skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
They still didn't answer the question as to WHY is it so difficult to predict? I think that Napoleon Dynamite has two types of fans: The people that watch it for the purely (seemingly) primitive comedy and the people who find a deeper meaning in it and who 'get it'. The first type will also like stupid screwball Adam Sandler comedies, while the second type will go for more indie, artistic fare. Thus the ambiguity when trying to predict per user.
My company, of almost 30 employees, uses OO exclusively. We also use GoogleDocs if we're on the road and don't have access to a laptop. Nowadays, we have no issues with it at all. We just don't see the need for 90% of the MS Office features that we would never use, especially at that price.
The 27" iMac is the anomaly in the equation, prior to that the iMacs were not nearly as comparable to the Mac Pro. And, the author is taking an existing hardware configuration and comparing it to a brand new release which has blown the doors off just about everything at its price point.

The benefit of the Mac Pro is obviously upgradability. I own one, it's a beast of a machine. The question to a buyer is, are you really going to own/upgrade it after ~3-4+ years, which is about when you start to realize the cost savings of said system vs. all-in-ones?

For most people the answer is no, so the iMac 27" is a much better deal.
But it looks like that there is always something else that is possible in FLASH but not yet in HTML+javascript. My view is that it works like a "lower level API" for web apps, where you can circumvent the limitations of the current generation of standards.
Given that it's practically November, on a reasonable interpretation "the next several months" that Peter mentioned isn't limited to 2009.
Commercial Smackdown: Pre vs. Droid vs. MyTouch3G
They are being purchased by the creative departments for various ad, print and digital firms. I've done IT consulting for several of these types of companies, it's typical for them to spec out low(er) end Mac Pros and then load them up with third-party ram and disks. Sometimes they're purchased as a bundle through accounts with places like PC Connection.
My minimalist gmail interface is called "pine", which I believe is still considered to be the reference IMAP client implementation. If I were have to make this decision today, I might use something more powerful and extensible like "mutt", but for me pine is just fine.

I started using it again a year back or so when Mail.app became too slow for me to use on some giant mailboxes I have. Deleting 5k messages from an IMAP folder in pine takes maybe 5-10 seconds. Try doing that in Mail.app. I found my email productivity went way up after switching, so I ended up using it exclusively, despite the ribbing my co-workers give me for using prehistoric email tools.
I too wish Apple would disregard the core of its business plan and introduce a niche product that few would buy.
It might be easier to just go to a list of all the ISOs and torrents available:

http://mirror.anl.gov/pub/ubuntu-iso/CDs/karmic/
I spend almost all of my time in firefox, emacs and a few other programs, which are the same on every platform. It really doesn't make much of a difference to me what desktop OS I use as long as it's cheap and it works with my hardware. I use Ubuntu on an HTPC because it's free and it (usually) works. I can't imagine what MS or Apple could do to improve on free + works.

To me Linux is a lot closer now than it was in the past because you can pop a Ubuntu CD into a computer and 9 times out of time it you have a working computer with sound and everything half an hour later. 7 years ago, when I first installed linux, that would have been more like 1 time out of 10.
Basically: people who need to fill the slots to connect hardware that's as expensive as their computing platform and/or are running a software stack that can also cost as much as an iMac. In generally these people fit the 'Pro' suffix ;-)

High-end multi-channel audio interfaces and/or audio processing cards that accelerate audio plug-ins. Even Firewire or USB equipment works best if each device is using dedicated controller cards. (every Mac has only 1 USB/Firewire controller)

If you need to connect multiple 30inch Cinema Displays and still have proper performance (e.g. 3D) you need multiple GPU's. These cards often get replaced after a couple of years to boost performance.

And most often these kind of applications demand a lot of (very performant) storage so RAID controllers and lots and lots of hard-drives come into play.

If you're not buying a Mac Pro for these kind of workflows, you're just shopping for bragging rights I guess ;-)

And trust me: if you're using a Mac Pro in this manner you're not jealous about that very speedy iMac with that really nice display. It might me speedier, but it just can't do what your workstation was bought for.

And hey, maybe you'll buy one for the 'light web browsing' in your den ;-)
Looks like a great read but they offer only a paid version. Would appreciate if someone could provide an alternative link to a full version for Free :)
Olbermann Overkill is Hurting America
Literate Programming: Retrospect and Prospects
Fishing with Strawberries
I don't think TI is still selling the 83; they've moved on to promoting the supposedly new and improved N-Spire.
Leading Analyst Rates Monitis as a Cloud Company to Watch
Monitis,the leading provider of 100% Cloud-based application and IT infrastructure monitoring solutions, is one of only 6 companies selected by The 451 Group, a respected technology industry analyst firm, to present its vision: "Monitoring in the Cloud: Monitor Anything from Anywhere", to more than 300 top executives from leading US enterprises.
This reminds me a lot of http://tinlizzie.org/ometa/ (another general-purpose programming language built around pattern matching).
There's no "woo" in this article, if that's what you're getting at.
This would be plausible except AFAIK all of their models have different hardware capabilities. The 83 and 84 even un the same exact software; they just have different specs.
Could there be the seed of a video game here?
Maybe for a site like okcupid...

Okay, that's still a stretch.
I work with a couple of agencies and the creatives are moving to iMacs. Cost less and built in monitor. The only people that use the MacPros are video editors.
Yes. (Though you just proved that knowing the busy beaver numbers is as least as heard as knowing the truth-values of all those famous conjectures.)
Not sure if I should take naming advice from the guy who registered 000fff.org ;)
Yep! If you want 32GB of ram, this is the way to go!
here's some writeups

http://www.h-online.com/open/features/Happenings-NoSQL-Confe...

http://blog.isabel-drost.de/index.php/archives/99/nosql-berl...

http://www.heise.de/open/artikel/NoSQL-Konferenz-in-Berlin-8...
It's easy to discount that when we have the benefit of 400 years of his work being verifiably true. Without that, the fact that he was an alchemist WOULD put a dent in his credibility, and you would be RIGHT in doubting the quality of his work. That doesn't mean you're excused from checking if it's correct, but having doubts about it's quality is perfectly reasonable.

Having beliefs that are out there doesn't prove that you're a crackpot, but it does slide the probability in that direction.

That said, a quick skim of the article doesn't reveal any glaring errors - it seems to be a good analysis.
I had the same sceptism, but found the article to be a good and a sound read without any hocus pokus. His theory is also interesting and worth a read.
Reverse Geocache Puzzle
Trends in Pricing Page Design and Layout
Ask HN: Share your Failure Stories
It often happens that we hear from successful people, successful products on various occasions, But still it turns out that there is no formula for success but everyone has to figure out on their own...But there are always somethings which will make the products fail( it may be a bad UI design, delayed launch etc)....Please share your experiences of what made your web startups fail .
Yes, Isaac Newton was an alchemist... in the mid-17th century. He died decades before Antoine Lavoisier founded "modern chemistry".

If Isaac Newton was an alchemist today, I think we would not spend much time listening to him.

Alchemy was a mix of practice and mystery back then. It's not the same as a modern alchemist, who is left only with the mystery, because modern chemistry claimed all the practice centuries ago.
Quietube? http://quietube.com/
Yes, but $50 in exchange for 300-400 words and a small slice of your credibility isn't a good trade.

However, if they don't have to put their names on the article then you're right, it is a good deal.
The 83 is still listed on their product website -

http://education.ti.com/educationportal/sites/US/productCate...

http://education.ti.com/educationportal/sites/US/productDeta...

Notice on the page it also says -
"Count on TI calculators at exam time. You can use this TI graphing calculator on the PSAT, SAT, and ACT college entrance exams, IB, and AP tests."
And bizarre comparisons at that, since the luxury car market can hardly be expected to be consistent in any meaningful way from 1920 to 2009.
If she has nothing better to do at the moment.
Almost all mathematical proofs are reverse engineered.
POPTECH
This was a really famous regression. It's not solely Ubuntu's fault, of course; they got bitten by shipping newer software. But yes -- they (Intel, really, not Canonical) fixed it.
At the end of the day, though, people want quality. If a low-quality SEOed article appears higher in the search rankings than a high-quality article, it is a flaw in ranking algorithm -- a weakness that other search engines can exploit.

I think Google is smart enough to realize that search dominance is their most valuable asset... that the money from search dominance dwarfs the money from favoring crappy content that matches ad keywords. This is just another step in the struggle between Google and the search engine optimizers.

(The deal between Demand and YouTube is curious, though... If the "real world" worked like that, prime time television would be filled with shows about cars, beverages, and pills.)
I seriously wish HN could handle the humour. Sure, eventually we would degrade from an intelligent discussion to being knee deep in lolcatz and welcoming overlords.

That said, your comment brought needed mirth to my morning.
Just a heads up, for some reason it didn't work too too well in Firefox 3.0.x; I didn't investigate further. It's fine in the latest 3.5 though.
Never getting started -- I suspect I'm not alone on this.
ABCL on Google App Engine
To be fair, his point is that naming doesn't matter that much.
Escape from Scrum Island
A friend of mine composes music in his spare time and recently bought a Mac Pro just for doing this.
> It doesn't, but someone has to have them in order for the concepts to get introduced in the first place.

Huh? People talk about dragons and other things that don't exist. With qualia et al, the only difference is that folks are claiming to have it.

Maybe telekinesis or other psychic powers are a better example.
Yeah. It'd be awesome if they published it the way okcupid was.
Me too, my first thought .. 000FFF is blue not B&W.

Names: Zyp, love it; Metallica, very masculine and "metal" perfectly 80s, hard edged; Flickr defines web-2.0 naming, was it the first, it's a better name than Flicker IMO regardless of the reason for the choice.

In the commnets "I’m not any less of an entrepreneur because my name is Joe. " - except that introductions would be a lot harder if your name was something unpronouncable, maybe a series of clicks (Khosa (sp?)) or something that sounds like swearing in your propositions native language.

IMO names matter a lot and no amount of interface will fix a bad name. A terrible name on the other hand you can work for ironic advantage.
A Series of Unfortunate Events Leads to $1.26 Billion Judgment (for Pepsi)
One of Tainter's more interesting arguments is that collapse, when it occurs, is a sensible, reasonable response to negative returns on societal complexity. He notes, somewhat famously, that the average nutrition and health of Romans actually improved after the collapse of the Roman empire, presumably because the wealth they generated was no longer being siphoned off to maintain the empire's overhead.
USB tethering coming to hacked Android phones
Eclipse to get friendlier with Windows 7, Azure, Silverlight
Perhaps the title should be, "What's not in a name - things you shouldn't worry about when naming your startup".
They fixed that bug along w/ a few other annoying bugs (pulseaudio, laptop mic, etc). I've been running Ubuntu 9.10 for a month now on my laptop and have had almost zero problems. Only one resume fail in all that time.
SongTapper - surprisingly accurate - I think it works because it outsources a lot of the frequency/beat detection (to your brain/sense of rhythm)

http://songtapper.com
i don't see the contradiction between spirituality and science. spirituality is very different than organized faith. to think that humans can be 100% rational beings simply ignores potential bias.

(if you meant that nature spirituality conflicts with the articles thesis then eit.)
000 black fff white
Report: States set low bar for student achievement
Carsonified had a good post on this back in 2007, and so did Kevin Rose and Tim Ferris.

http://carsonified.com/blog/business/how-to-name-your-compan...

http://vimeo.com/3934635

When it comes to consumer goods and services, short, sweet, and memorable should be your 3 primary objectives IMO. Be careful not to be to descriptive with the name or logo design, it can be problematic if/when you try to expand into other markets or grow new products that are different from your existing focus.
> If you are not in the business of domains no domain name is worth more than $50.000

And related to that: A domain name is (almost) not real estate.

What would inner-city real estate cost if a city had an endless supply of perfectly nice cheap houses all within a ten minute subway ride away? This is essentially the case with domain names.
Just whiny, but why does Ubuntu (or most distros) not give any idea of minimum/average disk required for install in their system requirements area? I know, I can customize the install so as to reduce or increase space requirements, but even a suggestion that "a straight default install requires around 2gb of space for programs, and 1gb for swap" would be helpful.
You mean, translating a phone conversation? I believe Android's current API doesn't allow you to access phone call audio -- similar to the iPhone, if the article is correct. (A translating app using IP telephony might work, though...)

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/media/index.html#p...
Isn't that the definition of ad hominem abusive?
Here's an independent MATLAB implementation of the Shazam algorithm: http://labrosa.ee.columbia.edu/matlab/fingerprint/
Tell this to your code, which uses char* host_name; gethostbyname() and friends, Windows and other legacy systems.

hint: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms738524(VS.85).aspx
My comment is largely reiterative, but important enough to emphasize.

It's not the law as written, but as it plays out in the larger socio-economic sphere, that is often determinant. It doesn't matter what your rights are, if the other guy can spend you into the ground with impunity.

Taken to extreme, it's one reason we regulate monopolies (in the U.S.). You may come up with a better product, but if the other guy has a lock on the market...

If you don't have the resources, the wherewithal yourself to execute the fight, how do you make it? On your own, your one option is the shop for a lawyer who believe you have enough of a chance that their willing to invest in the effort (in return for a hefty share of any judgment in your favor). If you are fortunate, the EFF or another organization may take up your case and use the pooled contributions of its members to fund the fight.

Even then, what will the publicity do to your career and other aspects of your life, depending on who you work for, etc. Fighting such things, one way or another, is important, but it is not easy and not everyone has the means, financial or otherwise. The means to fight, and/or the means to survive if the judgment (and penalties) goes against them.
I think the author is a little out of touch. Who's buying the Mac pro? Hordes of preppy college students who will use it browse the web and write up papers in Word. It's far from uber-niche.
I can't answer the general question, but for what it's worth a 32-bit desktop install took up about 2.5G on disk.
Looks like they've included Ubuntu One,GNOME 2.28, kernel 2.6.31, Quickly (rails like framework that brings rapid development) and many more
Most likely Wired didn't do anything based on a press release. The P.R. industry would like you to believe they are able to drive the news agenda, but when it comes to the Wireds and The New York Timeses of the world, it's rare for a press release to lead to a story of this magnitude.

Most likely, Demand Studios' P.R. people freaked out when Wired inquired.

This story likely took weeks to report and write. A graphic artist probably spent at least a week preparing the chart. Good journalism takes a lot of effort, and so few people realize that.

As someone who has been paid to write and edit news for 30 years, this article was pretty depressing, but I already knew about Demand Studios. And you know what? It looks like they take good care of their writers, at least in the karma department. These seem to be folks who have always wanted to be paid to write but never had the opportunity to get paid for it, enjoy surfing the Web, and can bang out three or four of these articles in a day and have some good walking-around-money.

They seem to be mostly American, but at some point I'm sure the Third World will be recruited to drive the price down even further. Seen what they are paying on Mechanical Turk?
This is a real concern, but browsers and registrars do have some protection against it. IE will render punycode except for scripts in the user's list of accepted languages. Many registrars enforce a no-homograph policy and Mozilla browsers will allow IDNs only from those registrars: http://www.mozilla.org/projects/security/tld-idn-policy-list...
Here is a fun thought.

There is no possible consistent axiom system understandable by humans in which it is possible to prove a specific number to be an upper bound for BB(1000000)!

Here is why. Suppose you have an axiom system. We can write a Turing machine that searches for proofs and disproofs of the consistency of this axiom system. If the axiom system is consistent the program will run forever. But if it is proven that BB(size of machine) has an upper limit then the program will eventually prove that the limit exists, and it has run past it, and therefore it will never halt, and therefore it will never find an inconsistency, and therefore the axiom system is consistent.

For the rest of my claim I claim that an axiom system that can be understood by humans can always be encoded in a Turing machine of size at most a million. I obviously have no proof of that, but it seems extremely likely to me.

For another fun thought, there is a school of mathematical philosophy in which BB(n) is not a well-defined function at all! (Look up the constructivists.)
Elegant Lisp programs
If you're a geek and need to ask, it's probably too large (if you worry about hard-disk space, you're probably trying to install it on something obscenely old. Ubuntu isn't for that.).

If you're not a geek, it'll fit (any consumer computer going over the counter for the past 6-7 years, probably more, has at least a 20 GB drive in it. Most likely you'll have 100+ GB).
Yes, there are!

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=909618
If someone owns a piece of it and doesn't want it on there I'm sure they'll tell me, it's not as if I'm hiding.

That's not how copyright works - "Well Your Honour I was selling those DVDs in public if the film distributors didn't want me to they can just ask, so no fine for me??"

Plus if you're putting ads with this you can't exactly say you're not making a commercial enterprise out of it. I'd leave it to someone with lots of lawyers.
The new iMac does remove some customers from the Mac Pro, but if you need the fastest Mac available or need slots (more video people now then photoshop people) the Mac Pro is it.

Actually, I think the new Mac mini server will make some people think who might have purchased a Mac Pro instead of an Xserve.
Bah; they should all just use slide rules anyways. /sarcasm
No, they're getting MacBook Pros. What's the point of having an expensive computer if you can't parade it at Starbucks?
"you're probably trying to install it on something obscenely old"

Or something new, like an SSD on which you're attempting to dual/triple boot.
I think quite a few Mac users would have a genuine use for the Mac Pro's expandability, but have to satisfy themselves with dangling piles of peripherals off the USB and Firewire ports of their iMacs and MacBooks because they can't justify the cost of a Mac Pro -- and they aren't spending somebody else's money.

I would also like to take this opportunity to salute the author for his use of the word 'nichier.'
This a very good intro. Readable, fun and concise.

Something that caught my eye though: links now have a rel="noreferrer" option. This sounds like a pretty bad idea. It's not supported by any browsers yet, but if it worked it would blank out the referrer field on HTTP requests you make after clicking on a link.

There are only two use cases I can imagine:

1. You have some super-secret URL's that are not protected by any other authentication method, you want to avoid others sniffing them out from the referrer field. Verdict: your security is broken and cannot be saved by any standards body.

2. You're hosting a site with malicious XSS-loaded links and want to hide your tracks. OR you are executing CSRF attacks and want to hide your tracks. Verdict: this rel value is perfect for you.
H(m || k) also insecure, you really should use HMAC
My co-founders and I use beefy MacBook Pros to handle the work associated with ThinkCode.TV. We produce programming screencasts, so nothing too CPU/GPU intensive compared to some other companies. Well, our laptops barely make it. When working with video processing, the more powerful and future proof (read expandable) your hardware is, the better. I fully expect us to consider purchasing some Mac Pros in the future. How much time does a high-end Mac Pro saves us over a new iMac? Is that time worth the cost difference? If yes, we'll go with Mac Pros, if not we'll go for the iMacs.
The delta is a lot less (webapps still add new features), but I think you would need to go the gdgt.com route and add a lot of search / categorization and community features.
>>I don't look at social security systems as a good thing for starting a new business.

>It isn't. It is a good thing when the business fails!

If you're worrying about what will happen if your business fails when you start it, you're not fully committed.

AKA "burn your boat".
This makes Gmail, what is should have been.simple and Just Email App. +1
Word count is not an indication of the effort involved. Itg's not merely a matter of typing in words like a monkey. You have to know about which you write. The more you know, likely the more time it took you to learn it. Time is money, words are just words.
Ahh, but that statement includes November and December, and since those months have been excluded by Apple (assuming we can believe them) it would be more accurate to say next year, or January or some other statement that excludes the rest of this year.

;)
Just a data point for you: I have a 4 year old Mac Pro, and have upgraded it pretty regularly. I do have to admit that the new 27" iMac is tempting though.
Yeah, well, good point. My point was that a userfriendly distribution shouldn't present technical information that isn't absolutely vital. And it's really easy to find, by the way:

http://www.google.com/search?q=ubuntu+requirements