skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I think that's a great description of the process. I would make the point that designing on customer language in OOP is one of those things experienced programmers shy away from. The next paragraph about "What to do, when" is a much better source of OOP design. Just to take the example of account balance, in looking at business-type worries it would probably become clear that transactional integrity is a big deal in this kind of software, so you'd want to clearly separate out queries on the balance and modifications to the balance and restrict access to the functions. These sorts of pressures, along with technical pressures much more clearly describe the design parameters.
You really need to let the visitors know what you are trying to accomplish with the website. After trying all kind of stuff I had to come back here to get a feeling of what you were trying to do.

You need to make it dead clear what the website does if you want to retain any users.
Also, given enough use, this system would output some interesting information about who the highly-thought-of commenters are. (It's like an upvote, but I think data that reflects actual usage of a system is more honest than data that users say reflects their opinion. Think del.icio.us vs. yahoo directory.)

Pretty gameable, too.
Who cares. Startups ultimately exist to make money. How do we get the most of that?
MIT Lecture Browser:  Finds keywords so that students can efficiently review lectures.
skyscanner.net is a pretty useful site. Compares flight prices for nearly everywhere.

http://www.skyscanner.net/
The question of price optimization is easily answered by basic supply/demand curves.

If you're saying that they should charge less just because other photo sites are then you're doing it totally wrong.
Thanks for taking the time to write that, Daniel. I just learned a thing or two reading it.
Amount/whether you can charge correlates closely with value? Unfortunately, often no.
> Unless you can be sure that your target market is Firefox/Safari

Actually this is fantastically easy to measure. Are you kidding? And I think we were talking about opera.
RDDB makes no sense to me. I was at RubyConf when it was announced. Why clone CouchDB in Ruby? Its got none of the awesomeness Erlang brings to the table for things such as this and you can embed Ruby in CouchDB with less work than Anthony did building RDDB in the first place.
Windows Support Issue: Computer Randomly Plays Classical Music
Yeah, I find it ridiculous that MYOB and Peachtree are the best small business apps out there, because they're horrific monstrosities.

Please make awesome small business software!
Media Temple Grid Review- One Year and Counting
I'm curious as to what made Delphi "legacy code" and why it needs replacing? Also, doesn't Delphi 2007 allow targeting to .NET? See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borland_Delphi

Be sure you aren't doing this rewrite for the wrong reasons.
So that the other users don't have to be on the VPN, only the firewalled ones.
This is amazingly cool and showcases the power of the web and the spirit of mashups. Only an open platform allows stuff like this. Thanks!
I haven't played with it enough to evaluate it on functionality, but as-is, it's not pretty enough to get popular. It's sad that aesthetics matter so much for a purely functional tool, but that's just how things are.
Has TechCrunch jumped the shark? They're profiling a website that sells videos of fireplace logs (yes, really)
Facebook Privacy Issue Won't Die
TechCrunch40 Presenters' Traffic Two Months In
iHound: Lowjack For Your USB Devices
Zoho Seeks to Replace, Not Embrace, Microsoft Office
The Unintended Consequences of OLPC
Data portability and thinking ahead to 2008
I'm Michael Nielsen (the first author). I'm very glad you liked our book! A little correction: my co-author is Ike Chuang.

(I'm not grepping my name. I've taken an extended, possibly permanent, break from quantum computing, and will likely start a web-based company or foundation. YC News is a great resource, which I check regularly.)
How to Always Remember People's Names
What's my name - naming your product, business or domain
This is definitely a worthwhile skill to develop. People don't like it when you forget their names, even when they themselves admit to being bad with names.
This falls into a class of technologies which can be described thus: It would be awesome if it worked but probably won't.

On 15 search queries which I regularly perform on Google Scholar (e.g. QED, fMRI, Feynman, Jeff Hawkins etc.) I got zero useful results. The one hit on Feynman for example was a false positive.

While I really enjoyed their UI and watching the transcript follow along with the speech (play a video to see this happen) the accuracy was so low on all the key concept terms that I can't imagine how it would be useful at this level.
Hopefully the superior screen technology of the OLPC will start trickling down to other consumer devices. The specs on the black and white OLPC screen are better than the kindle.
Even so, you can't argue that the growth is exponential by simply looking at the graph. It could just as well be polynomial. To conclude that it is exponential you need some kind of analysis, like "every user brings two, those bring two each etc".
An audio recaptcha should fix that.
I disagree. I still don't think any app that's been created really takes advantage of the Facebook platform. The toy applications are the easiest and most obvious ones to create. The real ones will come later, particularly when they start issuing fbFund grants...
I'm really hoping our fantasy sports site will be popular in the Sombrero Galaxy.
You are a bad leader when...
I'm surprised that no one mentions newspapers and magazines. These seem like the obvious win for the Kindle. No more dirty, bulky newspapers to carry around or dispose of. There is no DRM issue since the content has a one day shelf life. And the payback from a potentially lower subscription cost could justify the cost of the Kindle. As with books, it is obviously nice for commuters.
The guy who's responsible for marketing the iPhone and the iPod
Yeah, as far as I'm concerned, the OLPC XO is a far better device than the Kindle.

Sure it doesn't have "free" EV-DO for buying ebooks from Amazon, but it runs Linux so you can use any ebook format you want (without paying Amazon). Plus full web browsing and other (basic) desktop apps that you would expect from a low end laptop.

...For the same price as a Kindle (including a donation of a laptop to a child in a developing nation)
I noticed at some point in college that remembering the name of a girl you meet at a party is the number one thing you can do to impress her. More important than being good looking, witty, well dressed, etc.
I found this game more fun:
http://weboggle.shackworks.com/
There are tons of startups in NYC. Try going to NextNY ( http://www.nextny.org/wiki/ ) or the New Tech Meetup ( http://newtech.meetup.com/1/ ). You'll meet people in the community fast. You can start by going to Matchup Camp tomorrow night: http://www.nextny.org/wiki/show/MatchupCamp
The Complete MIT AI Lab Memo Archive
i loved that episode!
Finally an Office-killer that doesn't leave you at the mercy of the internet
Haskell vs. Erlang, Reloaded
Google Plans Service to Store Users' Data
CNet rates Vista one of "worst products in history"
Nick Carr: The Google Enigma
Even if they're not posting ads for interns doesn't mean they won't take one. I was in the exact same position last summer, so I emailed this one startup asking if I could intern there. It was a completely out of the blue request, but the fact that I took the initiative to write to them and showed an interest in their product/company obviously struck a chord because they offered me a paid position.

As the saying goes, it never hurts to ask.

Good luck.

Edit: I should mention that I did have to rellocate to Seattle for a few months to work there, but it was a nice break from the D.C. Area--Seattle's an awesome city.
Facebook under fire for retaining user data after account deletion
I registered for this?! Carr has better stuff on his blog.
People should link to their analogous lists of favorites in the comments here. That would be cool. Aggregating them into statistics is where it becomes gameable, but just having those links raw creates an ad hoc and transparent trust network.
I would think most startups would be happy to hire interns... they are paid less than full-time employees and aren't necessarily less productive.
I think you can make the case he jumped the shark long ago:

http://cache.valleywag.com/assets/resources/2006/08/satire-i...
Amazon's "Director of Kindle" has no problems with Kindle hacking
"all devices can be hacked. That's something people can do."<p>APIs for software developers..." an important future direction for us."
two things are true about humanty: if it can be tried it will be tried by someone somewhere, and, if it gets you laid it will be tried
In Critique of Git
Have you ever had a function with a longer name than that?
rm -rf :-/ :-\ :-(
Inside Galcon: Python, Game Development and Artificial Intelligence
WTF: Adobe Reader 8
Dilbert: We are going to try something called Agile Programming...
How to Break Anonymity of the Net&#64258;ix Prize Dataset (PDF)
GDrive: The Platypus Awakes; Maybe
Productivity, Team Size and the Blub Paradox
Ruby blocks gotchas
In Search of a Better Build System
MoveOn to Facebook: We caught you red-handed
Astronomers Find Enormous Hole in the Universe
For the same price as a Kindle

I have the sudden urge to put things into perspective: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_64

each C64 had an estimated production cost of only $135

I just have a really hard time being impressed by any of this. Maybe I'm too cynical, but it seems like they're aiming too low.
Screenshots And Details On Upcoming MySpace "News Feeds"
Universal Music CEO Doug Morris Speaks: Recording Industry in Even Deeper Sh*t Than We Thought
RIAA Must Divulge Expenses-Per-Download
It isn't. Neither is "things I like" and "things I dislike".
What's the deal with the second chart showing the search term 'Classmates' vs a bunch of computer related terms. Surely nothing can be determined from that chart given that classmate means something to non-nerds.
That comparison with the C64 is not adjusted for inflation and changes in consumer purchasing power. Besides, the US dollar is weak and getting weaker. As time goes on, it'll get even more affordable by developing nations.

I thought that the XO was a neat piece of hardware, something that would be cool to have but is not world-shaking, disruptive technology. About a month ago, I actually went onto their site to look at how the software was put together with the hardware. I then extrapolated what that would do to young impressionable minds.

And yeah, the OLPC XO is disruptive technology disguised as an educational tool. It was designed to be used by a group and not an individual. It is the kind of device you would give to a group of US kids to give them an educational edge, and it was originally intended to be exclusively distributed to developing nations.

If the device ever reaches the tipping point, there will be a generation of kids who thinks us adults are crazy to be using our current software setup, much the same way the Facebook generation thinks email users are nuts ... or how we laugh at the IBM execs who thought that the PC is a really smart mainframe terminal.

It is something that when I have kids, I will follow the genetic imperative to pass advantageous traits and buy/import/smuggle whatever latest model in order to give them at age 7, as a rite-of-passage gift.
Google seems to have broken remote pagerank checkers...
These haven't worked for a while now. Any substitutes?
Remember, $400 is the cost of two XOs. So really it's more like half the price of a Kindle.

Plus as qaexl noted, you're not taking into account inflation, etc.

And I do think the Kindle is overpriced.
Just how many sheep are out there???
Yeah nice game. Might code up a plugin of that :) thanks.
Wall Street Journal on the OLPC (3000 words)
Facebook is what - a few years old? really only a year in mainstream awareness? yet it has this evil empire feel about it already. Took decades for that and Microsoft. Gives me a new found admiration for googles under-appreciated "don't be evil" ethos.
BASHing Through Scripts - Introduction
Intel is more successful than OLPC so far, measured in numbers of sales. The competition was bitter. Intel recently donated millions of dollars to OLPC, joined the board, and the companies signed a "non-disparagement" clause. The next version of the OLPC will use an Intel processor instead of an AMD processor.
Or maybe you can aggregate the short-lists and generate a report in a few weeks that showcases the most tracked users.
You may 'think' you have deleted your account, but if you sign up again it will reappear just the way you left it - you can never really leave!
It would be nice to have a way of adding friends inside news.ycombinator.com. This site has to turn into a social network eventually...
Successful Business Planning and Execution
Over 50 tips from industry experts to help you take business planning off the back burner and make the plan a meaningful part of your business.
This is no the case with filevault, when it is set up with a login account. I have lost encrypted disk images under OS X due to drive problems... but have had a filevault make it thru a failing disk without trouble.

It helps that the Mac has HFS+ and Journaling.
Actually, all versions of filevault have done this.
Just let it clean up when you log out....
Email's Friendly Fire
Sure. I should have made it clearer. This isn't something I'd show users, just some early toys I made.
sounds cool but I play plenty of games and have hardware and software firewalls and never have problems with ports? By the sounds of it the users of your game would know how do operate a firewall. Just out of interest what percentage of your users asked for this?
cool hack, but I like to read everyones comments
How do you prevent factions from taking control of a community-driven site?
Hey folks, we've built a "poll the world" type site, and it's starting to get some traction.

Along with growth comes the inevitable community challenges which seem to occupy more and more time.

Polls are voted up by the community, and instead of a down button we have a "mark as inappropriate" to help monitor for abuse. Some folks have started to use that link to try to get rid of polls they don't agree with.

I'm a fan of PG's "Things you can't say" premise (http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html), and I'd love to try to guide the site in that direction.

The ideal would be that abusive questions are modded down, but "questions you don't like" aren't. It doesn't mean they'll be voted up and become popular enough to run, but it means they won't be squashed either.

I guess one option would be to remove the "mark as inappropriate" completely, and/or have trusted community members able to remove questions if needed.

Thoughts? Any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks!
Time for a little 'Hotel California'
Valleywag on the diversification of online video (legitimate article)
Most dedicated server companies will let you buy additional ips for $.25/month, or similar. I took them up on it.
This isn't an easy problem. One thing you could do is mod the moderators. Have each persons vote count a certain amount. People who report true spam you bump up, and people who are abusive get bumped down, perhaps to the point where their opinion doesn't matter. Then require a minimum threshold before you have to deal with it. Also have this ranked against the up votes and popularity.

On imageboard.net we have it setup so more than one person has to mod something down to hide it. It still doesn't work that great, but it's better than nothing.
That's what openvpn is for.

Basically, it deals with the NAT-traversal elements for me, once I've twisted it's arm into doing so.. It works, if I recall correctly, using the UDP trick to keep a port open by sending traffic to a host repeatedly.

The nice part about the hack that I'm using is that I don't need to deal with the specifics of the UDP punching, or how often to poll, etc.. I can use industry tested and standard software for that.

Think of it this way-

Have you ever worked at a large corporation, that has a VPN? Once connected to that VPN, you could access all the servers internally, and they could access you, right?

We're basically creating a VPN, and giving everyone an internal IP address.. And then using linux, iptables, and NATing to map all those internal ip addresses to external ones.
Sadly, a very, very large number. While Cx users are technically inclined, there's a surprising number of casual players who may not have the technical acumen to forward ports, even with an illustrated guide.

We've had several users quit because they can't/won't configure their firewalls, so we needed an automatic solution.

upnp just isn't reliable- It fails in > 60% cases, according to some case study I can't find at the moment.

Hamachi won't work for the reasons above. Too Expensive, and requires both parties to have the VPN installed.

Our only solution was to roll our own.
Your assessment of the tech is correct, but I don't think your assessment of the user-behavior is..

Keep in mind, this is for a full-screen game, and you can't really play the game and do other things. (This is one of many reasons why we're re-writing it to be web-based)

I think that when it comes to behavior on this subject, there are really two types of users..

The users who are bittorrent downloading, streaming media and other things where cutting out the internet connection would matter.. And the others, who just want to do some homework, then play a game for a while.

For the people who just want to play for a while, having the rest of their internet cut out won't be a major issue.. If they're playing the game, they can't browse the web, or use AIM, but since it's full-screen, they wouldn't be able to do those things anyway.

For the other folk, who use their connection heavily downloading torrents (legally), and listening to streaming radio- They're far more likely to be technically savvy enough to forward the ports necessary to make the game work, and wouldn't require any sort of VPN at all.
Eventlet: a networking library written in Python
High-Performance JavaScript: Everything you've been taught is wrong
From the top of my head, look at:

1. Fog Creek's Co-pilot: Joel wrote about something similar

2. Skype: How skype connects calls even in the presence of firewalls
Anyone tried the ClearContext product mentioned in this article?
Execution?

More seriously, though, have you considered:

http://www.advogato.org/trust-metric.html

and

http://savingtheinternetwithhate.com/

Advanced thinking.
I had to use Griffith's book, and he certainly didn't follow the historical approach. He writes out Schrodinger's equation on the first page, before moving on to "simple" examples (the infinite well). The hydrogen atom is covered after a 100 pages or so.

http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Quantum-Mechanics-David-G...

I love Griffith's informal style, and I'd recommend the book. Familiarity with PDEs and harmonic oscillation would be the only necessary prerequisites I can think of.
Stay home and go as far in life as those you know at home or go somewhere new and in short order it is YOUR HOME and go as far in life as your new circle of acquaintances and chances are much better if your new circle is in SILICON VALLEY.
Facebook: Whose idea was it?
Where the heck is NerdTV season 2?
Depressurize the priorities
How to Name a Name
Widgets make a big splash on the Net
New York Manhole Covers, Forged Barefoot in India
Your site is: http://www.ask500people.com/ ? Don't be shy about a link, it looks like quite a cool site.

Something to consider is what these people are trying to express with their use of the 'mark as inappropriate' and how you can incorporate that. I think reddit proves that you cannot simply tell people how or why to vote a certain way - you can only try and set up systems where the consequence of voting matches what you're trying to do. Are these people trying to filter out a certain kind of poll? Are they signaling a breach of etiquette?

Maybe you could leave 'mark as inappropriate' and simply have it count and display the number of marks, and leave it entirely up to human editors to decide whether to keep polls or not. Ultimately when people are trying to express something they really just want to be heard.
myyoung8: I agree, I have no problem emailing, cold calling, or even just showing up to ask. When I was in high school I really wanted to work at a snowboard shop and I just went often enough and talked to the owner enough that he hired me even though I was 3 or 4 years younger than all the other employees, I just can't FIND the companies to do that. Thanks for the tips bokonist I'll check those out.
Yahoo's Monday Meltdown
Java/JSP + Ruby/Rails in a single webapp with JRuby
It's not quite what you asked, but Teresa Nielsen Hayden has written an excellent essay, "Some things I know about moderating conversations in virtual space", at http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/006036.html#00...

Some of the ideas in that essay may be useful to you. Her point 11 is particularly worth pondering:

"11. You can't automate intelligence. In theory, systems like Slashdot's ought to work better than they do. Maintaining a conversation is a task for human beings."

Interestingly enough, Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia, has made essentially the same comment. He went so far as to describe himself as "battling programmers" who want to automate various aspects of Wikipedia's community.
Facebook Friends vs. Second Life Islands - they are similar
Good posting comparing the two
Clay Shirky: "A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy"

http://shirky.com/writings/group_enemy.html
I find it really surprising some people don't use the apps they are developing. If you're not using it day in day out heavily, how can you know what's likely to irritate users.

Use the app all the time, if it's slow or buggy you'll soon get irritated by it enough to fix it :)

As a developer you should be one of the biggest users IMHO
The Top 20 Ways to Come Up With Amazing Ideas
Jimmy Wales on The Future of Web 2.0 and His Tips for Entrepreneurs
Why Design Matters, Too
It's like if you were suddenly asked to operate on your dog to remove his kidney.
One thing you can do, is to announce that any inappropriate use of 'mark as inappropriate' results in an automatic 1 year ban of usage of the feature. And then follow up on that. It should keep manual sorting through misuse down to a manageable task, and the threat itself might stop people.

Then again, it might just generate whines and asshats that create multiple accounts.
lol, a site about high performance is down. The irony.

Thanks, but I think I'll stick with everything I've been taught.
I hate the loading time between slides.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpraJYnbVtE
Verizon Wireless to open up network
Burning Of The Boats
I haven't investigated yet, but I've got a cron job that fires off once a week, in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, and it googles for a certain term, and requests the first N pages of results, and sees where a particular web page is in the ranking.

...and this morning, that cron job timed out.

There may be something to this.
The only way this would be an issue is if "mark as inappropriate" was not editor reviewed. You can add in a message that states that an editor will look at the claim before taking action and then you can set the submission appropriate yourself.
Federalist Paper #10 might be a good starting point:

http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/7.htm