skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Sorry, but Namecoin is a scamcoin! DNS works on low-end computers, Namecoin is an overkill requiring vast storage and constant syncing - you can recall what happened a month ago when Coinbase went out of sync with the blockchain and were pretty much offline of hours. Using the blockchain for absolutely everything is an abuse! DNSSEC + DNSCrypt are pretty fine for me! Plus, being a scamcoin makes .bit domains pretty expensive - right now it's $14/yeah - way more than a way more useful .com!
Hm, when does a private thought become a provable reality?
The big problem with biofuel is that it takes farmland to grow it on

Jatropha is interesting, partly for this reason. It grows happily in semi-desert environments that are not suitable for traditional farmland.
The original, Sourceforge, still does. Also, GNU Savannah.
GitHub has removed the generic files section, but they have introduced some features for "releases" (basically, additional metadata associated to git tags) and that includes file hosting for release binaries. That should work for most use cases.
Google Drive's free tier has (fairly low) daily download limits. It's not actually a suitable replacement for popular projects.
> "These guys are toxic. I'd ban them for a year."

Wow, the hate is strong with this one.
I think that it would make sense to allow direct queries for the trademark, e.g., "rapgenius" in the case of rapgenius. In your example "lyrics" would certainly not be trademarkable, so I would imagine "lyrics.com" or similar would be used instead.
https://github.com/blog/1547-release-your-software
Ha, Bob doing another DI framework? Is it any good?
I agree that there should be a more formal process, but I think Matt has done an absolutely sterling job.
My experience is that, beyond some size threshold, people tend to stop caring about generic company policies because they don't understand them (nor they are well communicated or explained, since there is a large gap between management and employees) and just do whatever is handy to them. At the same time, management stop thinking that trust works as a way to enforce policies and start enforcing them technically.
I don't see why RapGenius should get a better customer service than everybody else from Google (i.e. none at all). Being able to negotiate anything at all would be way better than what paying customers (e.g. AdWords) get these days ...
+1 for a solution to the falling crutch problem.
Yeah, most "entrepreneurs" I end up speaking to have a "great idea" which is basically facebook for a niche market. I am sure a facebook group already exists in most cases.
this is pretty fundamentally true of clients in general... if the code is on my machine, i can modify it, end of story.
When they say downloads won't work does that include the ability to use git/svn etc. on google code?
Your private thoughts aren't private if they can gain enough information about your personality from your public thoughts.
What?

Java's strings are immutable, so copy-on-write is nonsense.

Performance tuning for mutable string types has been moving away from the copy-on-write paradigm (it used to be common in C++, but not any more). It's a big mess because the design of the C++ string class was truly botched, it's much less of a mess in other languages where you have different types for mutable and immutable strings (Java, C#, Python, etc.)
Steampowered.com - Is Steam Store Down Right Now?
Here is an interview with the founder we did a couple of weeks ago:

http://www.techendo.co/posts/indie-gaming-interview-with-itc...
The point is that Google sets the rules for the internet based on what makes their algorithm work - I.e. What is good for Google. Instead of improving their algorithm, they now manually punish sites for not obeying.
The difficulty from the standpoint of Google is the absurd scale that they have to deal with. Indeed, a mission of indexing all information and making it immediately available is a daunting one.

I get the sense that HN feels like these penalties are a rare thing; this type of ranking penalty is happening to an absurd amount of websites every day. If you were to rank the number of websites that received a manual penalty from Google on the same day as RapGenius by amount of traffic, my guess would be RapGenius wouldn't be in the top 10. They're not in a position to "negotiate" with Google, and Google doesn't "negotiate." They slap your wrist when they find you doing something dirty, and you try to recover your reputation. The only reason Google would try to work with RapGenius would be because of the PR RapGenius can generate, which appears to be happening, but there's no way they will just remove the penalty. My guess is at best RapGenius will get an expedited path to have the same options as any other site owner.

The only recourse a website owner has when they have received a manual penalty is to disavow bad links, and hope that somehow they've identified all of the bad links in their link disavow. This is a nefarious process for even the best of SEOs, and the process is quite poor; I've even discussed this with Matt Cutts in the past, but it's understandable considering the scale Google has to deal with. You can't exactly have people taking phone calls. And in Google's defense, they only penalize you if you were trying something sketchy anyway, so it's your fault for playing with fire (except in the case of negative SEO, but that's another discussion).

That said, while this ban will hurt RapGenius in the short-term, the penalty likely won't last forever. And considering that it doesn't appear that they're monetizing, it's not like they're losing revenue, just traffic for a short-term. Penalties like this, if properly disavowed, usually last about 30 days.

Interestingly enough, I'm unsure how much the SEO spam would have helped RapGenius in the first place; all of the links would have had the exact same anchor text, which raises some red flags for Rap Genius. I'm not sure of the kind of scale they were trying to hit with the blogs, but it was likely either 1. Not going to move the needle or 2. Become so big it would hurt them. Even disregarding ethics of anti-black-hat SEO, it really was just a poor move on the part of Rap Genius SEO-wise.

"Move fast and break stuff" can come back and bite you sometimes, but I'm confident RapGenius will figure it out in the end.
The plan is actually quite smart. As soon as the pornblock has been implemented, they will hire people like me to prove that: Hey, I could get through to this and that site, and they contain porn!

This will prepare the second step. In order to make sure that all porn sites have been blocked, the ISPs will start getting from a new HM Block and DontShow department, a list of sites that the ISPs must not show.

This will prepare the third step, in which they will give democratic access and oversight to the HM Block and DontShow list and extend its usefulness beyond porn, so that every pressure group around will be able to add its own set of sites that people should not see.

The fourth step is that the list becomes mandatory. It will no longer be possible to opt out of such democratically-constituted wishlist of bannings ;-)

There is only one problem with this approach, and the politicians do not seem to understand it, because the argument is a bit technical: The censorship is entirely based on the DNS system, which itself is just based on simple conventions. DNS is not mandated by the laws of nature or so.

It is not possible to force users to resolve IP addresses for sites through any particular database such as a DNS database. It is not possible to prevent users from creating alternative databases either. Therefore, all that they are doing is to push users away from the traditional DNS system.
Or, if you value privacy, you can use Duckduckgo.com which still ranks RapGenius plenty high.
Agreed, especially in the different SEO conversations that flair up (Calacanis at Mahalo, Google's problems, etc.). Just the way the RapGenius gents have said their talking with Google about a "resolution" is unsettling without a more formal process laid out.
Glue? Gluing the magnet to the light is tricky unless you get the right shape case and the right glue. Gluing the other magnet to the bike is tricky for the same reasons.

Sugru solves both of them.
One person's bullying in the workplace is another person's not putting up with excuses for substandard work.
I'm not sure it's as much hyperbole as you think. One of the statements by Ebon Moglen's recent talk that stayed with me is something like "In every country where people spend a long time online, Google already knows how you're going to vote."

Imagine the sort of things the government could get by mashing together our electronic signals, all of which you might want to keep private:

1. Who you will most likely vote for

2. Where you have been at all times.

3 Who you spoke to on the phone, text message and bulletin boards.

4. Your sexual orientation, shared trauma, or mental problems.

5. Your sexual kinks and porn preferences.

6. Your religion.

7. Your medical history (and from 23andMe, your DNA)

8. What films you watch, music you like and books you read (and from ebooks, for how long you spent doing so).

9. Who you met physically (if both are carrying tracking phones).

10. Everything you bought via paypal, credit cards or bank transactions.

11. Your credit history, savings history and financial proclivities.

12. Your possessions that are recorded, such as houses, cars.

13. Every country you visit abroad. Every plane ticket and use of your passport (including photo and fingerprints).

14. Your complete criminal record.

15. And already coming to the youth of today: cheaper insurance via car tracking = how you drive, how fast, cornering speed, where you go and where you stay.

16. Your genealogical data if given to any family tree site.

17. The names and all the data above for your friends and family, their friends, and so on, in a great big network.

Is that a loss of privacy? I'd say so.

It's a huge amount of data they have access to if unrestrained: all your opinions on bulletin boards, web searches, sites visited, physical locations visited, friend networks, phone conversations, face on cameras and photos via recognition, Medical records, library records, travel records, TV records, financial records, email, photographs, videos - and in future people will be using the internet and things like smart phones more, not less.

And of course this isn't even including the more extreme stuff they can do but probably only do rarely, such as watching you through your smart TV, computer or phone, listening to everything you say through your phone even when it isn't on, etc.

Heck, even searching google for types of recipe you enjoy might reveal you're Jewish when cross-referenced with things like friend networks and location. From an EU data protection (and last century's history) point of view, there is a lot to be concerned about.
No, some people only understand pain. Try everything else first, but if it's the only way, to the pain it is.
Check salaries in your Linkedin network.
Seriously. That's very impressive.
Thanks! Hope you find them useful
I'm confused, is there a new development? what do you mean by negotiate? The last thing I read on this was that they were penalized. Are they back in the SERPs?
My Kindle won't give me any sort of analytics for my reading. I can track my computer program use with RescueTime, my keystrokes with SelfSpy, my travels with my phone, and my heart rate, wattage, and location on my bike with my GPS, but not what and when I read on my Kindle. Does anyone know of a hack to do it? Or an e-reader that does or could be made to do it?

Separately, I'm not convinced that reading analytics would cause a big shift in what is published. Publishing houses appear to publish what turns out to be great literature mostly by accident, and as business tend to publish mostly what they believe will make them money. Analytics might help publishers make a little more money on their commercial works, but it's difficult to imagine a Flaubert, a Joyce, or even a Franzen decide to alter their vision based on some prospective sales numbers. But who knows, perhaps someone will use the technology to create something that is both profound and accessible to a larger audience.
This is the way it's supposed to work. This doesn't appear how it's working with RapGenius:

TC article: http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/25/google-rap-genius/

"Update: Rap Genius’ founders have provided this statement, indicating they’re working with Google on being returned to better search result rankings:

... (statement from RapGenius talking about resolution)

"Looks like Rap Genius and Google might come to some compromise where Google restores at least some of the startup’s search result ranking juice in exchange for it cleaning up its act. However, at least some of the decreased visibility is likely to stick around for a long time, impeding Rap Genius’ business. We’ll have more details on the outcome of the talks as soon as possible and we are awaiting a response from Google."
I'm sorry, did they not, with "malice aforethought", blatantly disregard Google's terms. And then brag about it? And, after being called on it, issue a not-really apology that basically said "fuck you, we do what we want"?
Loup Garous, which the internet tells me is by Natsuhiko Kyogoku. The only dystopia I've read which was both legitimately scary and utterly plausible.
Google Drive isn't nearly as public though, so it doesn't become searchable easily...
Epoxy putty, caulk and silicone adhesive also solve the glue shape issue. All available at your local hardware store for less than 20% the cost of sugru and with a shelf life greater than 6 months.
Welcome to the club:) But you should be careful being too open about it. I didn't last 15 min in my last interview, when I told them that I didn't use database in my latest project, since all data (the whole 200 rows) did fit in one json file. Haven't passed the "Technology Stack" qualification.

And indeed, code without frameworks is so much smaller, cleaner and pleasant to work with!
They knew exactly what they were doing. Sorry, but it does serve them right.
> How about Oracle provide a static method to return a substring in 0(1) ?

Not possible anymore, since they used the occasion to eliminate the offset and length fields.
eriksank, you seem to be hellbanned.
Again you miss the point, which is not to debate about the correctness of Google's decision, but the fact that one search engine can make the entire difference between a company being successful and not. This lack of competition is surely a bad thing, even if the decision to penalize RG specifically was a good decision.
Safari dev tools is horrible. Luckily we now have https://github.com/google/ios-webkit-debug-proxy to connect Chrome to an iOS debug target.
For what it's worth, they use Yahoo's search API.
No, this is about downloads only. It doesn't affect cloning and accessing repositories with version control software, which continues to be supported as before.
Rails + Zurb Foundation.
Everyone lives in a free country, everything is done for freedom and everyone fighting for freedom has the moral high ground.

The only real question is what freedom actually means.
No contest about Brian's role, but Keyhole is Google Earth. Maps is based on another acquisition, Where 2 Technologies.
"restores at least some of the startup’s search result ranking juice in exchange for it cleaning up its act"

As I tweeted to Josh on Twitter[1] this actually happens to all sites once they've got themselves out of a penalty and the Google Algorithms trust the site again.

[1] https://twitter.com/profitbaron/status/415918373575213056
One of the Thief game devs wrote the book Game Coding Complete, 4th Ed. it mentions Thief game several times and it has some code and explanation about component-entity system.

Also 3 articles about this topic:
http://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/1f83c5/3_articles_a...
Do you know if applied penalties are listed in "Manual Actions" under Google's Webmaster Tools? Is a 60-day penalty exactly 60 days?

I ask because I have a site that had its Google traffic cut suddenly by over 75% in October. This lasted 64 days, until it increased just as suddenly last week, though not to the same traffic volume as before. I'm trying to figure out if it came back because an unseen penalty expired, or if there was something I did to trigger more conventional SEO rules.
They're actually pretty good. Sit/stand electric desks all around, and lots of great spaces throughout the building if you get tired of your desk and want a change of pace. I was spoiled in previous jobs by having my own office, but short of that I think Mozilla SF is about as good as it gets.
Trouble is, a lot of Sourceforge sofware is bundled with adware these days, so anyone with sense won't download from them.
My interpretation is that Google may be willing to inform them better about what is considered legitimate and what is not. Then, their ranking will be returned as time goes on.
How to Implement Safari Push Notifications on Your Website
not optimistic (know the company personally). Communicated to the founder that he should pivot to specialty lubricants (for example low temperature lubricants that are used in satellites), wasn't interested.
"very few places to run to"

...
Real life isn't a fairy tale. Bullies win these fights more often than their victims.

When we are talking about the work place, losing such a fight can end in unemployment. Its not as easy for non-developers to find new jobs.

Personally, I evaluate the chances of winning in the event that I choose to fight against the consequences of losing. When I was in the military, my entire section had the privilege of having a steroid-laden megalomaniac as a first-line supervisor for close to three years. He was a couple of ranks higher than us, which as far as the military is concerned pretty much makes him God. He would show up to work every day at our remote site (away from anyone that outranked him) and immediately start screaming and throwing things.

The worst part is that he was careful to never act inappropriately when we were around anyone who could have actually done anything about it. On paper, he was an excellent Soldier, and so no one ever believed anyone that complained about him. As stupid the phenomenon known as bullying seems, bullies can be clever in their own way.

A few of us tried to stand up to him, but when you join the military, your right to freedom of speech is waived. No matter how politely anyone would try to address the issue, he would immediately threaten them with non-judicial punishment (They can take salary and rank from you simply because your supervisor claims that you did something he didn't like. You can ask for a trial instead, but then you could end up in prison.) if they didn't go away.

So, in our situation, we just put up with him as best we could. Innocence in the military means fuck-all when your opponent is higher ranking, so we didn't have much recourse.
As shift-leaders, we fought to protect the younger Soldiers from this guy as much as we could, which of course meant that we had to put up with more of his shit than anyone.

If I had been a civilian, I would have had a better chance of doing something about his misconduct, but even still, there would have been a risk of termination should those efforts fail.

Ideologically, taking action against a bully is always the right thing to do, but for those of us who live in the real world, failure brings consequences.
I've said it a couple of times. Google (with others like Facebook, Apple) is so big, its essentially infrastructure, and needs to be regulated.

It's not just that they can penalize other companies, and competitors (wheter they have a "legitimate" reason or not). They can make people's ideas, political positions, etc. essentially disappear.

A stupid example: If they wanted to oppress trade unions, they could penalize every page with information about unions when someone searches for "workers' rights". More likely, they could work with oppressive governments to remove certain unpleasant historical events from people's sight.

I wonder why the European Union doesn't do anything... they used to be very strict about antitrust laws, privacy, etc.. Probably someone has to step up and sue Google for them to get active. I could think of a few things they could do here.

- One is to force Google to make their rankings more transparent.

- Google could have offer a kind of appeals process if a manual penalty is applied.

- The EU could put a special tax on the market leader, which would fund a subsidy for promising competitors. (Google's European office is currently registered in a low tax haven in Ireland.)

None of this is without precedent, but there would have to be the right political intent to get something like this started.

And before someone says Google is not in the EU's jurisdiction: Europe is a huge market. They have already fought antitrust trials with Microsoft, and MS could have said "screw you guys" and stopped doing business here, but instead they paid their penalties, because anything else would have been crazy. And if the EU is not going to do it, there are very self-conscious governments in Brazil, China, and India that might put pressure on Google & co..

(OTOH, we know that Governments like monopolists like Google when they help them censor and surpress information, but that's a different topic.)
An ISP is in an ideal position to coordinate resistance to censorship. Everyone using your service to provide content should be able to opt-in to being a proxy for all other content. Then censors get to select between allowing all content, no objector's content or attempt to filter too high in the stack and/or violate copyright.
You should definitely read translated literature from foreign cultures.
I'm not an expert in SEO but I bet 1/3 to 1/2 of the serious SEO organizations/individuals do the same thing or something very similar.

"Its not cheating unless you get caught"
Is Ev Williams ruining Medium?
This post is a day old, but I wanted to add this in in case others think that Matthew Inman (The Oatmeal) has not been penalized: http://moz.com/blog/widgetbait-gone-wild

"We soon ranked for competitive keywords such as "Cash Advance," "Payday Loans," and a few EDU lead generation terms. Our success led to Google receiving a number of spam complaints along with some unfavorable press in the Guardian that referred to me as genius/fiend. The consequence of all of this is that we were penalized by Google. We no longer ranked for "Free Online Dating" and other dating related keywords. In fact, we no longer even rank for very brand-specific keywords such as "JustSayHi". In short, we had been completely banned from search results.

As soon as we discovered that we had been penalized, we immediately filed a reconsideration request. Matt Cutts got involved in the case personally, but after a couple of emails, the penalty was not lifted."

Sounds familiar!
Nick Szabo ≡ Satoshi Nakamoto?
GSM modem reception boost
You can feel kinship with the writer. It can be like meeting and talking with some really smart and imaginative and funny person - the likes you might not have around where you are right now in your life.
Should be captioned (2008)
That's the point of the quesion! Why should they be able to enter into a dialogue with google right smack in the middle of the holidays when others can't get a hold of anyone in google anytime in the regular calendar?
it might happen to anyone who is an absolute beginner
In no particular order:

The Tartar Steppe, Dino Buzzati

True Grit, Charles Portis

Thoughts, Marcus Aurelius

Its not all about me, Robin Dreeke

The unwinding, George Packer

Lives of the Laureates, William Breit

AntiFragile, Nassum Taleb