skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Umm, its exactly what its about.

He's complaining that "the big evil internet" is killing their business, because more people are consuming more media.

Yet however, the actual data shows that ticket sales in cinema are actually going up, but not at the same rate of consumption of those films. The people that had no intention of paying top shelf price for those films are not.

Yet the budgets for films have gone way up so that these studio's can compete with each other. Yet, the growth of ticket sales hasn't grown at the same rate (while rentals have stayed fairly static, just the distribution channels have changed somewhat) - so their profit margins have become less.

So he's complaining that the people who had no intention of paying to see those films, are not paying to see those films and because they've chosen to raise the budgets of those films significantly, its killing their business.

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

Films like Titanic and Waterworld were notoriously expensive for their time. Now that's considered nearly an average budget for a blockbuster - inflation sure as hell hasn't gone up by that much, and costs of actual production have gone down with going to digital media, digital editing etc....

What they really need to focus on, is less extravagant budgets. Take a leaf out of the book of TV.

Lost, which is a notoriously expensive TV show to produce, cost $44 million dollars for the first season which consisted of 25 episodes at 44 minutes running time each... or roughly 0.04 million dollars per minute of entertainment for the end viewer.

Similarly, lets look at Spiderman 3.. Sony Pictures most expensive film, $258 million dollars cost with a running time of 139 minutes, or 1.86 million dollars per minute of entertainment for the end viewer.

See the big divide there? It's really a function of cost of production.
Why can't it be both? Youth and inexperience may not necessarily mean attempting the impossible, like menloparkbum suggested, but certainly being youthful means having a better grasp on what's going on. So it's right to attribute part of his success to youth: he made a product that appeals to the youthful market.

Similarly, youth is a good reason to think that Foursquare could be a threat. The people making Foursquare have already created a successful product in this market. They spent a few years working for a powerful company that didn't understand their ideas. So they're the people who hit the market before Sam did, and they're returning with a more refined concept than they had before. The fact that they're youthful and determined is why I'm watching them and ignoring attempts like Google Latitude, which practically scream sterile.
> IIRC, PG posted once that there was a big correlation between comment length and score.

Yes, he wrote that. I wrote a small script to test that proposition. It does not hold up. If there is a correlation, it is only very weak.

You can have the source, if you wish. The script's written in Python.
Why did the peoples of the New World fail to invent the wheel?
For example (but that's kind of a meta-point): If you select any skill (say driving) and ask a sample of people in which quantile they place themself, you are very unlikely to get a uniform distribution. (Like: "90% of people think themself above median drivers.")
The Internet is people. It's a much less formal place for interaction than something like a bureaucratic corporate system. But both are just people, and good things come from people.

Nina Paley released Sita Sings The Blues under Creative Commons because nobody was able to watch her film because studios like Sony Pictures passed her up. Roger Ebert called it one of his favorite films. It's a hilarious and moving movie that I wouldn't have seen if it hadn't been placed online.

Nina Paley isn't the Internet. She's an animator. But the Internet is where she released her movie. I'll also say that it's better than anything Sony Pictures has released in a long, long while. (sitasingstheblues.com for the interested.)
My comment was tongue-in-cheek. Though spear-fishing is doubtlessly a great way of impressing the ladies, it requires a lot of technique and it can be lethal. If you live by the coast and the waves aren't too mean, something cool is kayak-fishing. I have tried and it's lots of fun. You paddle 500 meters offshore and lie there sunbathing on the kayak until some fish is dumb enough to bite the bait. Quite relaxing.
I try not to eat anything that does not easily rot.

Oatmeal and nuts are important exceptions to that rule.

Excellent ingredients minimally handled usually make for the best recipes.

This is the theory behind Italian cooking. The theory behind French cooking is that anything is edible with enough garlic and butter..
I wonder why they don't do profit sharing?

Oh wait!

Never mind.

As an aside, I have noticed more and more profit sharing in China recently. Maybe it is only because my Mandarin is finally getting respectable, and I can now interpret what was there the whole time. But it is an interesting contrast. Our workers get 'cash-outs' or 'guaranteed bonuses' in the case of bankers. Their workers are forced to share in the profits, AND losses of the company. Time will tell which is the better incentive system I suppose.

One more thing I know people will get a kick out of, over there they also have another crazy idea. If they make profits, they split it among the shareholders as well! I think it was Yunnan that just made the largest payout ever to A-share holders a few months back, March maybe. Largest payouts for China that is, but there is a bit of a competition among the companies to one up each other. Imagine that.
Carmenere wine racks
Everything regarding Carmenere; wines, wine valleys, wine cabinets, wine books, wine decanters, wine magazines, wine glasses, wine cellars,
Is there a downside to feeling nauseous and bloated? Like, any particular health concerns that spring up when that's the strategy?
Wikipedia occasionally has complex mathematical formulae & it seems to be working fine. This isn't a hard problem.
Adsweep (almost similar functionality as Adblock) is a greasemonkey script that works well for chrome. They have also released a extension for chrome.
http://www.adsweep.org
Interesting, our waves offshore are typically 3-4 feet. Is that doable? I could find some near shore/inshore areas with no waves but then the bugs will bite :)
Ben+Jerrys. Easy to eat from the tub while coding. Put some fruit in the bottom so it's "healthy".

Combine with a can of Mt.Dew and some pic'n'mix sweets to keep your sugar levels up.
Cook some vegetables, including potatoes, in a pan with a bit of oil. Add miscellaneous spices. Add two beaten eggs as a binding agent. Stir for a little while to prevent scorching, then let the egg congeal. Sprinkle some cheese on top and fold the thing over, and let it sit for a minute or so. Then put it on a plate and eat it.

This combines cheap vegetables with some protein from the eggs, and is delicious and easy to make. Stick some on toast if you want to add grain to the meal.
Lean Cuisine, Oscar Meyer turkey dogs and Spicy Chile Chicken Cup of Noodles. Every other day I go get a tuna sub from Subway to get my fresh vegetables. For desert, Hershey Kisses with almonds or chocolate chip cookie from the grocery deli. And to drink, I make 1/4 cup orange juice with 3/4 cup soda water. It's a homemade Orangina but not nearly as sweet. And every other day I allow myself one coke. Breakfast is usually Kelloggs Mueslix or oatmeal.

I'm 48 and have been blessed with having never been sick. I exercise regularly also. This may not pass muster with a lot of you but I attribute my good health to a positive mental attitude. Something has to make up for my diet... :o)

I
I try not to eat anything that does not easily rot...

yeah, that's what he said. He used a double negation.
Who won the preakness 2009
Yeah, for me, everything is edible enough with black pepper. My dad can eat anything with enough soy sauce, haha.

I have to say, dumplings are cheap and delicious also. Nutritious enough if you make seafood dumplings or vegetable dumplings.
I can only assume you are single or at least living alone? And male...

I am all against stereotypes, but my experience is that women never run out of home decoration ideas.
FuNdAnGgO - We are the number 1 drop ship source
If it wasn't worth anything to you (not intended in the personal sense), you wouldn't bother stealing it.
I used Xen because I know it well. I'm sure it would probably work with VirtualBox or dozens of other virtualization platforms.
I watched a few of those movies, and I simply cannot see where those budgets went. You sure it's not just creative accounting somewhere?
The club would have to be a huge, multi-billion dollar organization with a strong central leadership and lawyers to enforce the rules for distribution of the music. In other words, a...... ;)
what approach?

don't you get lower pressure at high altitude, thus cooking takes longer ... or do i get it backward?
You said their business model wasn't at all being made obsolete. Now you're saying they need to take a page from TV and focus on less extravagant budgets to survive? I guess if you just mean they'll still make movies, then sure.

The dollar per minute figures are slightly misleading, because if you took just the first couple of episodes of Lost, the number would be much higher. The pilot cost $10 to $14 million to produce. That's about 0.14 million dollars per minute. Of course the average cost goes down as more episodes of the same show are made. That's why they filmed some movies (like LOTR and the Pirates sequels, I think) back-to-back.
I think you'll bump into more startup buddies in Mountain View than in Palo Alto. Just visit any coffee shop in Mountain View and you'll see -- they all look like computer labs. There might be more funded startups in Palo Alto though.
Worse than that, these people are pushing DRM and probably lobbied for DMCA.
edit: yeah, I'm pretty sure I agree too, I'm not sure why I wrote so much...

I think strict Up-Down voting ultimately regresses to a Boo/Yay judgement; despite whatever benevolent community coercion exists to color the vote along some more complex institutional axis. (In so far as we're talking about a free public forum... substitute virtually any conception of "free" you like. e.g. if this were a pay-for community we could probably implicitly afford to have a higher expectation for the "respect" for institutional rules.)

I think the concept of providing additional axis of voting could lead to very interesting community conversations. I think having a voting system that was usably different would drive adoption of the additional institutional rules (e.g. voting via the four cardinals would be interesting enough to be "forthwhile" somewhere on the web) .

something like:
( ) I liked this comment. YAY!
( ) I'd like this comment to get a response. YAY for conversation!
( ) I do not think this comment needs a response. BOO for conversation!
( ) I disliked this comment. BOO!

* Though I'm not sure what to make of the third one. These may not be great exemplars.
Thanks. I took a look and the Chrome extension is basically the same as the greasemonkey script. Does anyone know if this is less efficient than the way Adblock Plus does it? If so, is it possible to do it more efficiently with a Chrome extension?
Honestly? I don't mind your "meanness" as others see it. I enjoy it. You want answers. Good, I'd love to give them to you. However, I didn't want this to go into personal attacks. I figured if I didn't respond to it, or, at least, if I responded in the way I did already it would come off as light-hearted and die away. I really did not mean for what I said to come off as a personal attack. I'll explain my accusation anyway.

You said this: This is Nietasche's ressentiment, the origin of moral feeling. Observe the hatred he has for the successful and the contented. They have won at the game of life, in that they fit in, are laughing, are enjoying themselves, yet the author feels that there must be something wrong with them. They must deserve his scorn because he has not achieved the ease and confidence that they show. It must be a chimera. Meditation sets the author apart. He has stamina. He has determination. He has 'grit', and for this he is despised by the masses. Bullshit.

The author of the article DOES NOT say that he hates these people, that these people are miserable, that these people have won at anything. Nowhere does he say they fit in, or that it must be chimera. Nor does he directly compare himself to these lesser-thans. No. YOU have said this. YOU show us your observation. The author was saying perhaps, they want more. Not that they are winners, but that they want more. You immediately jump to the conclusion that he holds "ressentiment" or whatever the fuck you call it. When all he was saying is that perhaps, they aren't as happy as they seem. Nothing more, nothing less. They didn't WIN or LOSE at life, rather, a different life is waiting for them if they themselves wait.

It's my opinion that the only way a person can hold the point of view you hold is if they, at some point in their lives, have themselves seen others in a similar way.

On a basic level, the author is just suggesting people take a moment and reflect on themselves and their own lives.

I'm really not trying to make this a personal attack on you, but, you seem like a reasonable person and there is some subtle bullshit inherent in your original post which got past your own built-in bs detectors somehow.
Sure, but how do you get from >0 to $10?
Gofarmer - farm to farm sales for livestock, farm machinery, equestrian, farm stays
Online market place for buying and selling livestock, farm machinery, animal feed, farm land and more. Do you have cows for sale, sheep to sell, pigs for sale? Or maybe you are looking for a second hand tractor, a horse trailer or a baler?
As a rule of thumb, I always try to eat fruits in their season.

There must be a reason they appear in that specific period of the year, like a natural diet plan ;)
If they do, it'll just die because it's not Safari. It makes sense to build the functionality on a platform where people are tolerant of incremental improvements.
I'm interested eru - could I see the script?
Maybe instead of cardinals, you could have:

(Up Arrow)
"?", "!" (not necessarily mutually exclusive)
(Down Arrow)

But what would be more interesting is to not force any meaning on them whatsoever. And wait and see if some sort of meaning emerges from the community.
Ask HN: Website to give to charity anonymously, useful to you?
I keep getting this junk in my mail (and email inbox) from charities I have given to in the past. In fact, some of them sold my mailing address to some other charities in which I have absolutely no interest. They waste my time, and they waste their money.

I'm considering making a website where you can give to a charity anonymously (or pseudo-anonymously where they have your name but not your real contact information, like a mailinator email address). My questions to you:

1. Have you given to charity?
2. Have you received an inordinate amount of mail from them?
3. Would you like to limit that mail?
4. Would you, specifically, use this website if I made it?

Of course, the website would offer secure payments, not spam you, have a clearinghouse of all charities, make it a one-click process to send more money to a charity, recommend new charities to you, keep records of all donations for tax purposes, recommend an optimal tax strategy, allow filters to limit or end communication from charities, etc etc etc.

I understand that there are scaling issues, potential tax problems, problems with donating to political campaigns, issues with getting charities on board, issues with charities wanting to communicate to new or existing donors, that charities already offer opt-out in many cases, etc etc etc.

I just want to find out if there are enough people out there who are annoyed enough to justify my building this for them and myself. Are you interested?

Also, if there is already a website that does this, please let me know! I just want to give without being annoyed, and maybe be reminded once a year to give to my favorites.
those formulae are rendered as images
There have been several startups doing the same sort of thing, all failing. I'm still not convinced people want this (Location aware social networking mobile thingy). It's a shame you can't get traffic figures so easily for mobile apps - without user/revenue numbers it's all speculation as to how successful or otherwise loopt is.

IPO seems like crazy talk to me.
Entrepreneurs can change the world [Video]
A related thread from a while back - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=57538 . I've actually been doing PG's rice and beans recipe (with some changes and some other variation), and it's not so bad.
That's a compelling reason for some users. I thought WA would be slow, and that would be a reason to buy a local version (or a subscription to a faster version), but it surprised me how well it coped with the launch load. But after seeing your freemium idea, I've changed my mind to think they'll just leave off some features - that's the standard approach.
> My own hunch is they did it to avoid scraping/botting

the text is in the alt attribute of the image. easily scraped.
Depends on what kind of kayak you have. My kayak would easily capsize so I would only take it to the ocean when it was flat. On non-flat days, it was also fun as one could try some harmless kayak-surfing and get wiped out countless times. Fun stuff.
I think that this would make for a very interesting experiment -- have two up/down arrows next to each post -- one for "I Agree/Disagree" and one for "This is Valuable/Worthless".

After all, the single up/down does combine several dimensions into one judgment.
Umm, no, the business model is fundamentally sound, it's just they need to reduce unnecessary costs which they've increased themselves.

In the case of the LOTR and Pirates sequels being filmed back to back, that was a situation consisting of continuity more than anything because the story is an ongoing saga.

If you look at that list of most expensive films ever made, the Pirates sequels come in at number 1 and 4... I don't think budget considerations were part of the equation.

(Also take note, Lord of the Rings isn't on there anywhere, because Pete Jackson reduced costs by setting up Weta Digital to do lots of their special effects inhouse. The cost of the entire trilogy was $285 million, less than the cost of the third Pirates movie)

Last I heard, Disney were considering making a 4th "Pirates" film, and given the subject matter (probably the fountain of youth as was suggested at the end of At Worlds End) - it might be another extravagant budget as well.

Also, in your argument of pilots vs ongoing costs, have you ever wondered how much of that is due to cost of sets?

With TV, generally they're re-using sets over and over, so of course the cost goes down, because the cost per episode is reduced.

With Film, the medium calls for lots of "throwaway" shots, which means lots and lots of sets.

Consider your average Michael Bay film, they might have explosions that cost several hundred thousand dollars each, yet are only 1 or 2 seconds of onscreen action and they might film them several times if there are any major faults.

But at the end of the day, it's all time wasting entertainment. I'd watch 6 episodes of Frasier (which were relatively cheap to produce) over a generic Michael Bay film any day - so why should the latter cost orders of magnitude more to produce? It's the same amount of entertainment for the viewer.
Any reason for the alternating capitalization? It just reminds me of people who tYp LyK dIs.
I don't use my cell for networking. I don't like that constant connectivity. But within that market, I would suggest that the Dodgeball team is a force to be reckoned with.

Perhaps I'm biased because Loopt is ugly as sin, and Foursquare is slightly better.
Well, that's my point. ;)

The rhetorics about "bad" major labels (or "mega-cooperations" as Stallman likes to call software companies) is just that: rhetorics.

However, there would still be an important difference: Club members are less likely to upload stuff to others, since they would harm themselves, only.

On a side note: I don't think it would need to be huge. There are quite a few small independent record labels out there, concentrating on one kind of music. So could any club.
It sounds like it would be appealing to someone, but to be honest I don't think I'd use it. Personally, I'd rather take the time to find charities myself that promote causes I believe in and wouldn't spam me unnecessarily.

But maybe charities like that are incredibly rare and I'd just end up using your site instead.
Interesting recipes here, but I don't think they relate very well to the question. The simplest/healthiest food I used to eat:

1. Get a rice cooker.

2. ???

3. Profit.

No, really, it's that simple. On a bowl of cooked rice you can put:

- vegetables (frozen or fresh)

- fish (of all sorts)

- cheese & bacon (mmmm)

And pretty much anything else. Some of these you just stick in the cooker with the rice, but mostly I bought canned veggies and put everything in the microwave. The best is you can play as much as you like and still keep it simple and cheap. And don't forget the soy sauce.
I just went through the hassle of contacting the Red Cross to ask them to stop sending me stuff. So, yes, I've had this problem. I tend to hold a grudge, though, and if they don't give me really easy ways to avoid getting mail (or if they sell my information), they won't be getting anything from me again.

But, I also don't know that I would go through a third party. There are the trust issues...the organization is never going to endorse or condone what you're doing, because it's damaging to their bottom line (the mailing list is a charities biggest asset). So, you'd be on your own to make it legit. Marketing that kind of service would be horribly difficult.

Even from a "hey, we're a bunch of folks who kinda know each other from the Internet" perspective, I have my doubts you'd be able to overcome the arguments against it. I've come to hold the opinion that if I can't trust the charity with my information, I can't trust them with my money, and I'll find an alternative. I'll also let them know that when I contact them. So far, though, when I've asked to be removed from mailing lists or phone lists, they've done it without delay (the Red Cross, Ron Paul; and the EFF has never bugged me with unsolicited mail or calls and I've been giving them money since probably their first year of operation). Not coincidentally, the EFF gets money from me on a regular basis, while most others do not.
Agreed! A legal obligation to do a prenup would be like a law protecting you from the law... Perhaps you can scrap the laws about custody, alimony, etc. in the first place and let people figure it out by themselves.
Pretty much the basis of the excellent show "QI" which Stephen Fry presents. Check it out.
Promotional Weather Stations 
One of the promotional products that people really enjoy are the promotional weather stations. These are high tech weather display stations, and are somewhat more expensive than many other choices.
I'm saving myself a little time here by copying this text from a previous comment:

Warning: Auto-starting video

Finding which tab out of 30 tabs in 5 browser windows is annoyingly difficult.

Please - it's in the guidelines - put a warning in the title.