skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
VCs like to take risk, but risk at the investment level of potentially millions is a lot harder to leverage or hedge when you only have 2 options. Invest or don't invest.

Big players in the stock market, hedge funds, banks etc have the ability to hedge and leverage risk with different processes such as short selling and many other tactics.

A VC will think like an investment bank but have limited potential to save themselves in a moment of bad judegement.

School yard mentality too, once its clear everyone is getting involved, due diligence shows that there is some sort of hype building then they follow - it takes a lot to be the first especially in a playground of Silicon Valley and startups.

(I have never dealt with any form of VC therefore this is my judgement and idea going from the mass amount of reading I've done)
Here's the thing, if you're taking medical advice from someone who isn't a practising doctor, you're probably an idiot. All those natural herbs and old wives tale remedies? Scientists actually have checked those and turned them into actual medicines where they worked. Everything else is a load of crap.
The number of children between 0-20 has been rather steady for the last decade or two, the only reason the world population is growing is that the average age is increasing, not that an ever increasing amount of children are being born.

Eventually the population will stabilize by itself and possibly also start decreasing as the countries that have the largest population growth continue toward full industrialization and modern ways of living.
Yourself. (OK, don't really, but c'mon...)

Personally, I'd try giving away education and birth control first.
GPL vs BSD, a matter of sustainability
Or simply inhaling water, of course.

Chemophobia is about nothing more than familiarity. What we are familiar with we accept and are comfortable with, what we are unfamiliar with we are more likely to be afraid of. News organizations play this up all the time, because playing on fear of the unusual is an easy way to gain ratings (especially in a modern world where anything unusual that happens anywhere on Earth can be fodder for a local news broadcast).

For example, imagine you hear a story of someone having died in an arson fire, the news will probably have little impact on you, you may not even feel anything other than a small degree of sadness. Now imagine that you hear another news story, except this one is about how someone tampered with someone else's toothpaste and snuck in eggs of a parasite which then hatched and grew in the victim's intestines for a day and eventually led to the death of the victim. You'd almost certainly pay attention to that story, and you'd probably have strong feelings about it too. And you'd also likely feel a little wary whenever you brushed your teeth or bought toothpaste. You'd almost certainly never feel wary or in fear of arson while living in your apartment though, and you probably wouldn't think about how horrible dying from fire could be. However, in the US the risk of dying from arson is far, far higher than dying from intestinal worms. However, in some parts of the world the latter would be far more common and familiar.

Just because something is common and familiar doesn't mean it's safe, and the inverse is true as well.
Interesting, very interesting, maybe we will be able to steer copyright back toward its original purpose ( block plagiarism )

Copyright purpose was not preventing people from getting your work for free, it was to prevent them to pay for your work to someone you did not authorized, like some crazy publishers of 16th century that would happily sell copies of books, even books not complete yet, without paying authors.
>> isn't limited to hiding their identities or living in another country

> Cause, you know, it's so hard to sign up for an account on a website in another country over the Internet. A good point you got there. Sounds nothing like FUD.

Please don't do that. Your snark is not constructive, doesn't help the discussion and reduces the signal-to-noise ratio.

If you reread jschuur's sentence with the parts you left out of your quote you will see that he is referring to the owners of the site not having to live in another country. There have been a few cases of prosecuted owners and admins of similar sites in UK and US recently.
Music to hack to
Maybe he did, only our reservation of what he did prevents us to recognize that.
As a Finn, I'm thankful for Mercator's contribution to improving Finnish self-esteem. It's an insignificant corner of Europe with less people than most Chinese cities nobody has ever heard of, but at least it looks big on the map!
Hans Rosling seems to think we'll top out at 10 billion.

http://youtu.be/fTznEIZRkLg

and the main mechanism is, counter-intuitively, reducing child mortality in the poorest areas.
... And blocking out 1% of the available energy from the sun seems like a poor choice, if the answer is efficiency.
Ask HN: Good leaver equity - problem for investors?
I co-founded a startup with 3 other co-founders. One of them will be leaving the company - as we have vesting, he still owns about 12% of the company.

cap table before leaving:

manager1: 24%
manager2: 24%
manager3: 24% -> is leaving and vest to 12%
manager4: 15%
Investor1:10%
investor2: 3%

Our CFO said there would be no chance to get into the next financing round (VC for example) if he would take the full 12% and we would have to cut it down to 5%. The leaving co-founder doesn't see a problem.

Is it really a problem for Investors/VCs?
Why?
Would they rather not invest?
Should we stop contacting VCs till we got this issue sorted out? (We are running out of money in 3 months)

Your kind help is appreciated!

links/books/contacts/literature appreciated
Or you could just, you know, check the list.

From the pictures it looks like all the good consoles are in there, Playstations, Dreamcast, the Nintendos, Atari, plus handhelds. Then it seems there are a bunch of special edition consoles.

As for games, I keep on seeing great games in there, including recent ones and old classics. Many are obviously imported and that's fairly expensive with the current Yen/Dollar exchange rate. Here's a picture of what appears to my eyes to be nearly every Zelda game: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/713/517ie.jpg/ Every Mario game: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/441/513ku.jpg/ and OH DEAR LORD it's the "Mother" series: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/525/506p.jpg/

Let me tell you about "Mother". You have to sell your kidneys to get those games. They're some of the best games ever written and they're also some of the hardest to find.

Update: Now that I have looked at the actual list I see it contains some other incredible pieces, such as a sealed copy of Chrono Trigger (in 2008 one such copy sold for $1,217), Bubble Bobble part 2 (at least $100), Sonic the Hedgehog ($300+), Suikoden II ($140+), Virtual Lab ($900+), SD Gundam Dimension Wars ($700+), Jack Bros. ($120+), sealed Ibara ($180+), ...

Update 2: That sealed copy of Chrono Trigger is for the DS, sorry. But Virtual Lab looks legit.
Are there any plans to support external authentication/authorization methods?
> Wait... wasn't this basically the plan they came up with in The Matrix? ... I don't recall that working out too good...

Please tell me that you are not relying on The Matrix as a serious resource for ... well ... anything.
Twitter Place Finder - Monitor tweets nearby
Not a bad idea, but maybe we should also educate the people living in the wealthiest nations to consume less and have more sustainable life styles? 80 percent of the world's natural resources are spent by the wealthiest 16 percent after all: http://articles.cnn.com/1999-10-12/us/9910_12_population.cos...

We could start by working less: http://www.neweconomics.org/publications/21-hours
Poor conspiracy theorists. They already have so many problems with chemtrails, and now somebody proposes this?
So this will also reduce the amount of power harvested by the sun panels? Therefore increasing the "green energy" costs?
Probabilistic programming and Bayesian methods for hackers (Python)
Only way to prevent the doom and gloom is to stop fighting it.
Great stuff. Thanks so much.
Absolutely beautiful... really nice stuff. Would love to have something like this of our (companies) network, as present for our it-staff. ;-)
Why do all VC's need to be leaders?

I think some do, but remembering this 3min talk by Derek Sivers http://www.ted.com/talks/derek_sivers_how_to_start_a_movemen... about leaders and followers, we need more followers than leaders. Once a lead investor is established, bring on the followers, startups need traction with investors too of which not everyone can be there first.

The question becomes which investors are known leaders and which ones are followers.
Here's what bugs me about the whole story.

The Headline:

(Meet the Man with) A Cheap and Easy Plan to Stop Global Warming

Key point made by David Keith:

“I’m not saying it will work, and I’m not saying we
should do it.” But “it would be reckless not to begin
serious research on it,” he adds. “The sooner we find
out whether it works or not, the better.”

And people wonder why I am so ungenerous in my assessment of journalists and editors.
> I think he is over reacting to the damage Windows 8 will do to his business.

He's not worried about everyone buying Windows 8, he's worried about no one buying it:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/other/display/20130204235238_Gl...

Windows 8 isn't an existential threat to Valve because there are some UI tweaks, it's a threat because Valve is tethered to Microsoft, and for some, Windows 8 has not inspired much confidence.
No login? That means I have to personalize it everytime I use it on a different laptop?

Btw, I wish there was a google chrome extension for this as well.
Murphy's law applies. If there is a way to do it wrong, people will do it wrong. There's a reason SQL injection remains in the OWASP Top Ten. I disagree that it is a solved problem.

The design of O is in part based on my experience using Zend Framework on large projects. I've learned that the only way to get people to write good code is not to educate them on the right way, but to make the right way the default / easy / lazy way. That's the issue with PHP as-is. It's possible to write good code in it, but it is decidedly not the default.

But, I see now that I will first ship what's in O already in a way that is reusable on other projects, mostly because I want to start mixing it with my own production code as well. After that I'll circle back to PDO.
The most logical thing would be to work your way down this list:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dio...
In OS X you type alt e (to get the acute accent ´) and then e. é.
> A tablet is nothing like as portable as a smartphone

A lot of people would disagree with you, perhaps most people. A tablet actually is VERY similar to a large portable smartphone - it doesn't fit in your pants pocket, but it does fit in almost any other purse.

In fact, Samsung makes an extremely popular device - the Samsung Note, which is halfway between a phone and a tablet. Do play with one. "nothing like" is a strong statement that I believe has no support in reality.

> So obviously nobody will ever buy a tablet. QED.

The logic that leads to that is flawed, even if one does accept the (wrong, IMHO) premise that a tablet is nothing like as portable as a smartphone.

And my answer to "are there any people ..." is simply "we'll soon see". I don't claim to know a definite answer -- unlike, e.g. Ballmer in response to the iPhone and iPad.
Also interesting email conversation on timing in investment between Paul Graham and Fred Wilson. Not so simple.. http://www.paulgraham.com/airbnb.html
I hope I'm not in the minority here -- plans like this terrify me. I'm currently a scientist by trade, and experience has taught me that while we have a mediocre grasp of very finely tuned experiments, to be frank, we don't know shit about predicting the chaos and unintended consequences of our actions within the complexity of the natural world. When dealing with nature, it's never as simple as do A to get B and that's it.

There's some slim chance this guy's plan could work, but I am pretty confident it is infinitely more likely to either do nothing or do something really awful.
Yes, and considering that Google Maps can use WebGL with vector graphics, it would be seamless.
Do people actually use Parental Controls? Why?
I have always thought it would be interesting to see what affect painting all the roof's of all the buildings on earth white would have on global warming. I doubt there is enough buildings in the world for it have any affect though.
If there is one youtube video this reminds me off then Yakko from Animaniacs singing the world's countries song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x88Z5txBc7w
Here, take some, ol' chap.
Sorry about that! And thanks for your feedback! Good point. I will look into implementing logins.
"Where you and he differ is that he advocates the use of compounds that seem to work, but whose mechanism of action we don't fully comprehend -- whereas you appear to take a more cautious view of said compounds."

I certainly advocate the use of things for which there is evidence that they work, even if we have no idea how. I'm just very cautious about hailing these things without investigation, or elevating the natural above the artificial (whatever that means) because of some vague belief in plant synergy.

I like the aspirin example here - aspirin can be produced from salicin in willow bark. Willow bark itself can be used in much the same way, but contains tannins that can damage liver and kidneys over time.

So I think we absolutely should use and investigate 'natural' remedies that seem to work, but we should never assume that they're better or that we can't do better.
> How do you feel about vaccines? Anti-biotics?

Both extensively tested, although antibiotics are interesting because they created drug-resistant strains. Which shows that it is rational to be on the lookout for unexpected bad effects of new things in general.

> Why is fear justified? Isn't the appropriate response reason and critical thinking?

Never stated it's one or the other. Fear of ill effects is what makes us do the whole critical evaluation, which is good.

> You're just trying to justify your fear of the unfamiliar.

I'm afraid you have read from my comments something that wasn't there at all. "Fear until reasonably tested" = rational. "Fear that makes one ignore all evidence" = obviously irrational.

> Do you think that the people who discovered tea, beer, tomatoes, and cheese thought that way?

They took the risk and won - good for us. I'm just against calling their fellow tribesmen (or countrymen) irrational, especially those who already knew about death caps & similar.
I cheated at 8/15.

Viewed source and got all rest of countries names.
The total value might not be that much, but I believe that the fact that they are "together", the collection as a whole should be worth around that money (efforts for collecting, etc).
Cleaning The Carpeting In the Office Is Important | Sprint Storm
I mastered PHP, Python, JavaScript, Java.

exelib: Master of PHP, Python, JavaScript, Java.

That has a nice ring to it.
Also, the math required to convert lat/lon to web Mercator is fairly light and not resource intensive.
Is useful, and yes when something don't go in your code can be very frustrating... but not more than other languages. It is frustrating its own complex ways.

The documentation, for example. Often very abstract.
Not to forget, the dificulty of the subjacent statistics for a lot of people. Some good Books can help with this.

The wow factor of R is very hight in any case. There is a lot of things currently that I can do only with R, thus... keep hammering _and_ take a look to as many R code as you can
Springboarder
Springboarder is a collection of interviews about people’s home screens and what apps they use on their smartphones for leisure and to get things done.
Good luck and everything, but don't you think calling a jobs board "3 beards" and calling the email update "the 'stache" is problematic in a country with strict anti-discrimination law?
The complaints about the parental controls options suggested are stupid. That's the Ubuntu wiki.
I'll try that tonight when I have access to my Mac (remote-debugging with dev tools).

Until then, I can tell you approximately that the DNS shakeup takes 5 seconds, the server/CDN shakeup takes 1 more and the loading/painting is near-instantaneous.

Will post solid numbers tonight.
Will we ever… simulate the human brain?
Acidification (the state of something becoming acidic) occurs when the pH drops below 7.0 and thus the ratio of hydrogen ions to hydroxyl ions > 1. This has never occurred and we are nowhere near that situation. pH (it's a log scale) of the oceans is roughly around 7.7 to 8.4. This is not to debate future trends!
I disagree. I've used Matlab for 4 years and switched to Numpy/Scipy 2 years ago -- so I understand the array paradigm part. The problem with R is the inconsistency and verbosity in syntax and semantics of the array language underlying it -- as other comments have pointed out.

Some differences in ease of use:

[1] Construct a matrix

MATLAB: y = [1 1; 2 2; 6 6];

R: y <- matrix(c(1, 2, 6, 1, 2, 6), 3)

[2] Insert a new row r = [3 3];

MATLAB: x = [y; r];

R: x <- rbind(y, c(r));

Which is intuitive and concise? ;)
What's this? What's this? There's something very wrong
The Most Embarrassing Graph in Modern Physics
I have, and continue to - it sucks. If I want to do any work that requires deep thinking or focus I have to work from home.
The great hardware support is indeed provided by the kernel, but out of the box it's nowhere near pain-free. In particular when you have to setup your wireless or video drivers. Sadly, these two still often require binary drivers and picking from several options. One specific example (mentioned in the OP as well) is with the wireless drivers - there usually are at least two options that provide some support and usually one of them is better. I've had to configure some Broadcom WiFi support and there are three different solutions - ndiswrapper, binary blob provided by Broadcom and the driver in the kernel. Picking one of the three is a time consuming and complicated process on other distros and nowhere near easy and accessible to new users.

Ubuntu on the other hand, with their driver manager, picked the correct driver, downloaded the required bits and pieces, and configured them all without needing to do anything else. The same can be said for eg. NVidia support.

This in my book is a clear win for Ubuntu.
I'm not sure that encouraging users to download another browser to try the page in would (a) encourage many bug reports (b) be a great idea for user retention.
Invitation to Dribbble
Guys, who can invite to http://dribbble.com/? We want to play a game :) Or advice whom to ask.

My Dribbble URL: http://dribbble.com/citizenblr
Our team: http://weavora.com
Couldn't the same be said for many worth-wild things? Didn't people say the Large Hadron Collider would cause a black hole?
You can't just chop off the page file. Disabling it entirely or reducing it significantly can and will affect system performance.
Cheaper solution:

- Make people ride bicicles.

- Reduce work hours to 4 / day.

- Make it expensive to buy gas. So people ride bikes and so that Electric vehicles that are charged by solar panels increase.

- People will be fitter, happier, more producive and more imaginative and with free time to plant trees also.
Welcome to 2013 and the sound and fury of insta-activism. Welcome also to 2012 (KONY) and 2011 (Occupy). Am I missing anything?
> Consistency within a code base is much more important than which style is used exactly.

I know this is a commonly held belief, and I held it too for a short while. But then, I was managing a project that ran on both Linux (lower_case_name libraries), Windows (CapitalizeEachWord), had components in Python (ClassesAreLikeThis but variables_like_this), Java (camelCaseIsAnAbomination) and even some VB6 (don't even remember the convention).

Utterly inconsistent. And it didn't make any difference to readability or maintainability, once people accepted that there actually is no single standard we can use.

In my opinion, it's one of these things like, e.g. significant whitespace or C brace style, that people believe make a difference because they have an example - in which the difference is often not attributable to the feature being discussed.
You're wrong. Ed Bott has a track record of being very accurate with the facts.

You are, of course, welcome to produce some bulletproof factual examples (since you have just shown your opinions are not worth anything) to prove otherwise.
I wonder if more bright engineers would actually solve SV's labor problem? Startups are like lotteries and engineers are their customers. A certain percentage of engineers are going to want to start their own lotteries rather than play someone else's. Increasing the number of engineers won't change that percentage. Currently, these "lotteries" don't have a great payout and unsurprisingly, they have a difficult time finding "customers".

Currently these "lotteries" are unwilling or unable to increase their payouts. Unless you can create a glut of customers/engineers that are somehow constrained from starting their own lotteries, I don't see why the lack of engineers willing to work at startups would change.

It's a little like complaining that "we can't find interns willing to work for free" when the interns have better alternatives.
> the fact that people without any scientific background have safely taken and studied natural products without modern science; namely by studying themselves; in India and China there were masters at this sort of art

Yes, because that explains why rhino horn is so great... For every traditional medicine that has value, there are a dozen that are complete quackery and to ignore those is to fall victim to confirmation bias. Still, I liked your overall points, but they can be taken too far. The FDA is certainly a good thing, albeit flawed.
So what do you call a downward trend in pH, when the pH starts above 7? And if there is a downward trend, what makes you think it would stop on its own at 7?
>the thief here in Brazil that broke his leg after his victim roof gave away, sued the owner of the house, and won.

Source?
It has been suggested (by people smarter than me) that lighter surfaces have the effect of reducing cloud cover, which allows for more sunlight to reach the ground which suggests it would only exacerbate the problem.

Some suggest using solar panels instead, which comes with many of the same benefits as painting roofs white, but absorbs the light as opposed to reflecting it, and thus wont reduce cloud cover.

Im not a scientist, just a casual observer, but my gut feeling is that the only way to halt or even reverse climate change is to stop producing as much carbon. Any other approach is more likely to come with unforeseen problems.

So get to it! Pop down to your local Tesla showroom and do your bit.
Shakespeare was a victim of this. People would sell copies of his plays and he would get nothing.
But we knew that already when the 4S came out instead of a revolutionary new phone. It's just sad that Apple has continued this course.
Exactly.

Acknowledgement of authorship and perhaps some very limited temporal monopoly on commercial use only, perhaps 10 or 15 years since publication.

That's the difference between encouraging creativity and protecting parasitical monopolies like that of paywalls' owners.
It's a huge turnoff.
90% of Tech Startups Fail [Infographic]