shrug your shoulders at.

Of course, in hindsight, one can argue that little slips like this makes it a slippery slope, and pretty soon, we'll get pictures of lolcats fixing computers. That's not an unreasonable argument, considering we have lessons about boiling frogs, and never hire B people that hire C people.

Hacker news is as much my home as it is yours, so all apologies. I'd like to have it tickle my interesting bone everyday. Only serious interesting stuff from now on. >:-|
Thanks my friend - good suggestion ...
The last two comics struck me as being there because there needed to be a strip, rather than because they had something to say. I hope I'm wrong, though.
Do something very unusual.

Build a board of advisors of three year olds and email valleywag. Make firebreathers wear tshirts to show how hot your start up is. Create disposable tattoo which doubles up as an invite code when put under the shower.

Email me for pointers, i love this sort of stuff.
Paul Graham beat Duke Nuke'em Forever on Nightmare mode using only Arc macros.
thanks for modding me down fanboys
Ok, here's a better one:

Chuck Norris wanted to be like Paul Graham, and tried to learn tail recursion. The best he could do was a roundhouse kick.
i'm not sure what you're asking. s-exp's already represent trees:

(html (head (title "hi" ) ) (body (h1 "hello" ) ) )

then (defmacro html ... ) to transform it. so lisp already has the syntax, the parsers, and the generators
A Beloved Professor Delivers The Lecture of a Lifetime
Randy Pausch, a Carnegie Mellon University computer-science professor, was about to give a lecture Tuesday afternoon, but before he said a word, he received a standing ovation from 400 students and colleagues.
Just remember how important the fool is in Shakespeare...
Good stuff sharpshoot!
Paul graham is so good, he multiplies 850 * 77.1 and gets 65,535
Al Gore didn't invent the internet, Paul Graham did. And then he invented Al Gore.
Paul Graham doesn't reset passwords. He decrypts them without a key.
LOL. great stuff