skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
He's not suggesting there a no advantages , just that the ones that it does provide won't be enough to compete against non modular phones.
You've misread his statement. He sees the benefit, but points out that the tradeoffs will be the main areas of competition among smartphones: size, weight, battery life. All three will be worse in a modular phone. You'll also get less for your money overall. Not to mention that having to choose among components just adds an additional layer of option stress that most consumers don't want. Sure, there's a market for a modular phone, but it's not going to seriously compete against the Galaxy or the iPhone in the mass market.
Fat guy is dancing on "Work B***h"
'The sophisticated man alarm clock' would be fitting
Which is the same as their first official response to the thread further up the page too!
Thanks for your feedback! Dragged it :)
Mailcloud: Is it a Gmail killer?
Because to be usable it needs to be fast (and portable), and for a long time those constraints basically meant C - possibly not any more.

But let's not kid ourselves, reimplementing a library the size of OpenSSL in a new language, or even the same one, is not a trivial matter. We're talking about a $10m+ investment, who's going to pay?
The Insider's Guide to JavaScript Interviewing
Well, the problem's just (obviously) that if you ever open up an iPhone (or I suspect any competing phone), every cubic millimetre of it is filled with things that do stuff. To add all the panels that bridge components, the connecting hardware etc can only add weight and space. It'll be interesting to see if Google can make it work, but you can't say that it's not unjustified skepticism.
In terms of 'any advantage', I interpreted it as 'any overall advantage', and I think I probably agree with him.
The EFF is already working in the UK to repeal their new censorship laws and to stop the UK government from jailing people for tweets.
The Coolest Web Sites From 1996
Really? I view that as a very straight-forward problem to solve. Leave the company.
Wikipedia begging really annoys me
No, Gruber has it exactly right, see my comments below on how an older modular phone fared.
Then, instead of whining around on the internet writing blogposts and making money off those banner ads, the poster should have contacted local law enforcement authorities.

I don't see why she should defame GoDaddy. If I had a server there, and I was accused of sending spam, I would have the right to know which address considered my email as spam (and determine for myself whether the user subscribed to my services or not).
Troubled Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox reportedly asks court to be liquidated
Someone who needs that, seriously!
CPM is more common metrics in showing ads. Most networks that sell on a CPV model use adware to do so.
Guy Kawasaki joins the Canva.com team
Awesome job dude, well done! It's just simple as it needs to be, don't mess it up. Just try to be more clear and simple on monetization. Hit and finish me with just something like this : "There will be two plans: free 500 items plan and paid for 500 or more items. Paid plan will be 4.99$ for a year and we will have 2 million users in two years". Because, as you know, nowadays analyzing people's data is horrible business model for monetization because of privacy.
I'm still puzzled that people are still using companies like Godaddy, Network Solutions etc.. which collect more horror stories than any other ones. Are customers really that stupid ?
Hm... there really is no difference between an email address and SHA-1 (or SHA-2) of an email difference.If you have one, you can get another easily.
I would report GoDaddy and the spammer to the police. If the spammer went through all that trouble he's probably nuts.
Size matters? My Android friends have huge phones (and cases) - Clearly they don't mind a phone being big and if the phone had cheap replaceable parts, that giant "life proof" case wouldn't be needed.

Weight matters? I have never heard "I wish my phone was lighter" from anyone, anywhere. In fact I've heard from several who think a heavier phone means it's "better made".

Battery life - Again my Android friends (and a few 5c friends) suffer from poor battery life - How would a phone where you could easily swap for a new/better battery be inferior?

Gruber should remind himself of the first generation of pretty much any tech product. Bulky, ugly, and clumsy could describe a lot of projects that push technology to it's limits.
Where did you get that rule? Maybe you are thinking of not begging users to click ads just to support the site.
Is that called "very technical" nowadays?

Basic proficiency in a random programming language and some grasp of HTML is something that's taught in a high school computer class or any introductory course for a tangentially related college program such as statistics or physics - this level of proficiency is something that a random student (of not-computer subjects) is somewhat likely to have.

I mean, it definitely is technical and does require some background, but it's appropriate to say "a bit technical, but you don't need to be an expert".
I tend to agree with Gruber on this one. Modular phone might be perfect for me (will see when and if it gets released), but I am not sure it can attract the masses as well as polished, high-end phones from Apple, Samsung, Nokia, etc. Size, weight and appearance do matter a lot to average customer.
Forwarding a complaint onto the end user is standard practice these days. It seems that every few months there is a story like this where someone sends an abuse complaint then is surprised when the hosting company sends it to the end user. For any large enough company it's unlikely a person will even read your complaint before it gets forwarded on. Most complaints are designed to be sent to the end user so it's no surprise companies automate this process.
I have a tutorial site that is probabky 8 years old. I used to see 100k+ uniques per month. I'm not sure I have ever made more than $1 CPM via adsense, buysellads, or even targetted affiliate offers. I basically gave up and tried to sell but decide just to let it sit there and rot. contemplating removing ads and trying to eventually sell something but not sure how that will work.
> So in the early days of a new market/category of product, the products are highly integrated

Not sure about this one, seems like the opposite to me. Twenty years ago, PC's were very modular, and it was very common to add/upgrade a sound card, memory, cpu, video card etc. Fast forward to now, and for the most common computing devices (think tablets and smartphones), there is almost zero modularity or upgradability. Even with current PC's (i.e. mostly laptops), it's increasingly limited.

The same trend is apparent in other similar technology. For example with analog TV, people could add a PAL block if their TV was NTSC or SECAM. Upgrading your car used to be significantly easier etc.
I love Brazil, I'm just not tracking how all of that fits into the above.
So if I forward your email, I'm committing a crime? There's too much law about the internet...

> In some parts of the world (e.g. Slovenia)

Slovenia is rather crazy about everything computer-related. A while ago Google was forbidden from collecting Street View data. I really hope that has been reversed by now...
An experienced publisher shouldn't be printing said book either.
Screen and battery are the two most common complaints/issues with current phones. Simply allowing consumers to buy and swap these two parts would go a long way.
Uber still offering rides in Belgium despite court order
> an email address is hardly "personally identifiable information"

Are you sure about that Tom from Slovenia?

Hint: google yours...
They received more than 3000 applications for this batch. Going by past ratios, 9% are interviewed -- and in the end 3% are selected.
Engineering does have to deal with real adversarial threats.

Just on example I've found:
https://www.nae.edu/Publications/Bridge/Terrorism/AnEngineer...

"The second relates to the design of structures. It is time for engineers and architects to get together to devise new structural forms that offer a higher degree of protection not only against terrorist attack, but also against other hazards. There is much to be learned from what happened in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, in Oklahoma City, and at the World Trade Center. Similarly, retrofitting of existing structures needs to be studied systematically, as it can reduce, at modest or virtually no cost, the potential for damage."
Wacko in the Morning – Very First Episode Replay 04/16 by The Wacko Network
I submitted my non-profit, CharityCoin.org and unfortunately was not accepted. However, I firmly believe in our mission to create a sustainable charity so I am still working on it. We do not need the capital, but It would have loved to get some advice from YC.

To anyone else that has not been accepted - please consider CharityCoin- we are the kickstarter for charities that helps startups raise money for Free.

Here is how it works: We ask celebrities for their permission to mint gold and silver coins with their image. We then give those coins to donors that promise money to their favorites charities. But the money raised goes to startups who promise to pay back and support the charities.
This effectively is a loan and the interest is just a commitment of volunteer time to promote the charity.

Please go to http://CharityCoin.Org to check it out and contact me Ric AT CharityCoin.Org
I find this interesting in contrast to Nexus devices. Two or three years ago, most Android phones had SD cards and removable batteries. These features have been conspicuously absent from recent Nexus phones in spite of their appeal to the power-user and developer markets who are among the most likely to want such features.

I hope it gets some traction. I'm seeing a lot of sameness in high-spec Android phones, and something like this might help manufacturers learn what kinds of variations might sell without having to take the risk of mass-producing and marketing a new model.

P.S. - if any manufacturers are reading this, I want a high-spec Android phone the size of an iPhone. My Nexus 5 is somewhat uncomfortable in my pocket and too hard to use one-handed due to its size.
Show HN: Handcrafted standing desks from reclaimed materials
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Need a VPS server for side projects ?
Here is a promo code for $10 : DEPLOY2DO (it would give you worth two months hosting for free)

You can use my referral link if you prefer : http://bit.ly/12666Dj
So hypothetically speaking you'd be OK with receiving a message from a hosting provider you did business with accusing you of spamming an unspecified person at an unspecified e-mail address and threatening to terminate your account, leaving you with no way of knowing what actually happened?
True, there is also the Langton loop, a really crazy but perhaps viable idea.
There is a similar, perhaps more significant problem with Twitter's abuse reporting tool[0]. To submit the form, users are required to tick the box that notes they accept the following:

"I understand that Twitter may provide third parties, for example the reported user, with details of this report, such as the reported Tweet. Your contact information, like your email address, will not be disclosed."

I think it highly likely that would encourage further abuse. This has prevented me using the tool in the past, and makes me think Twitter doesn't quite understand the issue.

[0]: https://support.twitter.com/forms/abusiveuser
>But is humanity really that way? Or does society require a small number of rulers keeping the ruled in line?

IMO it depends on the specific ecosystem, and there is no definitive answer for this question. Some systems bring out the worst in people, some don't. However, as bitcoin is a financial system, greed is a major force that it must contend with. As the value of BTC grows, the incentive for bad behavior will grow with the rewards. For that reason, I personally cannot imagine that bitcoin can continue indefinitely without some sort of regulation. I'd love to be wrong about that, however.

It remains to be seen if BitUndo can realize their goal under the current framework. It's quite possible that the costs coupled with the initially low success rate and the desire for miners to protect the value of their holdings might prevent it from ever gaining traction. However, their efforts highlight an attack vector and there may be ways to disincentivize their scheme early on.
Those with glass ceilings shouldn't throw stones

While criticism is good, the condescending way it is presented, as well as being overly critical are bad. Example:

"Total undue reverence for NIST and FIPS standards; for instance, the book recommends PBKDF2 over bcrypt and scrypt (amusingly: the book actually recommends against scrypt, which is too new for it) because it's standardized."

I know people love scrypt and bcrypt, and have been proven safe so far, but there are advantages to use standardized methods. An implementation can make something less safe than the standard.
OP here. I've been a developer for 10 years and have used a standing desk for the last 2. When I started, I just used whatever materials I could to prop my computer up higher. Once I was sold on the idea and benefits of standing, I started looking for a more permanent solution.

I wasn't really happy with the options. I wanted something very high quality and unique. So I decided to start building my own using reclaimed and salvaged materials.

Here's what I have so far. What do you think? What's important to you in a standing desk?
Cycling Tyres
They are also elephant killing [1] sopa / pipa supporters [2].

[1] http://gawker.com/5787676/meet-godaddys-ridiculous-elephant-...

[2] http://godaddyboycott.org/
Show Me The Money: The New Open Source Motivation
CSS3 Coding: Fresh and Popular Tricks and Tips
No. You could send them the sha1 checksums of those who had opted in, and godaddy could confirm if it matched or not. You have no right to their personal information, but you do have a right to be heard.

GoDaddy deserved every last ounce of negative coverage for this they can get.
I think what's confusing me the most is I'm not quite sure how or what "html5canvastutorials" has to do with KinectJS.

But thanks for the link, I'll go about giving it another try :)
Ask HN: How Important is it that All Founders Attend the YC Interview?
Given the allocated expense, would it be worth paying out of pocket to get a third member to the interview, or would there be any problem with 2/3 attending?

Thanks!
Please tell me nobody here is actually using GoDaddy anymore. How many lessons does one need to learn before they realize GoDaddy is an awful company?
High Court: Kim Dotcom Can Have His Cars, Millions in Cash Returned
A Bear can travel to Kilimanjaro
Perfect Woman
It does matter when comparing with alternatives. Modular phone with comparable specs to other phones (screen size, cpu, camera, etc) would probably be bigger, thicker, heavier and uglier. In other words, even when a customer is buying a big 5"+ phone, then I think he/she will probably not choose the modular one.
Okay sounds nice, but where/how do I get started? Perhaps too much information for a 3 minute video, but I don't feel like googling the name and seeing whether it's an application (Linux?), browser add-on (Firefox?), or some javascript that needs to plug into the page.

Then I also feel like, what is the difference between this and a folder? It's not as if all of the topics I need fit in a non-scrolling sidebar, plus I need to organize that sidebar too. The dragging is new, but it's not like it's an auto-organizer.

The pitch itself is pretty nice though. Telling as much as possible about a product you're enthusiastic about in only 3 minutes is tough. Good job on that :)
Holy moly. Connect this up to my del.icio.us & trello and you've created something very useful! Think rich annotations for my bookmarks.
Link to original text (in German):
http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/games/perfect-woman-kinect-sp...
Part of it is that sales taxes are set by the state, and in some cases, municipality/city, since there is no federal sales tax.

For example, in Massachusetts we pay a 6.25% sales tax. Though across the border in New Hampshire, there isn't a sales tax at all.
OK, email me at f234567a360f54c1d31a70936f336bc679ba4f9f (sha1sum of an email address with no trailing carriage return or line feed[1]) and I'll believe you.

1. e.g.

$ echo -n billg@microsoft.com | sha1sum
2517e4726f81e16f65eb95cf6446ad35352f566e -
Not that crazy. This is seen and encouraged in startups all the time: Companies should charge for the value they provide, not for the man-hours they're spending.

Additionally, anything that makes things significantly easier probably requires a large up-front investment of man-hours and/or money. If you've ever dealt with government software projects, you can imagine how large of a project this must have been. That money has to be recouped somehow, and that won't happen by giving things away for free.

(Note: I'm not advocating for the sleazy behavior of lobbying against easier/cheap tax filing. I'm just making the case that there's business reasoning behind this, other than plain spite for the common folk.)
I'm surprised that the author of the article left out QNX. QNX is already the OS of choice for the medical industry and is doing well in other "niche" markets like automotive. QNX in Action: Audi FPK Driver Information Display: http://youtu.be/Wlm6lD23d0g

They're still playing off the good idea the had for buying QNX 4 years ago now.
Great list, esp. Neal Stephenson!
What I've read about Blackberry it seems like they entered the phone war when it was at level 1 and then tried to reinvent themselves when it had reached level 10. Guys like Mike Lazaridis talk as if they didn't realise that shift had happened. That the smartphone game had become so intensely competitive that their problem went far beyond picking the wrong strategies; they simply didn't have the ability to execute at the level required by the upgraded game.

This seems like a common mistake made by people who win early and win big, they don't necessarily have a proper perspective on the components of their success that were luck or timing.
Moto X.
Let me fix that for you:

Customer: [generates the SHA1 of every email on their list they bought for $14.95 from totally-not-sketchy-email-lists.com] Here you go

There's nothing in the hash of an email address other than an indicator that the person knew who they emailed.
How  to Quit Wasting Time as a Business Owner
Why consumers will embrace connected objects: to care for them
Agreed. This is yet another product that will appeal to techies and first adopters only.

For instance, people could -- in theory -- build their own computers with a bunch of modular components, but instead a lot of them buy a Mac or some other variation of all-in-one solution.
> still, OSX market share has been stagnating forever.

28.5% growth last holiday season is not stagnating.
But lots of users say things like "Galaxy S5? Is that the new Droid?"

I have a hard time with that. The question itself implies that there are lots of users who know what "Droid" is but don't know what a Samsung Galaxy is - which I, frankly, find difficult to accept. I would think it's 100:1 the opposite way - most users know what a Samsung Galaxy is but few users (relative to user base) know what Android/KitKat/ICS/etc are. So I can't really see your point here.

This distinction would matter more if people bought the phone and the OS separately, but they don't. To the average user the phone and the OS are mashed together into a single indistinguishable thing.

Absolutely - that was sort of what I was saying (yours is much clearer though). Microsoft trying to make the OS version something that people care about is just short-term thinking. People care about a specific version in only a few situations that I've seen: (a) when there's a big marketing campaign around that version, (b) as a reaction against negative press around a specific version, or (c) because they want to upgrade from a very poor experience in their current OS. Those are all short-term (and expensive) customer acquisition methods. Apple's use of "IOS" - the name, the branding, release timing, backwards compat, etc - is so perfect for Microsoft that I guess I don't understand why they don't just copy it.
Two-Way Communication with Dolphins Begins with ‘Sargassum’
Galaxy S5′s fingerprint reader can be hacked exactly like iPhone 5S’s
This is an incisive criticism, but it's extremely educational in its own right. I would not have read it otherwise.

When working through basic knowledge to mastery of a topic, attempting to teach someone else is an extremely effective way to organize your thoughts and learn yourself. This is why graduate students teach undergraduate students.

The author of the original book shouldn't feel shame for making the mistake of working toward mastery of the topic. But racing to publish is dangerous when the topic is as serious as (heart surgery or) cryptography. A stern warning is worth repeating.
What does the bookmarklet do exactly?
Mt. Gox set to liquidate as court denies rehabilitation
Sensational headline. Blackberry has made many mistakes in the past 5 years but to say that this is its first good idea is wrong.
Not if you employ the law of two feet.
>so I'm going to take this approach whenever I get inadequate support from now on

I've used a similar approach twice, both times with positive results. Once with Lenovo for an overdue laptop and once with Cathay Pacific (airline) after having a rusty fish hook embedded in my gums after one of their meals.

I emailed the CEO and head of marketing/sales and in both cases had responses within 24 hours.
Better Backbone Applications with MarionetteJS Giveaway
Hence the "prove to us that they opted in" part. (That's why law enforcement should handle this, btw.)
>Not to mention that having to choose among components just adds an additional layer of option stress that most consumers don't want.

I think consumers actually like a little choice in their products now. I mean, take a look at the apple laptop website.

Also, I could imagine vendors offering different phone presets (e.g. battery life, photo-taking, media consumption) and then letting the customer further customize it if they want.
Well, it has some other benefits which might outweigh those points. Beside the added flexibility in general, ecological benefits might be one of those because you can avoid highly toxic and expensive-to-recycle waste if you can replace parts of your phone and escape the "I need to replace my phone every two years because one small part is now outdated or broken"-cycle.
fwiw, I have two employees who got Windows phones and, recently, both quickly traded them in for Android phones first chance they had for at least some of the reasons mentioned in the article.
why you break me scrolling with the arrow keys?
Since that post is quite old, I was surprised that this wasn't a reference to Bathy's recent efforts to make a wristwatch out of a chip scale atomic clock that is much closer to actual wristwatch scale (though still very large).

http://www.ablogtowatch.com/bathys-hawaii-cesium-133-atomic-...
Actually I think it is technological progress that drives what you have described. Take some things that have remained unchanged in the same time period. The price of land, property or gold for example. $100 will get you a lot less of those.

Wages going down for the majority, while a few get a lot richer is hardly what I would describe as progress.
The only real situation I'd like to use that is on Android, but it does not have /usr/bin/env either.
So, that process assumes that the end users are technically competent. Based on the way it was phrased (it sounds like this guy just CCd everyone), that does not seem to be the case.

That also assumes that a person looked at this email before it was forwarded on. With a hosting company the size of Godaddy, that's unlikely.