skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
This so clearly falls under Fair Use:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use#Fair_use_under_United_...

1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

2. the nature of the copyrighted work;

3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The upshot: the people with the best insight into Facebook's valuation voted on what it's truly worth. And those people were heading for the exits.

Employees taking part in the buyback could sell stock equal to the lesser of 25 percent of their holdings or $1 million

I don't really have a good idea how a facebook IPO would go, but I think it's easy to read too much into what the stock buyout says about the IPO prospects of facebook.

Were I a current employee of facebook I'd be happy to lock in 25% of my gains at a $6.5 billion valuation even if I thought, on average, my stock might be worth more at an indeterminate future time.

If the stock did exceptionally well, I'd still get a fortune out of the IPO, with the remaining 75% of my stock, and if the stock did poorly, I'd already have made a lot of money.
I would definitely change the name. It sounds more like a job ticketing. EDIT: And you can also add a link to an event on the front or a stream of events being created.
If you're making an app, you ought to be making an entire portal to your product. It's bad design to want users to use two separate, different-in-intent applications if they want full functionality.
Hey humbling and phace2phace family I recently learned about you in a post on hacker news today and since then I have done diligent research to determine if in fact you are able to do what you say.Needless to say that I found nothing about you whatsoever.I've developed a method of doing business using well-revised text to contact possible business partners using existing email and snail-mail infrastructure this concept has tentacles that are already wound cthulu-like around the minds of many venture capitalists that my knowledge to convey this does not seem likely to have an effect so I am prepared to speak your language and hope you understand how to take a more appropriate action. I am excited and look forward to seeing your personal and business growth sincerely, diiq
This is really well written - worth reading just to see a good storyteller.
If you like this, you'll appreciate "The Inbox of Nardo Pace, The Empire's Worst Engineer."

http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/nardo-design-empire.php

(That may not be the original link, but it was the first result on google.)
Apple is evil, You're All Fanboys, and other half-truths
The author doesn't seem to disagree (with you or Mackey) on this point, he just thinks it's impractical to expect human nature to change.

I think it's been widely accepted for a while that in first world countries we are literally killing ourselves with food, stress, cigarettes etc.

On the other hand, I thought people living longer was one of the problems facing society/medicine since even the healthiest of old people need more care than, to be blunt, the dead.
I think this is a common misconception in the startup community right now. I'm not reallys sure why, because logically speaking, the longer you survive (i.e. succeed), the more scenarios and learning experiences you can go through.

Whereas, if you fail, it's GAME OVER. You're just going to to go through the same experience once again.
the Unix philosophy heavily influenced the open source software movements and the creation of the Linux desktop OS

Of course there are plenty of desktop Linux distros, but most Linux machines in the wild are running servers.
I am given to understand that it is designed to be reloaded with end-user content. I don't know if that will be a feature of this initial rollout, though.
So, really, this is a metamarketing event. Pepsi and CBS can't possibly expect to see any benefit from sending such an expensive ad to a miniscule amount of subscribers.

This seems more about the message ABOUT the message. The large amount of web coverage over the little video player is really the expected payoff to the advertisers.
It's possible to be truly unidentified and uncelebrated. It's not possible to do so while maintaining a specific identity, especially after it becomes well-known. That he maintained this identity well after it gained celebrity wasn't exactly forced on him.
You guys are going up against the big daddys in this space:
http://www.eventbrite.com/

I did some research into this space.
There are acutally tons of companies in this space which IMHO is a good thing for you. I would try to focus on one niche to get revenue coming in.
It's easy to run up long bills if you roam internationally, $3/minute adds up fast.
I started using Git about six months ago for tracking notes (i usually use TextMate) and have been adding much more things into version control since then.

Even when not saving the data on a remote server, Git allows me to quickly start a repo when required and branch quickly and easily.

Version control provides amazing new possibilities to many kinds of data. Currently I am using Git not only for tracking Python, PHP and HTML/CSS/JavaScript projects, but also notes, papers, sometimes todo lists and pretty much anything text-based.

Tried writing and using a tool that unzips a Word doc and then adds the XML files inside to a Git repo, but the XML history is quite useless.

If Google Wave like Robots are possible in Docs, then would be great to add Git functionality to Google Docs. Or maybe Google will just improve the history views in its apps.
Thanks for the link. This micropitch will separate the men from the boys, the so called pitches, from the great ones. If it sounds great and can be easily and effectively conveyed to the audience while getting people excited, it can be a hit.
And what are aerial intercept fighters doing with harpoons?
Neat stuff, your Nethooker lib looks pretty nifty. I was confused about how the server emulator worked, or even what it was exactly. From your comment above, maybe that's a part II topic. A high level diagram of the key components would be helpful I think.
Our initial niches are university and nightclub events, hence the wacky colors, but we do aim to tackle eventbrite.com and the more mainstreams events eventually.

Mat
And I thought the kilogram was defined in some platonic, mathematical way relative to some well-known constant in the laws of physics all along...

Also, how did they decide "how much" the initial kilogram should weigh?
I deleted it in June.
Pachube, Patching the Planet: Interview with Usman Haque
I think that's just a different mentality. You're both right.

The grandparent is thinking "Every application should do one thing really really well, and everyone should have a bunch of applications".

You're thinking "Every application should be full featured and do everything relating to a specific goal. You only need a single application for every task you do."
Awesome idea, coming shortly :)
"Magic as a Metaphor for Ubiquitous Computing" - http://www.orangecone.com/ambidextrous_i6p36_37.pdf [pdf]

and

"Wizard School" - http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2006/07/wizard-school.html

may be of interest to you.
Esquire was animated eink, this is video on lcd.
Niche Social Networks
Family ties
A lot of people don't realize this, but Fair Use in the United States is not a "right," but rather an accepted legal defense to copyright infringement. There is a difference.
Also, I was suprised, given the source, to find this recommendation in your link, apparently one of the best ways to improve health by paradoxically spending less:

"nationalizing the industry and using agency budgets to limit spending."
I'm hoping the micro-usb for charging can also be used for reprogramming. Esquire had an open invitation to hack their eink display, I hope this one has a similar open approach.
The Only Truly Failed Project
I haven't done anything with it yet, but I do want to say it's a really great looking design.
Developers: Are you spreading malware when you code?
Ahh, so people suddenly have a right not to be offended now?

I find this view of yours very offensive. Shut up.
It's amazing how many programs are still made with Delphi.
Simple, effective and well executed! nice one (I actually can think of uses for this!!)

I especially like your time chooser method - that is really natural (though susceptable to shock/shake). The rest of the sign up form seemed a little oddly laid out (with the right column)

When you create an event it doesnt take you to the "invite people" page but to the admin overview, which then takes several clicks to get to the event page possibly directing to the events page might be better (with obvious links to the overview/management)?

Also the next step is obviously promoting an event and it is not clear how to do this. Some sort of popup when your redirected to the event page after setup that says "look here are some options --->" might help.

Have you got any plans for printable tickets? Or for the ability of the admin to reserve tickets themselves (say if they sell over the phone or via another medium but still allowing them to track "sales" in one place). Any plans to create a "template" event for reuse (if you hold weekly events say).

What about the email tickets - is it possible to add the ability to customise them? (for example I know some guys who would, if using you, like the ID number printed super large for easy checking).

What about ticket id's? Is it possible to customise these or at least track them in the CSV file you provide - so that they can be checked?

I understand some of that might not apply for your target market - just throwing random thoughts out there. All in all I think its really cool!

Any use?

(whats your revenue model like and what are your target audience? Do you think you can get enough events to make it profitable (actually I can see it working for club events organisers (we host some sites for them so I know the market in our area is like) as a ticker mechanism. <-- if you dont want to answer s'cool, just interested)
Hilarious. Valid points. I'm sure he could go on and mention another 100 or even 1000 things. I love Star Wars still.
In Star Wars' defense, it did happen a Long Time Ago.
Your transaction fee of 50p per ticket in the UK is far too high for University events. A lot of them would be £5-£10, so somewhere between 10% - 5% commission plus there are then withdrawal fees from PP for the money.

Eventbrite charge a flat 3% on the ticket price if you use their payment processing. What advantage do you offer over eventbrite?
easier: login to mysql and type "show processlist".
as someone who has been searching for a decent name/domain relating to tickets and ticketing (not for these kind of tickets) I can tell you it's tough!

Webticketing is an awesome catch even with the slight confusion!
Funny, your descriptions help me understand better than anything I've seen before. Maybe we're on to something here.
Entrepreneurs: Beware the curse of the new building
Wow. This is a great article.

When I took art classes in college, I was eternally frustrated. Every instructor would parrot a variant of, "here's what you should do to be a good artist, but remember: art can't really be taught because it's all subjective." And that drove me nuts. It was as if everyone teaching art just admitted that they didn't know how to teach art, but they were still more than happy to take my tuition money. As an artist who loves science, that just wasn't enough for me.

After reading this article, a bunch of critical and much-needed things effortlessly dropped into place. Thanks!
Is that you, Why?

More! More!
Great app - not a fan of paypal though!
This is getting silly, but it reminds me of,

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/2002/01/02cobra.html
I started clicking on the giant green + to start creating an event and it wasn't clickable. You should link that to your sign up page.
Think it might be related to the micropitching story here http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=775045
John Mackey agrees with you:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/aug/05/whole-foods-b...
You made the right decision. As you said in your blog, it's nearly impossible for someone to tell you the domain name (hab.la) without spelling it out. Olark.com is pretty straigtforward. This is coming from a guy who can speak limited Spanish and has a Spanish wife. ;)
> If you bought a reserved instance yesterday, you're in at the old pricing. And that's kind of crappy of Amazon

You're not thinking it through. Suppose the cost of the machine declines over time as a series over 5 months: 9,8,7,6,5. They could charge you those numbers each month, or they could charge you $7 each months on upfront commitment. Either way they recoup the cost and you are paying the same.

However, with monthly plan you have try to predict hardware price declines in your business plan and you bear the consequences of getting it wrong. With commitment plan, you can lock in the expected savings immediately and put it into your business plan. If Amazon gets it wrong they eat the cost, if they get it right they win.

This is a classical risk swap, and it allows you to focus on your business, not tracking the changing environment.
Aza Raskin: Conversational Computing (Ubiquity & Jetpack)
I think a nice, lean music catalog and iPod sync version of iTunes is in order for those of us who don't care about the store/video/DVD ripping/facebook integration/julienne fries. Or better yet a modular version so that people who don't even want the iPod sync can opt out of that as well.
Thanks really great feedback, much appreciated.

1. The Time Picker isn't mine, its a open source JQuery Plugin http://haineault.com/media/jquery/ui-timepickr/page/

2. We are working on the Invite Friends/Promote code still, which is why there is a kink in the workflow at the moment, by the time its done, it will all make much more sense.

3. Printable Tickets are planned, actually investigating using moo.com api or something similar, but won't be doing these in the near future.

4. Reserved Tickets are due out next

5. Templates, in due course.

6. No plans to customize the Email at the moment, but we are certainly considering a white label solution which would allow this.

7. Ticket id's aren't customisable, but adding them to the CSV would make a lot of sense, will certainly do that.

I wouldn't be doing it if I didn't think we could make this profitable, hope that is enough of an answer :)

Thanks for the great feedback much to ponder, and will certainly adjust the feature list accordingly.

Mat
It is not true that R2-D2 can't handle stairs. You can see him walk the stairs in Episode 2.
If you are selling tickets to your event, the Eventbrite fee is $0.99 + 2.5% per ticket sold. (max fee $9.95)

http://www.eventbrite.com/t/eventbrite-invoice
webticketing is ok, but it is still a .net domain.
Anyone got any more info on the conspiracy theory in the comments by "jdas"? I've heard others saying that On2 was picked up by Google at a price that cheated the shareholders.
This book is awesome: http://progit.org/book/
Thanks, we have had this comment a few times now, time to make the big boxes clickable :)
Coffee With Startups
Hmmm, I wonder how word got out about the proof. That seems to be the big issue.
Looking for air whales.
Yeah but it comes with built in applications and a platform that you can develop on top of. That's the part I find most interesting.
Rock Band is a fun game. It's a nice way to have a couple beers and kill some time with friends.

I get the feeling that, if RB and GH didn't exist, this guy would be complaining about other bands doing Beatles covers.

I'm pusing 40, but I'll make sure to stay the hell off his lawn in the future.
Why is the Antitrust Division Investigating the Google Book Search Settlement?
How is it a problem if someone you purchase a product from has your billing information? Pretty standard customer data to have if you're an ecommerce firm, just as stated in the article.
Could it be that our friend Humbling don’t just know how HN works?
Take a look at his/her profile
http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=humbling

In what case story about 'Diligent research' is not true. I don’t know about to say about this guy; Humbling troubling.
Does using a CDN count in any way? It's not "cloud computing" in a strict sense but it is in a more liberal sense.
The growth behind DailyBooth is very impressive (and it's a great concept - a lot of my Twitter posts have a photos). I'm sad I couldn't make it to Demo Day this year.
I have seen photos taken with a G10 at an arena concert by a professional photographer (who didn't want to take in her expensive gear). At ISO 1600, they were a grainy mess.
Depending on people to make sacrifices for a paradigm shift is a recipe for failure.

Amen. Just ask Jimmy Carter, who was the only president in recent history to have a sane energy policy (namely, that individually and collectively the American people must use less energy and make sacrifices to do so). Not only did we not heed his words of wisdom, but out of sheer bloodymindedness we voted the Gipper in and plunged headlong into the abyss of energy profligacy. We're now paying the price.
Terani Law Firm - Criminal Defense Lawyers
Experienced law firm made up entirely of criminal defense lawyers. Large firm with powerful resources available to help clients.
> By ending with "filling up boats", he implies something on a grander scale than "climbing the logs". In fact, I can't see instantly how you could correct your own attempt, because while "filling up boats" implies necessarily that there are many goats and turtles completely filling these many boats, yours doesn't have an end in sight.

You nailed it, here. This is exactly what I was thinking, but I couldn't put it into words.
wicked stuff (and thanks for the link to the JQuery plugin).

One comment I would have is that I would look into the white label approach a bit more. There could be a niche for brandable ticket sales sites - you know like if you run a club night a way to brand the whole interface with their theme and so forth.

We host a few club nights websites and I know something like that would interest them (because current solutions are a bit steep in upfornt cost, installation and maintenance).
The Longevity of "Enterprise" Tools
>I've blown up photos to 20x30 with no problem.

I'm sure they looked decent, but would they have looked better with more pixels? I think a 3MP image @ 20x30 with any reasonable printing density requires more data than your camera captures.
I think we're on to the idea of elevator pitches.
Good to know at least some of the big dogs don't treat people like serfs.
Not going to say too much more on here, but watch this space :)
Don't bother - the article is actually about Apple and how great they are.

"In the here and now, Apple's success is unparalleled, and the engine is humming better than ever on multiple vectors - products, margins, developers, profits and consumer engagement.

Simply put, the goodness of Google-style openness, and the good tidings it provides for consumers and creators, does not in anyway invalidate, lessen or neutralize the effectiveness of Apple's proprietary, integrated, secretive, totalitarian-style approach."

The comments are funny though: "Jesus, what a load of crap. You sound like a 4 year old screaming for his mommy. Did your app just get rejected from the store?"
How many people know that the lead developer for Bob 2.0 was also the co-founder of Valve and the development lead for Half-Life [Gabe Newell]

Worthwhile read just for that snippet of knowledge!
Mythryl: second public release featuring "first-cut OOP support"
This was not well thought-out.

If you were any other sort of vendor charging people money and accepting credit cards, you'd have exactly the same sort of information.

Move along. Nothing to see here.
Google, Bing and Yahoo do not have themselves as the top hit for that query either. Zoning in on Bing here and taking that as a recommendation is not entirely fair.
http://www.bing.com/search?q=search+the+web gives google
http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=search+the+web gives google
http://www.google.com/search?q=search+the+web gives yahoo

Everyone here knows it's perfectly possible to manipulate queries to all engines to return top results for their rivals.
And yet this is realistic. Wouldn't you expect a big, clumsy organization like the Empire to be inept at design? They should've outsourced. It's inefficiencies like this that keep people like Boba Fett employed.
That article is worth posting to HN. Please do so.

It seems just obvious to me that a frank discussion about the economics of health care would be a prerequisite for health-care reform.
I think you stopped reading just after that first commenter did as you missed his closing thought, though I admit it's a confusingly written entry.

The article has 3 stages, 1) what all the blogs are saying (confusingly written in the first person even though he doesn't subscribe to this view), 2) the fact that Apple are right now crushing the competition and finally 3) it then lays out a prediction/warning of what I think is the most likely scenario:

Apple starts off with an innovation and quality lead but at some point an "inferior" competitor (most likely Android) gets enough traction and marketshare to make it the place to be for developers and therefore users, and therefore developers. This virtuous cycle repeats until the iPhone is a niche player for folks who really appreciate usability and aesthetics.

Yes, it's just a retread of Mac vs. Windows and you heard it a million times when the iPhone was first announced but I think it's still highly likely, particularly with Google backing and a coalition of hardware partners based around an open source codebase.
"Better" isn't enough to gain traction. You need to provide something completely new.
There has always been some dark corners in _why's writing, with some dreary biographical detyails permeating.

I 2000-2001, his parents divorced, and his father went through a mental breakdown.

A bit later he writes that suicide would be the only thing preventing him from finishing some work.

Death is present in several chapters of the poingnant guide.

Then comes this: "narco+alco have
turned kooky people i love into obliterated people i love.
god, god, god, please keep her alive." in the post linked above.

The 4th version of shoes should have been nicked "murder". One of his last tweets was "i thought that RIP was strictly for cremation." ... An I find the Shoes book scary.

-

Overall, his universe wasn't as fun as he tried to present it.

I simply hope he's ok.
I would recommend a simple video highlighting the simple sign up process. 1-2-3 really prove to people that it takes minutes focusing on the number of steps involved and that the screens are not very long (not much scrolling).

Then I would focus on the ease of creating an event. Again hopefully 1-2-3.

The same or another video would contain the end user experience of buying tix for your event. So before signing up for anything you have a full blown view of what signing up will be like, setting up an event, and what your event goers will be experiencing.

Great idea. Best of luck.
I must be a real geek, then. Limiting myself to x words, y sentences, or z seconds never helped. Limiting myself to 111 characters, now there's a unit of measure I can relate to.
There are other reasons the Gipper was voted in, as I remember as a voter in that year, but I agree with you that Carter's proposed energy policy would have saved the United States a lot of grief over the next three decades, and possibly have prevented the major wars we are now involved in.