skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Take this site with a huge grain of salt. It generally rewards easy professors and punishes hard ones. Many of the best teachers at my school had so-so records on the site because they weren't afraid of failing people. People that do average or well in a class are much less likely to fill out the form on that site than someone who's looking to spite the professor that just failed them.

The corollary is also true, that easy but useless professors tend to have high scores.

The best advice for picking professors is to make friends with people in your program that are further along than you and ask them who their favourite professors were and why. If they say he was great because the class was easy and you got an A avoid that professor, you won't learn a thing. If they say something like well I didn't get a great mark but I learned so much that it was worth it that's the professor you want.
Kedrosky: Why Don’t More Entrepreneurs Want to Be Entrepreneurs?
I think the title pulls it solidly in to flamewar territory, we'll see how it pans out.

I commend you for doing your best to avoid controversy :)

EDIT:

HN controversy formula: credits for article / comments on article
Wow, incredibly unrealistic.

I mean, where's the hundred "WHAT KIND OF DINOSAUR ARE YOU" quizzes? Where's the dozen invites to join a VAMPIREZ VS. WEREWOLFS app?

I mean, come on guys. At least try.
> That you can't talk about morals in a modern sense without tracing them structurally back to Christianity, even if your morals are completely religion-free.

Why single out Christianity?
Five Greatest Hedge Fund Farewell Letters
The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare
Mobile Money Transfer Giant Has Arrived
HugePre-Launch.com is a Brand New Mobile Money Transfer Company That Allows You To Make Money From Home And Win A Mercedes Benz With Your Referrals !
I wonder when seriously diminishing returns on investment in an office chair kicks in? Is there really a substantial difference in comfort or health compared to the Aeron or even the Mirra?
That's a question for Hart, although I'll give it a shot (since I read the book)

I think the qualifier here is modern, western ideas of morality. When you come up with some system of morality, like Kant's Universal Imperative, or utilitarianism, or existentialism, you end up right back with either Christian thinkers or thinkers who were so influenced by Christianity as to be reacting/growing from that influence. These ideas are a integral part of Christianity's impact on modern, western thinking.
"Abusing" the patent laws? Isn't this exactly what these laws were made for?

Not that I am defending Big Pharma, but the generic producers are profiting on research that they did not fund. It has a number of good effects sure, but I can understand why there are powers that find this unacceptable and want to stop it.
FriendFeed Alternative Streamy Hammered By New Traffic
A lot of the Christian (or religious) morals are also ones we now (rightly) reject. Such thing as homosexuality being immoral.

When people make the point about religion and morals I always have to think: yes the influence is there (but no, it's clearly no the ONLY source) but that influence is not all good. And it is irrelevant in modern times: religion seems to now be catching it's morals up to the rest of society (example: IVF children)

EDIT: I think the title "Atheist Delusions" isnt helping the point TBH.
Definitely the people. I thought that it would be all about the sightseeing and the cycling, but since the company sets the route and they care more about keeping you en route and safe from cars, sightseeing opportunities are limited, and of course, vast swathes of the country are just boring corn and soybean fields. The cycling turned out to be more difficult than I thought it would be since I didn't really know how to maintain the right posture to keep my butt and shoulders from aching for the first couple weeks, but once I figured that out, it became pretty fun.

But I think I discovered a lot of role models on the trip (I'm only 21). Surprisingly, this is only the second group of people where I've felt like I've fit in really well. A few people adopted me as a sort of surrogate daughter, and I've become really good friends with them.

Most of the people were quite well to do--we had a lot of retired engineers, doctors, and a real estate lawyer. We had a couple crazy wealthy people, but they behaved like anyone else. On the whole, they were very gracious people, very kind, and generally good-natured. Some of them acted like they were 60 or 70 or whatever, and some of them could have fit in at a frat party if they looked younger.

I didn't really have time to go off on my own much. I really sucked for the first four or five weeks, and I barely came to the next motel in time for a shower and the overview of the next day's route. Also, they usually put us up in motels located in strip malls, so we were often a couple miles away from downtown. Even if I'd been inclined to get back onto my bike, urban riding is still something I don't want to do if I don't have to. Even if you're a strong rider who's able to fit in side trips and still get back in time, the sightseeing opportunities are limited.
Try having kids you young whippersnappers. You won't have any problem waking up when your 1 and 3 year old are awake at 5-7am looking for breakfast. You also won't have any problem sleeping as I practically pass out every night once the last one is tucked in for the night.
Good question, I've been looking at buying a nice office chair for home recently since my wooden dining table chair is starting to get a little old.

I'm really curious if the investment in something even as high as a mirra or Aeron is really worth it, though, to be fair, I've never sat in either.
IT Management Apps Don't Have To Be Ugly
Well, it's a markup language used for content presentation

XML is not for presenting information. It is for storing and describing it. Sorry. One of my favourite nitpicks.
The P2 theme is Wordpress's best answer to Twitter. It's pretty cool: http://ma.tt/2009/05/how-p2-changed-automattic/

Brad Fitzpatrick (LiveJournal founder) is at Google working on PubSubHubbub, which is a distributed push system for RSS. The Google Reader team is already experimenting with it (as a provider currently, not a consumer): http://googlereader.blogspot.com/2009/08/pubsubhubbub-suppor...
I'm reminded of the trouble that LiveJournal has had balancing the interests of its users and investors. They have millions of users, but many of those users post on topics that are, ahem, not what mainstream deep-pocketed advertisers want their names next to, and the users get very cranky when the LJ administration acts against their interests.

The "digital sharecroppers" may not be working for money, but they are expecting something less tangible in return for their efforts, and the things they want are not always compatible with the site owners making money.
The web is still very fragile
There was plenty of thought on morality before Christianity existed. Ask the Jews (and plenty of others). And before them the Mesopotamians and Egyptians.
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Beware the Idolatry of Numbers
Zazzle does. In fact, they just launched a partnership with Urban Dictionary. Every single definition now has a little "Get this on a mug" link.

http://www.zazzle.com/api
A Soldier’s Eye in the Sky
So anyone with a shovel is a hacker?
I'll be honest -- I'll probably get as much insight from reading the comments here on HN as in reading these books (as long as we don't start flaming) so hopefully the discussion can be enlightening for other readers on HN as well.

Sometimes in startups and small teams we have to make decisions with incomplete, inaccurate, or disputed information. There are no "right" or "wrong" answers, yet we still have to decide and begin execution. In these cases it's extremely fascinating to me to see how people debate and make decisions. Posting the current article (and picking the subject) is just a proxy, a simulator, to see how HN readers think in such situations.

Plus it gives me a place to make notes from my reading.
What follows is not physical truth, but emotional truth --- alas, that is what counts when you want to market a product like this.

I find your concept alarming. On paper or digitally, my signature is a symbol whose only referent is me. Not Sam, or diiq --- Sam points to a thousand thousand different individuals. But my signature points to me because I am the only person who can produce it.

If you want people to accept this product, you'll need to convince them that the signature they recieve is:

a) absolutely unique to them
b) representative of them
c) still points back to them

If I sign my name using Disney's trademark hand, people will see Disney, despite the fact that it's my name. Is there really enough variety in your showcase that I will believe people won't recognize your work?

To make this work, your designer(s) will have to become such master forgers that any hint of their own personal style vanishes. I... wouldn't want to be one of those designers.
If you're already suffering from back aches then it is definitely worth it.
Scam Artists Cashing in on Cash for Clunkers Program | TechJaws
And what do you know about India? And cultures?
Your comment says you know nothing about India and are an "internet-expert". People sitting on the couch commenting on things without having the slightest idea.

China and India are very complex countries. They are countries only on the surface. There are hundreds of very different cultures in both. Do you know India has 1762 languages for example? Generalizing for them on the basis of what some ignorant fools believe about eclipses is being as ignorant as them.
When they haven't been to grade five. They are more likely to believe heresy and superstition. Most people would not even know what IS cyanide. Forget committing suicide for it. Some people think of the sun as god as have some religious rituals. Having said that, some of these rituals are old.

Remember the hysteria after 9/11? Every two days there used to orange alerts and green and god knows what alerts. Was that a culture thing too?

It isn't about being racist. If you even mention that it (your comment) has to do anything with racism It's about ignorance. And absolute ignorance. I see this way too often about eastern cultures on the internet. And it sure is upsetting and extremely irritating.
Um, you sure about that? I just looked at it and it seems just fine. Firefox is rendering it as UTF8. I'm running FF 3.5 on Windows. (I'm not Japanese, but I can read the language.)
Remortgage With Bad Credit - You Can Refinance With Bad Credit
Absolutely. I've always been an admirer of the stoics (reading Meditations right now)

I'll let Hart speak for himself when it comes to outlining all of those. You'll have to read the book. I can't do justice to his argument as I'm still processing all of it.
SQL pie chart
> A lot of the Christian (or religious) morals are also ones we now (rightly) reject. Such thing as homosexuality being immoral.

I think that is 'in progress', we have some movement but nothing definite yet.

As long as there is a 'religious right' there will be controversy, and the 'noise' is getting louder rather than less so.

Plenty of people wonder what the fuss is about that gay marriage thing, and how come politicians allow themselves to be set up and used the way they do. Common sense as a morality guide here (you should not tell others how to live is a very nice example of a rule to live by that conflicts with how religion operates) is 'cleaner' than using religion (or what passes for it).
Big Think Interview with Anil Dash
Scalability Best Practices
The original Buddhist monastic precepts required that food be restricted to one meal a day before noon. It's a good way to live, but I've only ever kept it up for a couple of months at any one time. It's socially restrictive.
So, let's give it a shot, then let's come up with some non-religiously founded rules on what is a good way to live. Plenty of smart people here, and it's a bit like a program, hacking a society.

Rule #1 do not impact the lives of others in a negative way as perceived by them

Any candidates for rule #2 ?

Bugs in Rule #1 ?
New Atheists who are fond of bringing up "the list" are being intellectually dishonest. Historical atrocities were perpetrated in the name of religion merely because, at the time, religion had offered the best flag to wave. It is a symptom of an inherent human tendency to swarm.

Religious adherents who are fond of claiming that without religion, men would have never been viewed as equals, morality would have been weaker, liberty would never have emerged as a doctrine of thought, etc. are being equally dishonest for the same reasons -- religion was merely the medium used for transmission of some self-evident truths.

Then again, I didn't read the suggested book (yet) so maybe I should STFU.
Fark.com and CNN.com also do this. And it's an awesome idea. Geeks love snarky/one-liner tshirts.

(hint: offer them in black and in XXL)
Ten Top Tips to Grow Your Network
I am going to definitely give this a shot. As a side note... typically after a rough night of drinking I automatically wake up super super early in the morning... Like if my typical routine is sleeping at 4+am and getting up close to noon every day... after a rough drinking binge I'll be up bright and early at 8-9.

That's clearly not the answer to my problems but there have been certain occasions where when I know that I need to be up early I'll drink a six pack before going to bed.

This might not have anything to do with the alcohol, it might simply be because of the fact that I really need to take a piss when I get up. Or it's that combined with the fact that alcohol dehydrates you... so my body is waking itself up not out of hunger but out of thirst?

Just something I thought I would point out... maybe someone else shares this feeling?

Note: I too am writing this at 3:28 am, hah. Time for bed! I ate around... 10pm :|
Agreed. It's boring but starts you along the path to eventually selling your own ads. I'd also recommend highly targeted affiliate programs, which can pay better than AdSense and give you more control over who/what is shown.
A whole lot of nothing! Save yourself the bandwidth....
Ask HN: what's the time you spend on offering support?
I'm just wondering what amount of time do you need to spend on offering support for your users. Ok, it all depends on what kind of service you have and what kind of users you're dealing with. But what's your experience with support?
Interesting how physical activity is not showing up in any of these so called experiments. Why is this trend to outsmart the body? Give it a bit of work and you'll have a balance and energy that no wii fit and alarm clock can asses. No gadget nor habit can outperform a few push-ups with an intense workout or an energetic soccer game. Your body will tell you when it's time to sleep and when it's time to eat and believe me it will correlate with your working day.

Mens sana in corpore sano.
Best I've got: "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Categorical_imperative
Note 2 of 2: Apparently others feel this sentiment as well, I should have done a better job scanning the replies before posting.
Ive lived, worked, created, operated and advised startups in Colombia, Chile, Argentina, and briefly, Peru (apart from the U.S.)

In my opinion and limited experience, these are the top 3 places to launch a tech startup:

1. Chile: Government, (CORFO, specifically) helps out a lot with grants even for off the wall tech startups, something I dont see in the U.S., however, it is expensive compared to its neighbors, but living costs are at around $800/mo comfortably (no dependents)

2. Argentina: Amazing and large tech community with presedence, tech Angels and VCs, lots of tech and startup meet ups and events. Most, if not all the main tech startups have come out of Argentina. Great talent. Day to day living costs are more expensive than Chile.

3. Colombia: Best bang for your buck, more business friendly, extremely good engineering talent that is very affordable, easy cultural fit and work ethic. However, not a lot of tech startup presedence and capital. See: Results of: 7 developers, working 24/7 for 90 days, 1 house (in Colombia) http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=730031

• The #1 obstacle for startups in Latin America (and I think most of the rest of the world) is the Government. In the U.S. it takes 1 or 2 days, $70, to incorporate an LLC, whereas in Latin America it can take from a week in chile to over 175 days in venezuela.

• Most countries demand that you have an actual physical office, killing the option of work from home/garage.

• There is correlation between the time it takes to incorporate and the corruption of a country.
New business model: design a pet carrier that can run in the cargo tunnel, and rent out cats....
Neat :)

That reminds me of a story I once read, not sure of the attribution:

If you could choose to create a world just before you were born but not what place in that world you would have then that is the world you should strive to create around you.
A lot of christian ego-stroking bullshit, no new content. I'm gonna file this under the "jesus makes me feel good, so therefore it must be right" category.
These three points all revolve around this: your own network.

Which completely ignores the fact that working in this fashion means you are building an international network which opens up an entire world of opportunity.

You can keep your Valley network, thank you very much!
Microsoft to ditch support for IE6 in Office Web Apps
Certainly not ignorance; I've seen this affect first hand.

Mass panic in the US is incredibly different from what is seen in, say, India. It's fantastically interesting to see.

In the US it tends to be an "inactive panic" - so people will rant at length in bars and with friends etc. but end up taking no practical measures. The media heavily milk the situation but the healthcare profession tend to take a sensible laid back approach. In China (as I havent observed swine flu panic in India) its a much more "active panic". With remedies, face masks, precautions etc.

One of the guys who works for us and lives in India part of the year says mass movement is definitely part of the culture - and that panic (espeacially a global panic) can overlay onto that in interesting ways.

No ignorance: just interest.

> When they haven't been to grade five. They are more likely to believe heresy and superstition.

This perhaps was the problem then: the issue in the comet example was the media started the mass panic. But it was fairly global: and one of the biggest adverse reactions was in Asia.

Also please note you might have misconstrued "culture" - I see you talk about language and heritage, This is not the culture I refer to: but instead culture of the society there. And whilst India does have a many faceted and seriously complex mix of cultures and heritage it also has a clear national culture constructed from that. Sorry I didnt make that clear.

> I see this way too often about eastern cultures on the internet. And it sure is upsetting and extremely irritating.

(sorry to keep editing in further replies - im working at the same time). I find this highly offensive. Because I am definitely not ignorant of Eastern culture having spent some time there and having a deep interest in people, their interactions and their cultures. Please note I never said mass panic doesnt manifest in other cultures - I was simply commenting on one of the unique ways it does manifest in Asia.
Google file system, nothing to do with evolution.
I'd argue for some people the world is against them, it all boils down to random chance. Instead of poorly paraphrasing I will just link to this video which I believe sums it up nicely.

http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_ph...
Link me up with the suicides due to reports of Cyanide. That sounds ridiculous to me.
How Do iPhone Users Find New Apps?
Newspaper Revenues Predicted to Grow in 2010
It's Hard To Get The News From The News
First, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_pneumatic_post, the Prague system ended in 2002 when it flooded.

Second, the New York City post offices used to send packages to each other via pneumatic tubes. The system stopped in 1953, though, when it became rather impractical. I see that very much happening here.

And also, do we really _want_ this sort of thing? Are we just too lazy to get out of our houses to get a loaf of bread or whatever?
I know a few people using Dusty's service, for most it covered the hosting bills and has much better returns than Google AdSense. He's putting a lot of energy into making it even better.

I suggest diversifying your ad real estate, at least initially, there's no reason you can't have Featured Users + Adsense + Deck, etc. Just don't go overboard with the # of ads on the screen, you'll drive people away.

You may also try using Google AdManager or OpenX and selling ads yourself. I prefer the former because Google handles the hosting.
I'd be interested in knowing how many of the safety razor using folk in here made the switch after this

http://www.shaveblog.com/2006/03/welcome-new-york-times-read...

did a lap of the internet a little while back.

I made the switch after coming across it, haven't looked back.
identi.ca / laconica
After tweets have proved themselves, remove them from the site and hawk them to comedians. You'd just need one motivated buyer willing to spend a lot. Or better yet, use them yourself like William Shatner used Sarah Palin (giving back some to the original tweeters for an extra bonus).
Nah, I'm not sufferings honestly, I can still sit for 4+ hours and be fine, I just figured there was something I was missing out on. It's not exactly the most comfortable thing in the world to sit on a wooden chair for hours, but most of the time I don't notice it.
with pleasure :) (bear in mind this is in 1910! Internet-ness is vague. Hunt down a book called "Risk: The Science and Politics of Fear" - that has better references, I dont have it to hand right now)

http://books.google.com/books?id=U4FZp6f6q6MC&pg=PA437&#...
http://starryskies.com/articles/dln/3-98/comet.html

Interestingly in Rome the manifestation was a hording of oxygen bottles (which had to be banned briefly). There was some suicides there too I think.
I sometimes wear a bathrobe. Not one I actually use as a bathrobe... Just instead of a trenchcoat. It's ridiculously comfortable, and gets people to talk to me.
A business model based on setting a toll gate in front of an imposed monopoly is a business model that ought not to exist.
In my experience, building or joining a network for a tech startup when you come from abroad to another country is really easy.

It did not take me more than 2 weeks to get connected with the top lawyers, entrepreneurs, investors, accountants, talent, press and get complimentary access to office space.

At least that was my experience in Chile and Argentina, which have thriving and large tech startup communities.