skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Could be. Looking at it economically, let's say I have a farm that produces equal amounts of two food items. They're fairly indistinguishable, but one is healthier, say because it has lots more omega-3 oils.

Which one would I charge a premium for? Which one would I make most of my money on? Which one would end up with the fancier packaging? Remember, that's presuming it's no more expensive to produce the healthy stuff.

And who would pay that premium? Who would eat the less-healthy stuff? Taking those two kinds of consumers as the model, I think that's why anywhere a business can apply price discrimination to a healthier food, it totally will.
Yawn... Where's my article downvote?
Hi, I posted this notice, but can no longer edit it.

Join http://groups.google.com/group/hn-google-wave-invite-pool instead of posting your address here. Hopefully, when the invites come out we can help each other out.

As of 5:41 eastern 9/30, I am no longer manually adding posted email addresses to that group.
No.

Facebook messaging is like email... and if you get a lot of messages, subjects can be helpful.

The comparison to Twitter doesn't really make sense. It is Facebook status that is like Twitter (and has no subject requirement). Facebook's inbox is not like Twitter.
Got my hopes up for a second, I thought this was the real, remote API that is sure to materialize at some point.
The solution to spam is known and implemented on every social network: it's the "add as contact" request.

Before the user can send you any information, they must send you a request containing a standardized block of information that gives you a clue to their identity. You can accept or deny the request, and only then can they contact you.

Obviously, even that block of information can itself be considered "spam", but there is only one of them and the social network has safeguards to prevent the creation of millions of accounts and millions of requests.

The way to translate that "account creation" safeguard is to whitelist not individual email addresses, but hosts -- either you trust gmail.com to have adequate safeguards that initial contact requests are unlikely to be spam, or you do (and of course, you need to build authentication to the sending address into the protocol).

It's complex to be sure, but not unapproachable, and lots of solutions already exist in the form of in-network messaging at all the various social nets.
Tell HN: You're not the smartest guy in the room

Yes I am. The only other guy in the room I'm in right now is my cat, and he's really not very smart.

Just get over it and get back to work on your startup. Your customers don't care how smart you are.

Ok, joking aside... intellectual stimulation leads to increased creativity and improved problem solving. Your customers might not care how smart you are, but how creative you are and how well you solve problems certainly matters to your customers -- so being around smart people is going to help indirectly even if it has no direct impact.
> White bread is cheaper than Whole Wheat.

But brown bread is cheaper (and healthier) than white bread.
Doesn't bother me, but it does seem to bother the people who come up with these lists. (I am slightly bothered, though, by people who click on a a link, and then click it again when it's "loading too slowly," thinking that they're hurrying it along instead of going back to the start of a new request.) The best solution in both cases would be for the browser to simply ignore any attempts to load a GET of URL X in a given frame/window/tab when it's already attempting to load the same GET of URL X in that frame/window/tab.
8. What Memory (RAM) Is For

I like to use a desk metaphor when explaining disk vs. RAM to relatives, etc.

If the hard disk is the filing cabinet, the amount of RAM is like the size of your desk. You can take a file out of the filing cabinet and work on it at your desk. If you take out 5 files, you need a bigger desk. If you run out of room on the desk, you have to put files back in the cabinet, e.g. close the window. It's not a perfect metaphor but for some reason they usually get it much better than talking about RAM as "what your programs use."

EDIT: oops, it looks like I'm not the only one with this idea http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=853104
A lot of people are making money off of classified ads: it's just that they are individual small-time arbitrage entrepreneurs and small retailers, as well as people getting rid of extra stuff, not newspaper monopolists.
And now they've got an image as the "overpriced shite" computer maker.

As for MacBook-like conventional PCs, MSI is making a MacBook Air clone that's stylish and light, but otherwise a relatively conventional x86 computer, for around $800 or so. It's awesome. <Phantom-Phreak>I want it to have my children.</Phantom-Phreak>
You should write a book with this guy: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=852938

What can be taken by both you and the author:

Who cares if you are the smartest guy in the room...
Prove you are the smartest guy in the room.
http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/d?k=014ehsWPDEYdHjc10VbVmMlA==...

Thanks a bunch!
Do they live in areas substantially different from mine?

Probably. The article is talking about how poor people are fat. At grocery stores in poor neighborhoods, healthy stuff is significantly more expensive, or simply does not exist. For instance, a can of black beans at the ghetto grocery store by my apartment near Bushwick costs twice as much as it does at the Whole Foods in Union Square. Produce is rarely available, and when it is, it's almost spoiled.
Ah ok :) I took the english title to mean that you were trying to buy the book in English.
Click once to highlight, then press ctrl+down ;)

(Well, I'm joking in general, but I do this myself often enough.)
Domain squatters are quite frustrating. I wanted to buy the .com version of my hn handle, but (after contacting them several times), they responded, saying they don't even consider anything less than $50,000. Yeesh. The .net version is owned by Future Media Architects, who are famous for never selling domain names. I haven't bothered to contact the people who own the .org.

Squatters, while I acknowledge their right to do what they do, are quite frustrating.
A side note: this product, like many others, hosts its video walkthrough on Vimeo. But, Vimeo clearly says on their upload page: "You may not upload commercials, infomercials, or demos that actively sell or promote a product or service."

So, does Vimeo just not enforce this rule, or what?
The most useful piece of information in the article:

http://twitter.com/twephanie/status/4497929072

It's 7:43am in Sydney right now. Shouldn't be long.
Poor analogy. Assembly is a magnitude 'harder' than C and they are different languages. Firefox extensions are written in XUL which is Javascript+XML last I checked. GreaseMonkey scripts are also written in Javascript.

My point was that this is a 'simple' hack and by keeping the solution simple (i.e. a GreaseMonkey script) users of multiple browsers can benefit. Claiming that writing for GreaseMonkey instead of writing for the Firefox Extension 'Framework' is the same as going from C back to ASM is disingenuous (and from my point of view a straw-man).

{edit} Personally for 'simple' things like this that just modify the display of the page and don't require significant user interaction (i.e. a preferences pane) I don't feel like there is a need to create a Firefox extension. There are obviously instances were Firefox Extensions are the correct option, especially when you're talking about modifying the behavior of Firefox (like the MAFF extension or the one that tells you Firefox to also save the stylesheets when saving the 'Complete Webpage'), but things like "replace all the URLs on the page with X" or "click on the image to expand it inline instead of opening up the larger image in a new tab/window" are more suited to a GreaseMonkey script (especially since a wider userbase can take advantage of them) IMO. {/edit}
Thanks a lot, I'll return the favor!

http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/d?k=01gI5QT7TlbdP13YEEhTCqFA==...
I distinctly recall driving a late '90s Saturn that didn't have power steering. According to the owner, who bought it new, it came that way and wasn't broken. As far as I can tell, power steering and brakes were relatively common 50 years ago though not as ubiquitous as they are now.
Are you in the sandbox right now? Add me tumult ~at~ wavesandbox on the dotcom. :)
Nmercer _at_ thatdevelopmentcompany dot com
thanks!
Hacker News readers seem to apply the Principle of Charity to insightfulness when reading: we would rather think that someone is making an interesting-but-wrong point than a boring-yet-right one.
It certainly does make sense, the NYT does have the branding and clout to pull this off. Offering local editions does remove some of the fat in the newspaper business, but isn't there a risk of "the wal-mart effect," especially if the NYT moves into less populated regions?
Thanks in advance.

http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/d?k=01zw50rxe8-Xkbh37JFuhkKA==...
A simple workaround might be using dropbox to sync the sqlite db file. It would be nice to have an integrated solution though.
Sun Drops the Swing Application Framework from Java 7
It gets a different point across.
This one also appears to break my control-click to open in a new tab. Extra bad!
The flood was of all of the other Oz applicants hitting SEND on their email clients. That was why I allocated myself two channels before. There were many more than 2 channels available.

I could have DDOSed the server to ensure only I got tickets, but that sounds like an ugly thing to do.
That's not necessarily a good idea.

Most of the higher profile features of H.264 actually decrease CPU requirements at the same quality level, because they reduce bitrate required for a given quality (in particular, B-frames and 8x8dct).

The only things that significantly affect CPU usage are CABAC, deblocking, bitrate, and resolution. Sticking to a "mobile" profile (i.e. Baseline Profile) is needlessly slashing quality.
Or, equivalently, the table/bookshelf is a great analogy for short and long term memory. :)
Build Native iPhone Apps with HTML, CSS, JavaScript and PhoneGap [video]
This article should be plastered with a massive red warning banner that says:

CONFLICT OF INTEREST DISCLOSURE
We are, ourselves, trying to develop a product inspired
by the original Chumby that we hope will be its competitor.
It is called the CrunchPad, and it will arrive in time
to play Duke Nukem Forever.

In the meantime please enjoy our UTTERLY unbiased
opinion on the upcoming next version of the Chumby.

The article's contents don't seem valuable, either. They express an opinion about the Chumby and then at the end, say "Oh, except that thing in the picture that we've been criticizing isn't what we thought it was."

TechCrunch, are you sure you wouldn't like to impose a voluntary embargo? ;)
A discussion on one possible outcome: the fight over trademarked domains:

U.S. Loosens Grip On ICANN, Domain Chaos To Follow? http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/172901/us_loos...
You won't get O(1) since scheme-free dbs are not organized around columns/fields in the same way a traditional db is all about rows and columns, but just about every one I am aware of let's you create an index on a particular field so at least you get O(n). Given the infrequent use of this operation I am happy to leave it in the "O(n) is good enough" category in return for the other benefits an efficiencies that a schema-free db offer.
If you get an invite, make sure you check out the AccuWeather weather app. I made it, so please give me any feedback you may have.
I don't know which one you'd pay a premium for. You'd see which one you're selling more of and charge a premium for that.

The reality is, foods aren't indistinguishable. They have different tastes, different marketing, different cultural value, etc. How "good" something is is not, and never was, a prime indicator of success in the marketplace or value to the consumer. If Pepsi wants to spend billions on advertising, people will buy Pepsi.

I'd also venture a guess in saying that you don't just get a tally of every food component available within some distance of your house, their nutritional content and their price, and then you just optimize on nutrition regardless of what your favorite childhood dish was, or what you're in the mood for or what your friends are having.

All I'm saying is it isn't that simple as turning into a simplified problem of supply and demand. Go to a fried foods place at a poor neighborhood and watch how people order; I sincerely doubt they'd always end up getting the cheapest thing just that's what they can afford. Certain lifestyle choices lead you to a certain lifestyle (or perpetuate it) and completely forgetting those choices for problems like obesity is being disingenuous with yourself.
"Data structures: storing non-flat data (trees, graphs) in a SQL database == FAIL"

Can you expand on this a bit? Or is this another MySQL-ism? Databases I use work just fine for trees/graphs.
So a good way to look for other business ideas is to look at other issues on the list and brainstorm solutions for them, similarly to the way Dropbox solved the problem of moving files between computers for non-computer experts.
For http://www.movielandmarks.com I ended up caching the DVD images locally and serving them up myself. Some of the URL's served up by AWS go away and I don't re-request them after the initial add of a movie.

I'm going to have to read this article in more detail and see if it can clean that up for me and move image serving back to Amazon.

If you are going to use Amazon's images, why not sign up for an associate account and provide links back to the product pages so you can generate some income from it.
Zed has maintained many open source projects for more than 6 months. Also, if you've met Zed in person, you'll find that he's one of the most considerate and cool people ever.
All I'll say is don't try too hard to make "thoughtful comments", and just be yourself. Sometimes the best insights and comments are what you make instinctively.
Move to NYC. Hack on cool stuff. Enjoy startup life
We are small, self-funded, profitable startup located in a sunny loft in Manhattan and we are hiring. About you:

- Smart, gets things done

- Knows usual CS trivia

- Comfortable with Linux/UNIX

- Languages don't matter. We process lots of data and pick whatever works best.

About the company:

- Profitable. No VCs involved.

- Founded and ran by engineers

- Great product. Actually, it's quite awesome.

- Meaningful stock option plan

- Competitive salary, even in NYC.

See my profile for contact info and/or forward this to someone you know who may be interested. We may offer relocation assistance for a right candidate.
The difference being that if you want to answer a question like "what hour of the day is my store busiest?" you would have to write a MapReduce function in Erlang for couchdb. Where alternatively, anyone with minimal knowledge can figure out that query in SQL.
So whip together a Greasemonkey script and put the choice in the hands of the savvy user. Not the most elegant solution, I know, but it's clear there's a difference of opinion so taking either road would leave someone out in the cold.
I think you forgot one...failure to understand the deal itself. Many times I have seen entrepreneurs not understanding the content of the security they are structuring when raising capital. Lawyers can help, but entrepreneurs need to understand these things for themselves or risk finding out hard realitites later - like being forced to sell and not knowing you had given up the right to block (as an example).
We did something similar when we were running our own home grown publishing system, though it was only for sizing purposes (no fund stuff like discount badges).

If you go this route, be very careful making the URLs too human readable. When it's obvious that you can hammer on URLs to use server resources, it becomes a natural vector for a denial of service. If we went this route again, I'd go one step further than encrypting sensitive data, and encrypt anything that can somehow result in a new image.

Unfortunately, doing this safely sorta kills the user friendliness of it. It was fantastic to be able to tell authors "if you want a 100x100 image, add /100w/100h/ before the file name". I think they'd be less inclined to respond to "if you want a 100x100 image, generate a hash from the width x height x secret key and add /100w/100h/the-hash/ before the image".
For what it's worth, the "local supermarket" I was talking about is on the border of Oakland, and the area is so ghetto that they keep not only the liquor and razor blades, but also the toothbrushes and condoms, in locked cabinets.

I see plenty of fat people there.
I think as long as they stick to major markets where they already have some pull, they'll be ok.

At the same time, Playboy Inc. makes waaay more money from licensing its brand than it does off the actual content it produces...so maybe extending the NYTimes brand is a good idea in general.

I want some NYTimes socks.
You should be careful caching images and other data, since it's (or was) a TOS violation. :)
read.hn
There's no cable going to the mouse/keyboard or to the network either - if it's an office computer that you didn't buy then this seems a genuine possible point of confusion.
Nope 500 error on everything, once logged in can't even go to the main page.
I've had success buying domains from individuals, but rarely from squatters (or domain holding companies, or whatever they call themselves). I think you'll find that unless you're able to get ahold of someone and offer them what seems like an exorbitant amount of money, you'll never get anywhere.

The cost of keeping a domain is so low that people generally aren't losing much by hanging onto it, particularly if they have a pretty decent parking page setup.
I'm somewhat surprised that no one has pointed out this angle yet:

Domain squatting is an abuse of a public resource for personal gain. There are more evil things to do, but it's hardly moral.

Do not give them money. (micks56 e.a. suggest other ways of getting your hands on the domain you want.)
I lived in England until I was 7, and I grew up saying "couldn't care less". I'm American now, and it's always bugged me that the vast majority of Americans can't get that phrase right.
Linux TCP Tuning Guide
'Data Center in a Box' vs. Explosives
My advice (well, others said this before, but my experience confirmed it) is to build your first product the way you like it. If you are happy with the product and you really enjoy using it then you already have one customer :). And I am ready to bet others will come.

On the other hand trying to fulfill every customer wish and implement all features users suggest is not every time a good idea. Usually it leads to an over complex product that is not well adapted to "young markets" of "untrained" customers. Is like trying to sell them a dvr enabled TV set when they just learn how to change channels.
Microsoft Unveils Its Container-Powered Cloud
I'm just saying that taxes tend to head towards a level somewhere between the economic optimum (as flat as possible) and the political optimum (all taxes paid by a tiny minority).
Which supermarket is it? I used to live on the Oakland border.
I use a really really dirty hack for this exact problem, I handle the rescaling in the 404 handler.

It's the laziest possible approach and it has one huge hidden benefit, which is that if a bot hits your pages you're not going to end up pre-generating a bunch of scaled images that nobody is ever going to use.

A simple list of allowed sizes in the handler makes sure that someone can not use URL injection to generate a large series of nonsense images for sizes that we'd normally not use.

Typically a url looks like http://host/resourceid_widthxheight.jpg , where width and height are replaced by the desired size.

I'll be the first to admit this is a nasty bit of code but I haven't found anything else that comes close in terms of efficiency and flexibility.
"My girlfriend left me for being so goddamn pedantic all the time, and I could care less!"

I wonder if there's an opportunity to be had in creating a dating site for linguistic pedants, purists, and grammar nazis. I'm thinking a required literacy test to join, and auto-banning the account of anyone who commits more than some threshold limit of grammatical errors.

</probably joking>
What scares the US Air Force
I met a group of several people who were very persistently trying to put a floppy disk in a CD-ROM drive. They refused to listen to my polite explanations that it just doesn't go in that slot. They tried for half an hour, and I think they broke the CD-ROM drive at some point.

Ignorance is understandable. I'm ignorant about all sorts of things. But what I don't get is willful ignorance.
Could one build a social news site on top of Google Wave?
If so, what would be some advantages to doing so?
Inside Fermi: Nvidia's HPC Push
I haven't heard the overpriced thing before, on the contrary most 'common (you know computers? Fix mine!)' people I know buy dells due to the great deals they get.

Also the XPS line is pretty solid for a reasonable amount of money, with windows 7 I'd say you're getting less aesthetical appeal, but more total bang per dollar than you would with a mac. I own both a MacBook and Dell XPS, which is what I base my opinion on.
The Pak N Save in Emeryville.
Ask HN: Review our app, Site Assistant
I would really appreciate any feedback on any angle of S-A.

Thanks!
I actually prefer this model of code generation to abstracting everything away into the plugin where I can't get at it. I generally do a lot of modification to code in plugins, and having it generated and hackable right away is much easier to me than having to hunt it down, hack it in the plugin, dig through the plugin's tests, fix the test there, and then hope it didn't break anything else. Of course, if you're not skilled enough to be doing that sort of modification or your apps are simple enough it doesn't call for it, then that's no win for you.

But even so, to say the code that restful_auth generates is nasty either betrays your ignorance and/or shows that you tow some party line that I've never been privvy to. The code it generates is perfectly fine. It was written by Rick Olson, who (as I well know) is a fantastic developer. It doesn't support tons of extra bells and whistles like Clearance and friends, but who really needs a lot of the stuff they offer in every app? It's deadweight.

In fact, depending on which branch you get of the restful_auth plugin, the code it generates abstracts stuff away in modules that you include (so you don't have to go through that oh so cumbersome maintenance you seem so caught up on) and it generates all the stuff you'd have to create by hand for Clearance.
This is a _perfect_ example of why I hesitate to click on a nytimes link. Fascinating reading, with nothing useful coming for it and quite of bit of damaging info. Now I have in my brain an association (very cleverly made, because their writers _are_ good) between marathon running and heart disease. And absolutely _no_ shred of new knowledge.
>just fork his work

Oh how I laughed.

The man is more important than any given individual in the core Linux kernel team. The body of code he's managing is pretty scary as well.
You're right. Facebook is not Twitter. Twitter is what happens when you eliminate everything but subject lines. It's a platform for transmitting social MIME headers.
Is it in the sandbox? I'd like to play with.
Please invite me:
http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/d?k=01kuUk1OOGXIeQ8_PrxKjeLA==...