skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I have been a regular drinker for most of my adult life.

Recently, I tried a "semi-dry July", where I told myself I would drink only once a week (with no limit on that day, i.e. binge drinking allowed). But when I got to that day, I felt only like having one beer or so, and same the following week.

Well, here's an amazing thing, shocking and totally counterintuitive: I felt much better while doing this than I did for years before that. My mental acuity went up noticeably, and was much longer lasting - I would wake up at 7am and feel mentally sharp within 15 minutes, and stay mentally sharp all the way to 10pm or so.

I was forced due to holidays and social circumstances to resume drinking in August. Well, now that the social circumstances and holidays are out of the way, I've gone back to not drinking. I'm still in the ramping up phase, and every day I feel better than the last.

I strongly recommend giving this a go to pretty much everyone on Hacker News: try going a month without alcohol, see how you feel.

Oh, I'll add that near the end of "semi-dry July", I had one instance where I had a couple of pints with a friend (social pressure!). I could feel that my brain was noticeably less sharp and my motivation was noticeably down compared to before. That lasted 2.5 days. TWO AND A HALF DAYS!

My conclusion: When you don't drink, it's as if you hired an extra one of you to work on your business. When you do, it's as if you fired that extra person. Are you resource-constrained? Stop drinking. You'll save money too - bonus!
How does it enhance your socializing?
I am in my early twenties, and I have yet to drink my first alcoholic beverage. I made a decision a few years ago after weighing the negatives and positives of drinking against each other, and concluded that drinking alcohol provided very few benefits in comparison to the potential risks.
J suffers vs APL/K. The verb trains; number of verbs vs number of available symbols; variable lengths and semantic baggage we bring to various symbols contribute to a much worse 'line barf problem'. I understand why Iverson went with ascii but frankly I don't even know APL beyond 'advanced calculator' level but every time I look at an APL program it just seems cleaner.
We use Nexonia. Web app is ok, mobile app is good.

(I don't work for Nexonia, I work for a company that uses it)
Is Twitter's management team on HN? That could skew the results...
Also there's no option for "never drinks but is not a teetotaler". I don't have anything against drinking, I could if I wanted to, but I don't. Teetotalism implies rigidness/preaching.
Why not make it explicit to your friends that they are welcome to drink even if you're not drinking? I was at a BBQ yesterday, everyone was pissed, I just drank water... that wasn't a problem.

Just don't rub your non-drinking in people's faces, and let them drink as much as they want.
Have to do it right when its done :-)
Study: Cities with super fast Internet speeds are more productive
I didn't find option for anti-social light drinker. once a week, alone at home.
Ask HN: Any software like the Twitter Translation Center?
Hello HN,

I have a software that each time I have any small change, I need to submit to several translators. This reduces a lot my product iterations. I think this problem happens with a lot of developers.

I made some researches on Google and I didn't find any free (or open source) and reliable solution.

Anyone knows what software Twitter uses for the Translation Center (http://translate.twitter.com)? And if we have a good open source and very used solution?
Note that just because something works in a country of 10mln, that doesn't mean it will work just as well in a country of 300mln. It's unlikely that Scandinavian style policies scale linearly. You can always find a sample of 10mln Americans that does just as well on all metrics as Sweden or better.
It's still based on implicit human trust though.
15 years sober. So, I don't drink. Before that, hoo boy :-)

I was at a bar last night with co-workers, and as long as I have a diet coke or something in my hand I'm okay. Weekly AA meetings keep me on the level, too.

A old co-worker of mine who was more public about his sobriety used to crack the keg at beer busts, reciting the Serenity Prayer over it and telling jokes as he pour cups for everyone else. He had fun with it.
Pretty much, being a kiwi may also explain it
I have horrible memories of needing to switch back-and-forth between the Concur mobile app and the desktop version to submit expenses. The mobile app was very convenient for uploading photos of receipts, but as you mentioned, half the time the upload just sat there. It wasn't feature-complete enough to submit the expense claims directly from mobile, so I'd go in and fix up fields on the desktop.

The people who have to use this software the most (employees) would never willingly purchase it, but they are not the decision-makers for this purchase. A competitor might be able to gain traction by targeting small-but-growing companies that wish for a nicer future for their employees.
They've been done before.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=509614
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8021822
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7594543

Search Google with "site:news.ycombinator.com marijuana ask hn" and variations thereof.
Your accountant is not going to vote for simpler tax laws.
http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2006/03/execution-in-kingdom...

Steve Yegge's "Execution in the Kingdom of Nouns" has some interesting commentary on the idea of OO being in any way how humans think. The allegory has some harsh things to say about Java, which are not my intention in suggesting this link. The observations that objects tend to be nouns while functions tend to be verbs is very interesting.

/* footnote 3 is hilarious */
It reduces inhibitions, makes you more relaxed, frequently more open, less judgemental. And, importantly, because people know you're drunk as well, it reduces their inhibitions around you as well, even if they're drinking less than you.

I hope I don't have to make the case as to why reducing inhibitions and making everyone more relaxed enhances socialising?
I also have the impression that "IT is one of the most open and socially conscious fields there is", but I think it's only a temporary situation that is happening only because the field can't afford to be less open.

IT sector is in a golden age, the times where there's more demand for programmers than people available for the job. The field so desperate for even mediocre workers that it gets its recruiters to keep cold-calling and spamming people in hope someone will change a job. It's extremely hard to find talent, even harder to retain it, so companies just can't afford stupidities like discrimination. Being socially conscious is actually a signalling method - "yes, we don't discriminate; yes, we're that awesome! yes; you should come to work at our place".

But wait a generation or two, when there will be more talent than jobs available - IT will start looking like every other sector. Recruiters will stop calling and we'll all be subject to the same amount of discrimination, politics and overall workplace-abuse as everyone else.
The question is not about the visa after you get into YC and moving to the Bay area, its about starting a business while on a visa that prevents that.

For After, you could move from an H1 to a B1, or apply for a H1 using the newly formed company with the money YC gives you. But what about before? Looks like no one has done this yet.
Facebook React Starter Kit
I haven't seen the term before too. It's etymology is interesting: 1830s, from total, the reduplicated tee being an intensifier – “T-total” (see https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/teetotal).
Are you planning to build a web application with complex UI? Consider using React.js which is used by sites like facebook.com, instagram.com, feedly.com, khanacademy.org and many others.

Another idea - instead of spending dozens of hours putting the initial project structure together you can clone an existing template on GitHub and customize it for your needs. Later on, if new features are added to the template, you can fetch and merge them back into your project.
How FIFA Ultimate Team Went from Console DLC to EA Sports' jewel in the Crown
Pick a language and put a project in github as a showcase of what you can do
Some people really don't have that sort of self control after a little drink, so their only path to not being ill is to not have the first one.

I've not been ill through drink since a certain point in my early 20s when I was not in a fit mental state for a while (unless you count the occasion when I stupidly went out for a couple on an empty stomach after giving blood that afternoon). My body gives me advanced warning that I'm heading towards a state of having "had enough" and I have the good sense to listen to it even when quite "influenced", but I know people who do not seem so lucky.

People can react to alcohol (and other behaviour altering substances) quite differently, one rule does not fit all.
The term for that is "binge drinking", and it's supposed to be more unhealthy than regular drinking.
Yes certainly. Peter Thiel actually talks about people with Asperger's possibly having an advantage in his new book.

http://www.amazon.com/Zero-One-Notes-Startups-Future/dp/0804...
What More Evidence Do We Need? Carbohydrate Restriction for Therapeutic Uses
Klarna Announces U.S. Team as It Plans for 2015 Launch in the U.S
The Physics of the Death Star
I got it to the point where it wouldn't happen _every_ time I drank, but I still messed up often enough that it started to affect my relationships. I just decided it wasn't worth it. I'm not an alcoholic, I never _needed_ to drink, I just have a really difficult time stopping when I should.
I'm a teetotaler, but not by choice. My body reacts violently to even the slightest hint of alcohol.
@OP: see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8339988 (I saw that thread before this one). Congrats on the move. It feels great, no?
> Just like Samsung, Apple relies on a huge amount of marketing

I'm not sure "just like" is warranted there since Samsung spent $12-14bn on marketing in 2013 and Apple spent $1.1bn (Asymco numbers).

> at some point that's going to outweigh its profits

Which were $37bn in 2013. They'll be ok for a good few years.
> In this context "access control" doesn't mean what you think it does.

Good luck explaining that to the judge.
Well, they'd come to visit me on a Friday night for a drink, but when I wasn't drinking, they'd ring another friend that was going out for a drink if you see what I mean. I think they were afraid that if they came to me, they'd have to drink tea and watch youtube video's all night or something.
On the basis of what evidence do you make such grand claims about her intellectual abilities?
I would try to cross sell on the bad PDFs. Ask the user if conversion went well; if they say so, direct them to Fiverr with an affiliate link.
It's important to remember this, quoting from another HN comment [1]:

> Erdős was a heavy user of many other stimulants (like coffee), but only started to use antidepressants and then amphetamines in 1971 when he was 58 after his mother died. He was already established as a first rate mathematician (he should have won the Fields Medal), and using amphetamines to work 19 hours a day was his way of coping with the death of his mother.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8316764
Not even prescribed ones? :)
Simple solution is to invite them round, give them some beers, and sit down with your orange juice and be your usual self :-)

Not drinking doesn't mean you can't have a well stocked drinks cabinet/fridge!
I'm a bit disappointed that they haven't upgraded to a proper line-breaking algorithm. The high resolution display is probably great, but look at that inter-word spacing! How can they state this is "passionately crafted for readers" when the typesetting is worse than in Microsoft Word?
The most commonly cited proponents of this viewpoint are Rosson and Alpert (http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1455754, behind a paywall). The first study you linked refers to them and a few other explicitly, and uses their research as a basis. It's difficult to find much more than those, because this kind of 'programming philosophy' is rarely under this level of academic scrutiny.

Aside from official sources, it's a statement that I didn't think needed much citation. It's absolutely fair to criticize it, but it's a widely-held belief that seems to hold true (at least anecdotally)
Used to be regular but now social - body can't take it well no more - age unfortunately
I know a few people who are total themselves, but don't preach. In fact one or two are happy to join us at the pub (though my regular circles are not "silly drinkers" so that might change if we were).
I never thought it implied that. I have certainly known some people who didn't drink, and were preachy about it, but they have been the minority. The vast majority of people I know who don't drink tend to be pretty cool about it. Though, being a sober person around a bunch of drunk people would try anyone's patience, so I tend to just stay away from places that I know will be filled with drunk people.
There's some evidence to suggest that drinking every day, or even drinking well over the recommended limit, could be healthier in the long run than abstinence.

http://www.psmag.com/navigation/health-and-behavior/truth-wo...
> Black nodes are value computations in general. Blue nodes are value computations that use the values of objects.

I don't quite understand the difference. Don't all value computations use the values of objects?
Late thirties here, and I've never drank, not once. Not for any religious reasons, but exactly what you said: I weighed the positives and negatives as a teen, and decided I'd have more fun watching my friends get drunk and making sure they got home okay, than ending up in the same mess as them.
What strikes me is that I can leave beer in the fridge untouched for weeks or even months, but I can't do the same for chocolate in the house.
Stephen King describes how sometimes he can't stand seeing people sitting in front of a glass of wine without drinking. "Drink it already" goes through his head - I'm somewhat the same with chocolate.
Only solution is to not have chocolate in the house.
Instagram took themselves off Twitter after the Facebook acquisition, they weren't kicked off.
Based on my impression (as an outsider) of the tech scene in Silicon Valley you are probably more likely to be discriminated against for having socially conservative views than liberal ones.
On a side note; the distribution of alcohol habits in humans matches that of monkeys showing that our liking of alcohol is determined mostly by our genes. For more insight into this, watch this video from BBC Worldwide:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSm7BcQHWXk

Which may also the best 3-minute video on youtube ever.
I'd like to be able to do this. If I have just a single beer I can get quite tired/sleepy, so when I drink I tend to have a few. Actually, I was talking about this recently with a friend and quite often a hangover can be more intense if I have, say, 3 beers than if I have 6. Really strange.
Electric car breaks 200 mph barrier to set new land speed record
Teetotal here. :P
Last time I checked, the US had 50 states, giving 6 mln people per state on average. I think such solutions implemented on state level should work exactly as well as for a country of 10mln.
Podcast Gift – Curation of the best podcasts in business, design and tech
Forgive my ignorance and bluntness, but reading the above, it sounds more like an anxiety disorder than like depression. Both are serious, but I'm not sure if it helps to confuse the two?

I've not experienced either seriously, but I know people who have. Depression seems to be more about things not mattering anymore, everything being pointless, the world seeming drab and just not fun anymore, rather than feeling that everything is going to go to shit. Anxiety, though, (and I'm speaking from experience here, having had some light anxiety attacks caused by too much regular caffeine usage) seems to be characterised by a feeling of impending doom, that everything is wrong, it can't be fixed, it's all hopeless, etc. But in my (mild) anxiety attacks, like Rand, I still cared about the outcome. I just felt like there were too many problems to solve, overwhelmed, ready to say "fuck this", give up the entire thing, and start again from scratch with something completely different.

PS: Otherwise, props for the very honest and open article. Running a business is a lot of responsibility and very stressful and it can be comforting to know you're not the only who seems surrounded by world-ending scenarios.
I definitely fall under the "some people" group you referenced.

My biggest problem is that I eat and drink _very_ quickly. It is just a habit, my dad blames himself for inadvertently teaching us to eat and drink quickly.

This creates a problem because, while socializing, I can easily plow through a handful of cocktails before I feel the effects of any of them. Combine that with a not-great tolerance for alcohol, and I can be blacked-out before I knew what hit me.

I recognized this problem, and tried to correct it by drinking more slowly. But like I say elsewhere in this thread, I didn't _always_ remember to do that, and so would still have a "bad night" often enough that it came to affect my relationships.
Don't drink, love my heroin though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I'm a teetotaler. At every social gathering - be it work or relatives - somebody asks me the inevitable question "but why?". I never have a good answer. I have no idea why I'm a teetotaler, I just am. I did try alcoholic drinks exactly 3 times in my life, and didn't like anything about them. I think drinkers - even the casual ones - hate teetotalers.
Don't drink, love me a good hit of dope (heroin) tho
Ok so this is the third time I've drafted a comment about SAP and the enterprise landscape to try explain this and all I can now think of is GRRRRR!!!

To avoid a the down votes, I should probably mention that you have to experience the enterprise landscape firsthand to be able to comprehend why it is. (That's it, 'why it is').
I'm probably a heavy drinker, maybe, depends on the week. I had a couple where I was drinking every day, then a dry week, then a holiday where I drank every day, now a dryish week. Mostly I drink more over the summer, more parties and such.
Out of curiosity what would you have used?
The difference to the end user is that while the bank's operations division can only do this for a single website, Cloudflare can do so for 2 million of them.
Relative to drinking, there seems to be so many behaviors with completely different effects depending on the person. There's people drinking one or two beers every evening, but only enjoy a light euphoric feeling from it. As a behavior, it wouldn't change much from people having a smoke or masturbating before sleeping IMO.

Would that put them in the "heavy drinking" part of this poll ?
Well, what does "drinker" mean. I drink a beer almost every day, but seldom I drink more than that. I have friends who drink at least 5 beers every day. Obviously we don't compare, but we'd vote equally on this poll.

Also, it matters when you drink it. I drink very late in the evening, definitely after dinner, and way past I finished working. Some people drink in the morning or at lunch.
With traditional manufacturing methods, you would need to make a mold. Molds are very expensive unless you can reuse them for thousands of units.
A while ago I was listening to some podcast discussion on beneficial "drugs" and some of the problems of classifying things as drugs, harmful or beneficial.

In any case, 'even alcohol can teach you some things" came up. It got me thinking. Most people experience (or semi-knowingly exhibit) reduced inhibition. If you're able to pay attention and observe, experiencing reduced inhibition has a side effect of shedding light on the existence and the nature of your inhibitions otherwise. It's interesting. It's not a 'nature of compassion' type of enlightenment, but potentially interesting nonetheless.

There's a resurgence of interest in psychedelic spiritual practices. The use of drugs in religious or cultural context is extremely ancient, possibly predating fully modern humans. But alcohol is also a part of that tradition. In fact, the use of alcohol in religious ceremony survives and is widespread in Christianity, Judaism and many other religions.

Ketamine is addictive and potentially harmful in several ways. Many are adamant that it's interesting and beneficial as well. I'm not sure those statements are competitive.
It looks like Microsoft is the assignee? If so, is this included in the Microsoft OCR library?
Show HN: Nowfie – Selfies with Friend
Pirates often were portrayed for their love of gold. These financial interests and their colloquial tendencies lead many to believe that the favored programming language of the pirate is R. However C, the harsh mistress, was indeed their favorite.
A big thank you to all committers, Ruby keeps getting nicer and nicer with every release. Keep up the good work everyone!
Ignoring the /s tag, it sounds apt for a hollywood movie or a sci-fi show, but in reality it will most likely be run on an unnetworked VM. But funny nonetheless :P
Every now and then I'll buy a four-crate (it's hardly a crate) of Kopparberg. Sometimes they'll last me months (one a month) or a couple of days.

I don't drink often, but when I'm out with work or some mates, I'll have a couple. I prefer driving though - I hate being a passenger, especially when I've had a few drinks.

Instead of drinking alcohol, I do tend to drink a lot of energy drinks. That's my problem.
The issue on that specific story was that Nick was given nearly 7 minutes of response, which was edited out on the main evening news with a "he declined to answer" dismissal. Technicalities surrounded the legitimacy of that edit, but YouTube videos showed the whole episode and the edit was, at best, disingenuous.

This single event spurred the whole BBC protest, and brought widespread attention to actually quite a lot of small, arguably subtle but definitely existent, biases in the reporting.
You Are Using the ORM the Wrong Way
Carlsen hasn't had to prepare. It might be that a real challenger is what we (and he) need to find out just good he can be.
I often drink - beer, wine, liquor. Mostly because I like the taste, sometimes because of social situations. I rarely get drunk (a few times a year), mostly I drink so little (a glass or two) to feel no effects. When I get drunk, I drink as much water as I can until I get sober (before going to sleep!), that prevents the hangover the next day.
Time isn't the only investment required though is it? How much is even a single-seat licence?
What does the smiley face “:)” mean in CSS?
It's a wonder he wasn't under an NDA or something.
I don't disagree, but experimentation should still be on the table. Maybe a certain state or municipality should be sponsored to try policies more along the scandinavian kind. Of course this is problematic. How do you for example stop everyone from moving into that particular priviliged district, etc?
Raft: In Search of an Understandable Consensus Algorithm [pdf]
at least in AutoCAD you have AutoLISP :-)
I definitely learned a lot by drinking. Quite a few times, I went into a meditative state, where I was observing the way I feel/think/act while being drunk. Or I would go over the events that happened, before I got completely sober (and forgot most of what happened). I think I'm much more honest and open because of it (not always a good thing, but it's aligned with my principles and I like living like that). I don't drink that much any more.
Netbeans is an excellent IDE for developing C++ on Linux. I've been using it for a Cocos2d-X project with few complaints. It has a really good Vim emulator which is critical to me and where Jetbrains continues to disappoint me.