skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
First up don't say "The anarchistic book shop" (definite article) when you mean "An anarchistic bookshop", ie a hypothetical bookshop which from your description appears to be a worker owned co-op.

I get where you're at now (I think), you want to allow the commercial use provided that the business, eg a co-op, isn't providing profit to external agents only to owners or workers in the form of wages. That's still commercial. It's not greatly different if a family owned bookshop make millions off liberalised copyright works versus a publically owned company making millions split amongst it's shareholders. In fact in some ways it's worse.

The only way to keep your model and not have this sort of scenario would be to specify the allowed wages, but then if the same people own the building they can put the rent up - the company doesn't make a profit as their rent eats up all excess monies which goes to the same peoples bank accounts at the end of the day.

I like the spirit of what you appear to be suggesting but in practice it seems entirely unworkable as a system unless all members of society agree not to abuse it. Most systems would work under those terms IMO.
...and this is powered by energy from the vacuum?
Clickable link here
http://article-rewriter.appspot.com/
Restore, Work, Destroy: An EC2 lifecycle
I fail to see how this is "evil". The evil one worries about in context of a company like Google is information privacy.
Not everyone expects that the singularity will be survivable. Extinction still seems the most probable outcome.
Let me know if you're interested in seeing more visualizations.
Tried WysiHat?

http://github.com/37signals/wysihat/
Hm. When I cliked on the Ebook "Add to Cart", Opera complained that the encryption key length was too short, and thus that the site was insufficiently secure.
There was one JavaScript bug causing it to act up. Fixed now, though.
On Music and Code
For a proof-of-concept that you expect to throw away when you start on a real version, things can be sacrificed to speed. But it is ugly, I'll agree.
I'm not saying the poster is necessarily faking, but how should we know that someone who chose the name MattCutts is the Matt Cutts he claims to be? Do we assume he's not an impersonator because we like his answer? This comment is the very first activity on that account.
Me too. My fondest memories were coming home to a fraternity house where 40 of us lived together. There was always something going on. What great times! We were either learning something new, hanging out together, playing football in the yard, playing bridge, fixing up our house, partying, chasing women, etc., etc., etc. Lunch and dinner served every day in the dining room. No shopping, no mortgage, no one depending on us for so much, and no cubicle!

I've been trying for years to recreate that atmosphere in my adult life, but without much success. I haven't given up, though...
I decided not to filter the data in the interest of giving anyone the ability to use the exact data set I received. For my personal use, yes, I removed the bad data. But as far as giving out the csv, I thought it made more sense to give people the full set and let them decide (honestly, some people are fishy, but not obviously fake... so it'd be hard to be fair).
Obama's 10 Leadership Mistakes (And How Not to Make Them)
Hi. Nabeel here. To be clear this should not be thought of as conclusive academic analysis. These were just interesting indicators that I found.

I was using the data that was available from the article linked, which means it's the largest 100 public software companies, then segmented by type. Which meant, any individual category had roughly 5-8 companies with which to sample.

In the entertainment category it was Activision (4 years to $50m), Electronic Arts (6), Take-Two (6), International Game Technology (10) and a few others.
Contrarian view (which to me is much more informed):

http://venturehacks.com/articles/share-price

This argues that all that matters is share VALUE, not percentage.
We're talking about a website that normally gets 100 page views per day. Are you saying that Google should hire thousands of full-time employees to service customers who each only account for ten or fifteen bucks worth of business a year?
Links to the editors I have already tried:

http://ckeditor.com/demo
(a little slow in FF, seems a little hokey in general)

http://www.fckeditor.net/demo
(crashes FF3 with it's slowness!)

http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/examples/full.php
(really slow to load in all browsers)

http://nicedit.com/demos.php
(I liked this the most out of the alternatives so far, it's fast and lightweight but the HTML editor is not full-size and it's image properties box kind of misses the mark for my use)

http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/examples/editor/code_editor.h...
(I had numerous problems with the editor's Image properties box disappearing and taking images with it, also setting up the editor to allow editing of raw HTML never really worked that well)
Who's views aren't shaped, in part, by their father?
GGF Shareholders Push Through Pirate Bay Acquisition
This is totally not what you're asking, of course, but I still wanted to represent this opinion:

I've never made a penny on Adsense, and probably never will. I think the ads usually look like warts on a site, and if you need to have them on your site then you have other, more serious problems. Unless maybe you're an open-source developer site or something. I think the argument that they are 'zero work' and 'free money' is ludicrous. I'm not against advertisements, in general, but I think Adsense often makes sites look like crappy, low-rent. low-content, spammy, rip-off sites. (And, yes, I'm aware of all the major media companies that use Adsense on their sites.) Another major reason I hate this type of near random text ad is that you rarely have 100% control over what is being presented to your audience...and I'm very picky about who I want to be associated with - even at the subconscious level.

Most importantly, every single time we have tested having Adsense or their ilk on one of our sites, it has lowered our overall conversions. Paying customers are worth more than the pittance you usually make from blind text ads, so we try not to make our customers feel like they should take a shower after visiting our sites.
This isn't a person attack. It's just a general observation.

People seem to vastly oversimplify Kurzweil's (and others) stance on the singularity. The truth is that we don't know what will happen. The best one can do is prepare for possible senarios.
Apple to App Developer: Remove the Most Useful Function, Please
The point in the above comment is that adwords customers with large accounts pay such large amounts each month because

When you do get to speak to someone (via above hidden shoephone method) it's still like speaking to a clumsy CIA agent. In fact I spent most of this morning doing that. It seems very clear that the googlers on the other end of the shoe phone aren't allowed to disclose much. They allude. They read out the relevant policies to hint at what might be going on. [me]'Has a trademark complaint been made?' [Googler]'All I can say is that your ads have been manually disabled at some point last week?' [me]'Would it help if I got the trademark owner on the phone?' {Trademark owner has already told us that they don't know what is going on. Google has been impossible to get on the phone and answer emails extremely vaguely} [googler] 'reads some policy that hints at a recent complaint' [me] 'Can you email me the procedure for trademark exception.' [googler] 'Google it'

challenge Try & find the form you need to have filled in order to get approval to advertise using someone's trademark.

We are talking about customers that have spent hundreds of thousands with google over time. Google allows itself to unceremoniously damage their business as if they are doing something shady. They then make it impossible to contact them and when they are contacted, well they make phone companies look good.

Answering blog posts is great. Writing your blog is great. It isn't instead of normal customer support though.
Ask HN: How to get acquired?
Are there any good resources on how to get acquired? I am in a strange situation. I believe my company should be an attractive acquisition target. How do I engineer the acquisition?

Cold calling or meeting someone with the intent to sell might not be the best way. A buddy of mine is an investment banker. Should I get him involved? What would you suggest?
The transitions I made from FORTRAN to PL/I to C to C++ to Java to Perl to PHP were each pretty painless

That just means he's still writing FORTRAN in PHP syntax :P
This was starting with the premise of "success" -- let's assume it's a world class idea and hits $50m in revenue, goes public, and becomes one of the top 100 software companies in the world (in terms of capitalization). How long does that kind of amazing success take?

If you're wildest predictions about growth of your startup are off from what the historically most successful companies public today are doing, that's worth looking at.
Why don't you import one?
Yeah, the data was just software companies. So no Apple, Nokia. They also didn't have Google or Yahoo, which was unfortunate. Still, in terms of top 100 software companies, it's a valuable sample.
I've never used it myself, but I have gotten job offers from LinkedIn
Would your productivity double? (This is a serious question btw).

Absolutely. (This is a serious answer).

Yesterday was a typical day. In the middle of 3 hot tasks that needed complete focus. A user wanted to grab a "quick bite" and discuss her project. "No problem," I thought, "I have to eat anyway."

Despite cell phone calls, it still took 15 minutes to meet out front. 10 minute drive to restaurant. 10 minutes in line. Eat. Wait for check. Massive traffic jam because of road work. (If we had known, we would have come back a different way.) 2 hours for lunch of which 10 minutes was spent talking about the project. Then, after returning emails, voicemails, and taking Pepto Bismol, I just didn't feel like getting back to what I was doing all morning. I lost half a day because management doesn't have enough fucking vision to provide some kind of "eating resources". (Sorry, such a disruptive problem with such an easy solution that I hardly ever see.) BTW, this facility employs 1600 people with the same problem every single day.
Tech celebrity quiz
Worked for me too. $6 for a bad ass book. Thanks for posting
I was offering Joel's essay as context, not contradiction. I just thought it was worth comparing the two arguments, given that the authors work together on stackoverflow.
Thanks for the response. So, what would be a good book before SICP?
I remember a comment at some point by pg that customer service might be Google's Achilles heel. The evidence is accumulating. Any service that cannot be provided without it cannot be provided by Google and there is an opportunity to compete.

Judging by how keen people are to share google customer service frustrations at any opportunity, I think this is evidence.
Other possible interesting graphs:

* Family type v. income
* Number of years in industry v. income
* Hours per week v. family status
* Age v. Employment type
* Level of education v. Employment type
* Marital status v. Employment type
* Age v. Hours per week
You can get just as bad with a $100,000 account.
What are some tips for a new programmer?
GScreen's Dual-Screen Spacebook Coming Soon(ish)
Rails Rumble finalists announced - Vote for the best 48-hour micro-app
Patches grow on our code because it's easier to patch than it is to figure out the paradigm-changing code simplification that will encompass all previous functionality plus the new thing we want to add. That's hard work!

I'm elbow-deep in patch remediation right now, and even though I'm not worried about breaking anything (I have good code coverage and a big automated test suite), it's still mentally draining to do it right.
No I hadn't! Thanks!

I'm looking for something that comes a little more ready-to-roll unfortunately... I need to get a new editor in by tomorrow and I don't really have the time to setup something like this...

It sounds very similar overall to the YUI text editors...
Really sucks that they don't seem to be able to get an guidance on whether there app will get through or not before they create it. I'd imagine building an app like this one would be a sizable task, even more so in Google voices case.
> Patents do not apply to the developers, they apply to the users of the software

"Under certain jurisdictions, there is a particular case of patent infringement called "indirect infringement." Indirect infringement can occur, for instance, when a device is claimed in a patent and a third party supplies a product which can only be reasonably used to make the claimed device."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contributory_patent_infringemen...
Looks interesting, but no support for IE6 and IE7 can be a deal-breaker for many users, especially when there's 960gs (http://960.gs) which supports those browsers.
I was surprised to see that the number of respondents working "40 hours a week" more than doubled any other entry. I listed 65 and felt sure I would be just average. FML lol
Business idea: Musician's own website as definitive source of all info
If one percent of them call once in a year, why not?

I can call a toll-free number about the 1 dollar pack of gum I bought. I don't get stellar interaction but it is still more than what we are talking about.
Since I sold HostBaby, and signed a non-compete, I'm not allowed to do this anymore, but I hope someone does. :-)
Most of the 40 hours a week people would probably be people just working full time jobs with no startup on the side.
I don't know - haven't done it - but I can say that, generally when I see these questions, the first things people ask tend to be about both competitors who might be acquirers and/or huge conglomerates that might be developing/developed something similar and might wish to purchase you to save time or gain market share. What can you share with us along those lines?

Good luck!
I doubt it's a mistake. The fact the BBC and Wired have reported this so quickly to me indicates the hand of Apple PR, slowly working to turn the tide of negative App Store stories.
Improve PACER - The Petition Site
One thing I would like to point out: Going from 100 hits a day to over 10,000 hits a day does NOT look like regular traffic. If anything, it looks more like bot activity than anything, which is definitely against the ToS, and would be plenty reason to shut down your account.

I'm not in the position to do so, but if I ran an advertisements, and suddenly saw 100x the regular users hitting the site, I'd be pulling the ads.
Yeah, I fell for this. Not that I think anyone was actively deceiving me, I just didn't ask the obvious question. They said, "We're offering you X options." and I should have immediately said "Out of how many total?" I didn't ask, so it's really my fault.
A Manifesto for Speed - a reply to Freeman's "Manifesto for Slow Communication"
Sure. The industry is dominated by large competitors, two public companies and four backed by large conglomerates with deep pockets. All of them spend millions of dollars in advertising and attracting users. Its a highly competitive market and we've been able to carve a niche with very little investments.

It a mature market, from a technology standpoint.
If your customers have to invoke the "legal system" to get around your incompetence, you've failed in every way that matters.
Countertops and appliances with this technology would be genuinely useful. Wires and plugs are only a hinderance on a kitchen countertop. I can see this introduced as a high-end luxury, then have it filter down into the mainstream. Tables and other furniture with this tech would be great. Step in the door and set your smartphone down on the stand, and it charges. Desks would be awesome. Laptop stands would be great too.
In other news, dog bites man.
The difference is that Apple is just being Apple while they try to figure out how to handle the App Store. I'm not saying it is right, but there's a certain intelligence and style behind the way Apple ignores people.

Google, on the other hand, is just incompetent.

(And PayPal is, too, but they seem to be slowly learning.)
Unless it can play music while you do other stuff, like the iPod app can do, it's not really making iTunes obsolete.

I find that really frustrating, with all the streaming radio apps.
6 million songs...until you lock the phone or exit the app, deeming it almost useless. So that sucks.
When this many people express frustration with their inability to talk to a person, you have a problem. Your methods aren't working. Sending an email isn't enough; people need feedback to be reassured someone is, in fact, helping them.
In short, Apple has just approved an application which renders iTunes obsolete.

And this is why I can't wait until it shows up in the AppStore.

Edit: Except the "minor" point renkeky brings up.
If you can not make it work for sites that have 100 page views per day then you should not accept them. Once you accept them you have to support them.
Yeah, that's me right now. I'm taking a vacation from startups, so even though I still program all weekend, it's not "work" anymore. ;)
this is why I don't understand the "nerd utopia" line. it seems that the vast vast majority of possible non-human intelligences would have goals directly harmful to human goals (even modest ones). It seems like the best we can hope for is a really nice zoo.
I'm very happy with the support I get from the Google AdSense team...but it sounds like i'm outside the norm....
and by outside the norm I mean someone interacts with me once every quarter or more.
even with as little confidence in apple that I have, there is no way this is a mistake, its a high profile case and an application that apple have no doubt had their eyes on for a while
As an American, I officially envy you, and I've been bitching about the cellphone situation for years. T-Mobile is the closest to European phone practices that you can find this side of the pond.
Marissa Mayer of Google thinks anonymity is bad
For instances like these, I would happily pay $x per minute to talk to a real person.

A high call charge would prevent random crazies from calling (e.g. "why isn't my website top of the search rankings!?!?"), but would at least give the chance for people for whom Google's service has financial implications the chance to talk to a real person who can get appropriate answers from within the company.

And if random crazies do end up calling it, then maybe that's a new revenue stream for Google?
If you're paying by the click and the clicks are not fraudulent (and the amount of traffic says nothing about it being fraudulent or not) then there is no reason to pull the account if the traffic goes up.
The cake is a... never mind.

Small and efficient governments which create law and order are good for growth. They themselves do not create the growth, but they create the necessary conditions for growth.

Government spending on the other hand, with few exceptions, does not create new value and doesn't even create the conditions for new value. It can create additional demand. If the source of the spending is debt, it can be stimulating in the short term, but it rarely is, see Japan's attempts to stimulate through government spending.

Big or huge governments almost certainly are a significant net drain on productivity.
iTunes obsolete? Nah. I have lots of music I don't have to pay for (already paid for) that I don't need to use or even can use Spotify to access. It is hard to use Spotify on the plane. And when I travel, even if I wanted to, the data rates when roaming in Europe are pretty appalling. €4/MByte, no thanks.
Open source is/was never about the money. It's about the freedom of having the source. The license is pretty easy and simple if you distribute your modified soft with the same open source licence.

The concept of the gpl is: I show you my code, if you show me yours. It's about sharing and repriocity.

It's not about snatching the nice tools built by the community, putting a nice gui layer and some extra features on it and closing the source. The fastest way for our friend here to adhere to the license is dropping ffmpeg or releasing his code as gpl. He doesn't seem to be willing to do that.

How would you like people who copy your sourcecode without permission and sell it to anyone?
I would say that the best we can hope for is that intelligence is so hard to understand that we get uploading first, and therefore the vast majority of non-human intelligences are previously-human intelligences -- that is, us.

The second-best possibility is that intelligence is possible without consciousness ("really powerful optimization processes") and no one creates people AI before we are adept at using RPOPs to further our human goals.

Both of these seem like wishful thinking, unfortunately. I don't have any idea how to push the future toward one of these outcomes.
I disagree. I believe the user threshold to be higher because it does require a good connection. And good connections are not common.

You may probably have a good (or even a decent) connection to the net, but I have a painful 3G connection that lately have been dishing out a performance worse than my old US Robotics 33.6 Modem.

Playing browser based games nearly mandate that you have both a good and stable connection. Stable being a often forgotten keyword. Connection spikes can kill you easier than the challenges you face, even very small spikes can bother you severely.

However, desktop based game tend to be very network-cheap. Civilization can be easily played on a 56k dialup connection, without much hassle. But the latest batch of MMOs are very network demanding, which is the main reason I won't even bother to try them for a good while, even the desktop ones. Devs seem to be only cattering to the very small percent of the gamers that happen to have good connections.
I found it interesting that only 1.8% of the population seems to be female
"Given the hundreds of millions of users" - I doubt that anyone who is using Google for search purposes will need to contact customer support.

Tens of millions of webmasters - I would suggest that only a fraction of them would need to call customer support, same with the publishers and advertisers.

Banks also have millions of customers, just when the call center is busy, they are put on hold. I think the best investment that Google cam make right now is not to sacrifice customer service in order to get on with throwing stuff on the wall and see what sticks. Instead, just hire some recent grads to deal with people's issues. How much would that cost, lets say ten grads, 100k a month each, that's 1 million, a drop in the water as far as Google is concerned. The return on this investment on the other hand would be so great as people can then continue loving Google rather than suggest that Google is being evil.
Security Snafu: Elance Sends Private Messages All Over The Place
It's probably an overestimate too, because if you look at the dataset a lot of the 44 women are fake (i.e. have improbable ages such as 407,407,99,95 and are pre-high schoolers). People filling out the survey for the lulz would choose as different a profile from the typical HN-er as they could, and that includes making a female respondent.
Is art criticism so easy that a pigeon can do it?
1 hour Swedish (English subs) documentary about Hans Rosling: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=776421
Yeah! Rumble! Yeah!
I'm surprised to see the default thinking is that there is something dodgy at play here.

Jumping from 100 impressions per day to 10,000+ probably just triggered some automatic fraud prevention system.
Is is just me or did the project seems a bit mundane? The introduction is about biotech and nanotech, etc, and the projects are mobile apps, scaling up 3D printing, and smart traffic. Anyone else underwhelmed? Maybe I had unreasonable expectations.
Seem to be a surprisingly (?) high number of 300k+ earners. All Silicon Valley?