skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Hard to believe that we couldn't bring hundreds of thousands of new workers to the US in these fields - the difference is that congress hasn't been convinced that a labor shortage exists.

I think the difference is that there are enough people who can do some jobs who are willing to work for what other people are willing to pay, so there's no perceived need for people to try to get more. On mowing lawns, though, perhaps you aren't aware that in many places in the US, lawns are mowed primarily by immigrants who are willing to accept a lower wage than legal citizens would be (since they risk deportation if they complain about not getting minimum wage, or think they do).

The real problem is that there's no way to know what the right answers are once you start trying to manage the economy rather than letting it go. Each attempt to solve a problem with force causes other problems, which are then ripe for solving with more force, but at each stage, the problems that you're going to cause are mostly invisible compared to the problem you're solving.

It's pretty impressive that the US culture and governmental structure has resisted this trend as well and as long as it has, but at some point, things are going to go very badly more quickly than most people who haven't experienced such a thing can imagine. We can all hope that isn't soon. :)
For this we thought about recording user input, then replaying it on the new build as a pre-deploy step and looking for errors in logs etc. Obviously this would only work without major ui/schema changes. Have you tried anything like this?
Apple chose them as their exclusive US carrier, so I don't see much sense in passing the buck. But we use different frequencies for the most part so it could still be a phone problem and you would not experience the same issue.
From the comments here, it seems there are no clear leaders.
[10 days pass...] I wonder if unix beat Plan 9 because it was established in the market (certainly a huge factor), or if its hacked together approach was somehow intrinsically better (as in the "worse is better" essay); or maybe that there were some specific decisions in Plan 9 that were bad in practice (though they seemed good to the designers).

I guess unix being established and being adaptable makes it very hard to displace - so the first factor swamps any effect of the other two.
Any satellite service is pretty poor when the thing you really need connectivity for is SSH. These days, I could get away with a 3G tether in those situations, but cellphone internet wasn't like that then.
Apple has always been a bunch of douchebags. In their own way, they are every bit as evil as Msoft was in their heyday.

Power corrupts etc. What I can't understand is why there's this tendency to rub people's face in how successful and powerful you are (ie the session as described by OP). It speaks of an underlying insecurity. If you are the alpha dog and know it, you should not be afraid to face your underlings squarely and tell them "hey, I'm alpha dog, I don't need to explain every decision I make". You know, like "I'm the Decider".

But that would be too direct and honest for the mamsy-pamsy, passive-aggressive Silicon Valley style of "fuck you", which is something like "Oh, that's nice. What, did you ask me another question? I thought you had left already."
The boot loader is likewise software which you do not own. You're free to replace it along with any other software.
>David Postman, a spokesman for Allen, said the company attempted to reach Mayer on a number of occasions but the email and physical address provided on the domain registration papers didn't work.

That's just as important -- a reminder to you to always use real information when you register!
How exactly does one make six percent a month from safe investments?
I'll doublecheck my IM logs. I know the slashdot thing was on the frontpage yesterday, but the other info I've been getting via IM from several friends with family over there..

This is kinda cool:
http://blog.austinheap.com/2009/06/15/how-to-setup-a-proxy-f...
Other "basic" stuff not in the iphone: pedometer, dual bootability and quantum teleportation.

OK, I'll give you MMS.
Not true, as evidienced by the existence of jailbreaking, unlocking, etc. Apple has not taken any legal action against people for doing these things. What legal action they have taken has been against people allegedly infringing on their software copyrights. The difference is crucial.
I think all the developers want is some clear guidelines and transparency into the approval process and some recourse when they feel they have a good argument why their rejected apps should be approved. I think if those two things were in place, most developers would be satisfied. As things stand now, your app is just an update away from rejection by Apple and they don't even have to give you a reason.
Seeking Technical Cofounder
I'm looking to hire a technical cofounder for an 'augmented reality' / location based services startup with angel backing. I have a good prototype built and a huge library of proprietary content - and I am looking for someone to put some finishing touches on it so we can launch in Beta (at which point we will secure VC funding). The technical cofounder will also be responsible for building out the technical team.

I'm looking for developers with experience in building scalable, secure web applications (mobile a plus). There are several interesting problems to work on, so a CS degree and algorithmic experience is a plus. The majority of the system has been built on PHP/MySQL, j2me and Objective C (iphone). The candidate we select will work on a contract basis for a trial period.

I'm a well connected investor / former entrepreneur (sold first company to Nokia) and current tech executive. If your experience is commensurate with our needs I will set up a phone interview followed by an in person interview where we will walk you through the project in detail. Email me a brief description of your background and interest (attach your CV) at techxc(at)gmail.com
The "Perforce at Google" case study that this article links to seems to discount some of the ideas that Perforce is super-scalable. Things like:

- "Every command, from any client (e.g.,
p4v), appears to the server as if it came
from the p4 command line."
- "Each command starts a process on the
server."

Of course, this is probably a use case in the extreme (and it was 2006), but I think it just goes to show that it doesn't make much sense to make such absolute statements ("X is more ___ than Y").
Quick Start With Brazilian Portuguese: Lesson 6
In Portuguese we replace the verb to have for estar
com when we are asking for possession of our objects/things. So, if you want
to know where your object is or if your friend has it, you can ask:
Você está com a minha passagem? Do you have my ticket?
I am living in Bangkok right now at €500 (euro, ok) a month and before I clicked this I was wondering if it would mention Asia.
You won't believe how many 'old western people' actually live here in Thailand (mostly the coast areas) or Indonesia for that matter.
There were initial issues with Optus in Australia - their network wasn't prepped for the volume the iPhone delivered, so disconnections and poor connections were common complaints for the first 2-3 months. I believe that's been sorted now.
I worked from Beijing during the Olympics last year for 3 months. The hardest part of the setup was securing an apartment on a short term lease with broadband from a few thousand miles away. I had to hire a guy that went from apt to apt then uploaded pictures to me at night. You definitely want to see pictures. I also had no clue where the "hip" parts of the city were, so I spent many hours just talking about the various Beijing neighborhoods and prices. Then we had to negotiate a short term lease, and pray that the landlord would honor that when I arrived.

It all went rather smoothly (it helps that I speak Mandarin and knew some trusty locals).

But while I was there, I kept thinking how difficult it would be for someone who didn't know anyone in Beijing and who didn't speak Mandarin to set this up. And what if I wanted to do something like this in, say, Cairo? It'd be very difficult.

I think setting up apartments around the world for technomads would be a great business idea. All that'd be required would be a clean place with broadband, hot shower and a bonus would be a nearby co-working space for local or expat geeks.
Why would anyone expect high school grades to mean anything in the first place?

http://www.amazon.com/Howard-Kirschenbaum/e/B001IOBN0I/
Multi-tasking and tethering have been standard smartphone features for a long time. I can personally remember those as far back as 2001.
Very nice video on relative sizes of planets and stars
Until recently that was close to the interest rate from a basic savings account in Australia.
I think the concept is similar to Clicktale and even simple User testing. But instead of asking users to perform tasks you get to watch real users using your site.

Something quantifiable is nice, but after watching a few of these videos of your users, you will quickly find some of the big problems your site faces. You likely won't notice the small ones, but you should be able to see some of the big ones, which are the ones that need your greatest attention anyway.

I also would like to see their price before giving them an email.
As a Brazilian myself, it is always interesting to see how other people learn Portuguese.

The link is not to the whole lesson, but to a sample. Even then, it is what it claims to be, a "quick start". It shows you how to ask for stuff, but doesn't really explain anything. In particular, the difference in the two forms of "to be" that Portuguese (and many other languages) have.

Still, the lesson (the complete one) might be a valuable online resource if you're coming to Brazil on a trip.
They typically get paid more than they would ever make if they tried to get a position that matched their skill level at an established company like Apple or Yahoo!.

Do you have any evidence for that? A lot of the people I know of who are startup CEOs used to be high-level managers/executives at big companies. I don't know of any evidence to support the idea that high-level executives at startups are any more "overpaid" or incompetent than executives at big companies.

I would wager that 9 times out of 10 they are hopeless and drive the companies they latch onto into the ground.

They certainly require a different skill set than the technical leadership in a company. A CEO needs to be able to give a convincing pitch to VCs, recruit other top talent, close big deals with customers (often other big companies), and decide on the company's direction. Those are all hard skills for a typical engineer to evaluate.
Facebook Chat hits 1B messages per day
I don't really get this. Why does the narrator go from critical to sycophantic after the first letter? Is it just that the author wants to make fun of both Joel and his admirers, so he has the character inexplicably change his position by 180 degrees? Or am I missing something?

I'm not being wilfully dense here, I'm just confused about this piece. Any clarification will be appreciated.
One doesn't. The article suggests 6% annually.

That's currently a slight stretch given interest rates in most OECD nations, but definitely achievable without effort over a longer term (eg, 6% pa for 10 years).
six percent a month

Six percent annually.

That said, it is a fantasy, unless you intend on your retirement getting cut short by death prior to you exhausting your money. The standard recommendation for someone who is much older (i.e. can rely on death to moot insolvency with greater probability) is that the safe withdraw rate is 4%.

With a withdraw rate of 4% and a standard mix of stocks and bonds you can be fairly confident that, assuming the future looks something like the past, you will not run out of money within your lifetime. (Most people will in fact see their money "go infinite", i.e. their portfolio expands faster than their withdraw rate and when they eventually pass away their heirs and government get to toast their name quite a bit. However, the prudent investor doesn't plan on being "most people", they plan on being the unlucky sod who bought at the top and sold at the bottom.)
Being that this page is from 2005 (almost exactly 4 years ago!) and the source is still not available, I would say that it is a neat trick, but also difficult to reproduce.
Here's a few related threads:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=139901

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=167076

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132026
A better title would be "How to leverage your income far more effectively".

How much money do most of us flush on rent, cars, overpriced houses, and other things. If you add it up over 10-15 years the opportunity cost of living in the US is over $1M for most people.

All that so that we can eat a horrible western diet, watch cable news, and work for prestigious firms in hopes of retiring at 70.
#IranElection brings up a few interesting things in my mind and is an example of how no matter how legitimate an election may be (I have no documentation of election fraud), if there is no trust in the system, people will demand change. Plus, it's interesting that Obama is staying away, as are other arab nations when everyone has been isolated by the current President's regime. Also, I heard comparisons to the beginnings of the Velvet Revolution. On top of this, Iran is supposed to be one of the more democratically liberal nations of the Middle East and the outrage is there. (versus Saudi Arabia, Dubai, etc.)

Ignoring the politics, I'm trying to understand historical significance.
Do You have a viable startup idea?
I continue to use Adium with AIM/MSN but now 90% of my chat is through facebook.
Great demo as soon as you arrive.
Believe it or not, I originally purchased the iPhone for the ease of making calls, placing people on hold to answer the other caller, merging multiple callers and using the speakerphone option. It does not get much easier than the one button option and I haven't had any problems. A bonus was being able to load Skype and use it while in Mexico to avoid the ridiculous international rates.
I'm confused. How is this relevant to HN?
browsing sucks for sure, but email? come on? Thats the whole selling point and they sell very very well with most customers being repeats. Your experience is very atypical.
My only answer is, the market has spoken. Apple's process may be kludgy and untransparent at times, but they have the dominant App Store and phone for a reason.

Some how they have succeeded in enthralling tons of developers and tons of end users. I can't help think that part of that is that because the process is actually pretty good in the scheme of things.

It would be really expensive to deal with every bitchy developer who had a problem, personally.

I mean, Google operates the same way and they are great. It's nearly impossible to email anyone for support for any Google product.
Where those who predict and those who need predictions meet
This what I found on registering:

You get 10 free captures on signup.

After that, plans vary from '$5 for 100 captures' to '$30 for 1000 captures'.

[edit #1]

I added this to one of my websites. Holy Shit, it is good! I've bought 100 captures for now, for $5.

[I shamefully admit that this is one of the ideas I had but didn't execute all. These guys have done an amazing job.]

[edit #2]

Thanks to paraschopra's comment, I checked out userfly too. I am going to try that too. Clixpy didn't detect keystrokes correctly on one of my websites. Lemme see how userfly fares for the same test case.

Note to self : Competition is good.
------------

It is like a neighborhood coffee shop getting more traffic because of a Starbucks opening nearby, contrary to the tiny shop's fears. I wouldn't have become a user of userfly today without clixpy.

[edit #3]

( Userfly dude rambles for quite a while in the demo :-) )

Notes on Userfly:

Userfly's performance can be better. Hmm. Definitely. But I like it too.

I wish Google released a product that has this functionality. I don't trust userfly or clixpy completely, since they didn't replay my test drive properly. But I'll definitely be using them until something more robust comes along.
Commercializing Technology: A Need For More Entrepreneurs
Have any good links/articles on job queuing & db sharding?
Does anyone have good links on how/when/why to use job queuing to scale web apps? Also, articles on db sharding would be useful too :)
Tee hee - this is pretty much the Eric Ries/Steve Blank outline in a decision tree format.
wait... live comfortably on 2,000 a month, and live on 4,000 a month as a king?

Heck, I live on around 3,000 a month (after fairly aggressive savings by American standards) in a middle sized city and it's very comfortable. I could live comfortably on 2,000 a month if I wasn't working! (That's for one, mind you.)
I wrote the code we use to generate funding documents.

Did you use arc? If not, why not? If so how does it compare to HN in terms of complexity?

Did you learn anything worthwhile?
Showing your age there...
What do you do for healthcare? Do you have insurance or pay out of pocket?
Yes, in fact the beginnings of a trip were organized through Hacker News a few months ago: http://coworkthailand.com/

I think these specific plans fell through, but I am planning something similar. Also, there's a commune of people doing this at http://www.cocovivo.com/
Testing this now. One issue for me is that I get a lot of traffic from reddit, stumbleupon, etc.. these users don't stick around for more than 5 secs and they are going to use up my captures quickly. I would suggest only counting captures that have clicks.

Another suggestion: I'd love to be able to see how users browse a particular page, but i might have to wade through a ton of captures to do so. Would be cool if you captured every user session and I could then search to find some that include that page, then unlock those session by using some of my purchased credits.

EDIT: One problem I'm seeing is that when the user goes to a new page the timer freezes and it takes about 10 seconds to start playing again, but it jumps 10 seconds ahead, so you miss some activity there. Looks like th is is because my website takes awhile to finish loading (lots of images below the fold).
how many times have SF companies planned their maintenance windows around Iran's day... That's got to be a first.
I've been using facebook chat almost exclusively for friends I've made in the last year.

MSN/Yahoo for older friendships.
Will be curious to see his answer but health care standards are high (if you can pay) and, compared to Western rates, ridiculously affordable in Thailand.
This looks amazing. I've been wanting something like this but I didn't realize it was possible.

This is going on my website tonight.

[EDIT]

Looks cool, but still has some bugs in it. In particular, some of the Javascript that is on your site seems to activate while you watch the replays.
And let's not overlook that it's 4% before taxes. So in reality, closer to 3%
Health care is ridiculously cheap in Thailand compared to the US. A hospital visit a little outside of Bangkok cost me about 1500 baht ($40), including medication. It was a simple out-patient procedure, but I'm sure it would have been several hundred dollars if I had to pay out of pocket for the same procedure in the US.

Also, prescription medications are fairly cheap and you generally don't need a prescription. I got my allergy medication for $20, which is normally about $60 here if you don't have insurance.
Sounds more like "Do you have an idea that investors would want to invest in"
I don't like facebook chat very much, though it generally works so maybe I shouldn't complain.
It's the sort of humor typified by:

http://www.bash.org/?5300
I like the question that mentions a comparison to the seven deadly sins. http://www.hunch.com/startup-idea/?h=1461053.1461083.1461103... For me it could be Lust...
Since when does "Have you built a prototype yet?" matter when talking about if your idea is good?
I still have my Dutch health and extended travel-insurance; besides that I have a work permit here and insurance of the company I work for. So that's like double safe.

But yeah, it is ridiculously cheap; just had a blood and regular check up last week for 300 baht (~$9, ~€6)
This demonstrates a major flaw in Hunch. There is huge selection bias. I answered this, and got a 74%. Right on the page is another question asking me "Do you agree with this result?".

I claim a few things: 1) people who are in startups or want to be in startups are more likely to take this quiz. 2) People in this group are more likely to say they have a good idea.

I had a similar problem with the question "what college should I go to?". The quiz did a good job of telling me which colleges I wanted to go to, with no regard to whether I had the grades to get into those schools.
Why would you want to live in a place with a lesser standard of living than US?
Harrisburg Lawyer
Caldwell and Kearns Attorneys at Law have been providing legal representation for the area of Harrisburg since 1920.
To make sure it's easily feasible, with low entry barrier and risk.
Do many of you still use IM other than Facebook regularly? I used to, but most of my peers have dropped off AIM/MSN.

And perhaps more generally, I've found that Twitter/Facebook let me keep control of my time rather than the synchronous "chat with me now" nature of IM.
Wow very nice. I wonder how it handles different browser renderings though? For instance the clicks and stuff could seem off.
I've had issues on Telstra. Sometimes the phone UI will prevent you from answering the call. Sometimes the phone crashes mid-call. Sometimes you answer the phone and you can hear the other party but they can't here you.
I do the same, but with Excel (desktop and mobile version)

I suppose it doesn't count because the OP asked for open source specifically.
Only if you believe Elon's side of the story (I don't).

If you believe Martin Eberhard, here is his take:

Martin: "The 2-speed transmission was the first major edict to come from Elon, and though I thought it was an unnecessary risk for the first model year's cars, I was certainly willing to be a team player and support Elon's edict. I knew there were risk and cost associated with the decision, but by themselves, I felt we would be able to manage them."

Editor: Here's an another example of how different people see the same events through their own personal filters. Musk acknowledges that he pushed for the 2-speed transmission from Job 1 in order to meet the original performance targets. From a December 2007 interview in Inc. magazine: "The most controversial of Musk's edicts involved the transmission. Martin Eberhard, Tesla's co-founder and then-CEO, argued that it would be quicker and easier to build the car with a single-speed transmission. Musk ordered a two-speed model so that the Roadster would be able reach a top speed of well over 100 miles per hour."

Of course, it's never quite that clear cut. My belief is that Elon's ego and pocketbook far exceeds his engineering and management ability.

This was from a very interesting piece done by Autoblog Green:

Part 1: http://www.autobloggreen.com/2008/06/23/autobloggreen-qanda-...
Part 2: http://www.autobloggreen.com/2008/06/24/autobloggreen-qanda-...
Part 3: http://www.autobloggreen.com/2008/06/25/autobloggreen-qanda-...