Linkseed/hacker_news_with_comments · Datasets at Hugging Face

id int64 2.3k 8.36M	parent int64 2.29k 8.36M	comment_author stringlengths 2 15	title stringlengths 1 173 ⌀	author stringlengths 2 15	comment_text stringlengths 1 99.1k ⌀	text stringlengths 1 23.4k ⌀	comment_ranking int64 0 524	score int64 0 4.34k	time_ts stringlengths 23 23
42,634	42,585	mpc	JavaScript:The World's Most Misunderstood Programming Language	mk	Great explanation about why the name "JavaScript" has done so much harm to the language.	null	1	13	2007-08-15 13:09:15 UTC
42,635	42,551	nreece	Request: simple story promotion algorithm	zemaj	Rank = ( ( current_time - post_time ) / number_of_votes )Simple enough!	Hi all,I recently added a karma-like voting system to posts in a phpBB forum that was having some problems with spam (we have an point incentive system that users use to bid for real items - now instead of rewarding points for posts, they're now awarded for votes).My question is; does anyone know a simple algorithm that can get a list of the "best-recent" posts based on votes. So simply if an item has a certain number of positive and negative points with each vote point made at a certain time, how can I combine that to get a list of highly voted, recent posts.I could obviously research and come up with something myself, but there's probably quite a few people here who have experience in this area, so I thought it was worth a post!Thanks, James	2	4	2007-08-15 13:12:35 UTC
42,636	42,581	yubrew	This patent application seems coherent. Then, a dedication to 50 Cent. Then...	zach	20070156594 - This number refers to a published patent application, which does not mean that a patent has been granted.I have a 98% confidence rating that you can only enforce rights from issued patents. An application means that it has a chance of being issued, but normally does not have much value until it is actually granted.When a patent has been granted, you'll see a number similar to this "5,146,634 6923014 0000001" http://patft.uspto.gov/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.htm	Scroll down to see the description.	0	3	2007-08-15 13:20:55 UTC
42,637	42,398	aswanson	We are living in someone else's computer simulation	mhb	No we're not.	null	16	57	2007-08-15 13:22:06 UTC
42,638	42,629	davidw	The nerdiest nerd test around	LaurieCheers	Not that some people wouldn't find it entertaining, but this is just the sort of thing that I was happy not to find at YC.news in the past. The question is: is it just me being a grumpus, or is it indeed not "hacker-worthy"? The expanded scope makes it a little tricker to judge content.No offense meant, LaurieCheers - it's not like it's some horribly lame and offensive site, just not the sort of 'usual fare' for this one.	null	0	1	2007-08-15 13:22:09 UTC
42,641	42,571	damon	The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)	nickb	i constantly get distracted at the day job when i have to compile, like now ;) it's amazing how much more focused i stay with a repl. (and a better language than C#)	null	2	17	2007-08-15 13:37:32 UTC
42,648	42,508	morselsrule	Can software start-ups succeed with non-programmer founder(s)?	NoMoreSnow	Constant Contact and Intuit are examples that come to mind. Intuit is debatable since the programmer was the first hire and was working partly for equity. For both companies, the founder came out of Bain Consulting. MySpace might be another example - I don't think their founders were really technical.	Can non-programmers have success at raising money for a software start-up?Also, do you know of any success stories(received more than angel funding) where the founder(s) were not programmers?Thanks, NoMoreSnow	3	11	2007-08-15 13:57:11 UTC
42,650	42,587	amichail	Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector	mk	Scala version here:http://blog.circleshare.com/index.php?/archives/61-A-spell-c...	Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.	4	63	2007-08-15 14:15:57 UTC
42,651	42,540	jkush	Does your project need a Cool Cam?	dood	I hate to be a wet blanket, but posts from www.worsethanfailure.com are really going to bring the quality of this site down.	null	2	31	2007-08-15 14:21:50 UTC
42,653	42,398	r7000	We are living in someone else's computer simulation	mhb	What about the morality of simulating an environment where sentient beings are produced by a long agonizing process of evolution? Greg Egan points that out here: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/PERMUTATION/FAQ/FAQ... (question 6). "Post-humans" should have room for a much more robust morality that would preclude someone purposely creating the world we live in - unless we were an unintended byproduct of an unintended byproduct that no "post-human" has even noticed or something.	null	10	57	2007-08-15 14:27:16 UTC
42,663	42,591	gibsonf1	BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?	RyanGWU82	It looks interesting, but what happens there exactly?	null	2	9	2007-08-15 15:26:33 UTC
42,674	42,630	run4yourlives	Disrupters are agents for change -- what makes technology disruptive?	electric	You should fix the link - it's going to the second page.	null	1	2	2007-08-15 15:58:23 UTC
42,675	42,587	ivankirigin	Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector	mk	I've decided that what is amazing about Norvig is that he is skilled in both theory and practice. A maker and a thinker.	Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.	0	63	2007-08-15 15:59:32 UTC
42,677	42,571	ivankirigin	The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)	nickb	Now that StartupNews has become HackerNews, expect XKCD to get to the front page 3 times a week.	null	0	17	2007-08-15 16:01:03 UTC
42,681	42,664	Tichy	Matt Maroon: Demo Day	toffer	Enough with the tantalizing teases: when will we finally get to know what the current YC companies are actually doing??	null	0	25	2007-08-15 16:13:52 UTC
42,685	42,676	run4yourlives	Nine Javascript Gotchas	morselsrule	I thought the purpose of javascript was to be one big giant gotcha? :-)	null	0	1	2007-08-15 16:32:47 UTC
42,686	42,587	far33d	Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector	mk	I swear this is a dupe.... did the already submitted articles list get reset when we turned into "hacker news"?	Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.	2	63	2007-08-15 16:33:25 UTC
42,687	42,652	ivankirigin	Silphium: Did Greek science die out because their elite discovered The Pill?	byrneseyeview	Here is an interesting note from FuturePundit:"Upper Class Fertility Rising Due To Competitive Birthing?" http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/004462.html	null	0	10	2007-08-15 16:34:35 UTC
42,689	42,629	bvowk	The nerdiest nerd test around	LaurieCheers	Perhaps the lamest nerd test would be a better title. Don't you all have something better to do?	null	1	1	2007-08-15 16:38:00 UTC
42,691	42,664	menloparkbum	Matt Maroon: Demo Day	toffer	Drunk dudes whizzing on trees, a couple shots before the meeting, "strap on some plums" t-shirts. Apparently even Y-Combinator can't escape the inevitable consequence of nerds turning into frat boys as soon as they get a little money...	null	1	25	2007-08-15 16:48:44 UTC
42,692	42,591	chaostheory	BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?	RyanGWU82	I can't make it Sat, but I'm going on Sunday	null	3	9	2007-08-15 16:49:20 UTC
42,699	42,667	randallsquared	Blueprint is a CSS framework	webology	Okay, so I looked at this. I don't get the point of the grid system. Rather, what I want to know is: if you're going to laboriously simulate tables in CSS classes, why not just use tables? It would be simpler, more easily understandable by human readers, scales up and down better (Blueprint doesn't do non-fixed layouts yet, apparently), and in HTML4, at least, would usually involve less markup.Against this, it wouldn't be quite as easily read for the tiny fraction of a percent that use screen readers. That seems like a very small price to pay for the major wins.	null	0	9	2007-08-15 17:05:01 UTC
42,700	42,602	bvowk	OLPC speed improved	qwertyuiop	What the hell. 72 seconds to boot a box with no moving bits and a wildly simplified OS? And thats the IMPROVED time. Thats pretty pathetic.	null	0	1	2007-08-15 17:06:10 UTC
42,715	42,702	hhm	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	I don't agree. I think this Hacker News idea is fantastic. Some time ago I proposed a "classic.reddit.com", the idea being the same: having a place where we could have the good old reddit, or rather, where we could have intelligent news back again.	null	3	37	2007-08-15 17:37:27 UTC
42,717	42,702	pg	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	Because we ourselves were bored with reading about nothing but startups. If our site was boring to us, it was probably boring to the audience we intended it for. This is hard for business guys to understand, but the people who make the best startup founders often don't care about business very much. Some of the most successful companies started next year will be started by people who do not currently plan to start companies.	null	0	37	2007-08-15 17:39:24 UTC
42,743	42,317	blats	Hacker News	pg	Yep, the stories are already much more interesting. I just blew an hour when I only sat down to check my email. Great. Guess I'm going to have to call in hacker to work.	null	17	150	2007-08-15 18:20:24 UTC
42,744	42,702	DougBTX	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	What would be really interesting would be some sort of hidden A/B testing...	null	10	37	2007-08-15 18:25:57 UTC
42,755	42,731	michael_nielsen	Ultrafast quantum computer uses optically controlled electrons	mk	This is a strange article, in my opinion. The point of quantum computing is to enable completely new types of algorithms whose running time scales much faster - ideally, exponentially faster - than an ordinary computer. For certain very limited classes of tasks, this can be achieved.Given this, the "running speed" of the computer, which is what this article focuses on, isn't all that important. A working 1 kiloherz quantum computer will greatly outperform a 1 teraherz conventional computer for those problems quantum computers are known to be good at, such as factoring composite integers.	null	0	9	2007-08-15 18:43:13 UTC
42,756	42,702	nickb	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	I posted this in another thread: why not start a NEW website hackernews.org or something and leave this site alone? Why mess with success?This site is, after all, a subdomain of the YC site which is an early stage investment firm. n.yc.com made sense since it dealt with YC company news stories, VC investment, angel investment etc. stories. If you wanted to get funding from YC or wanted to learn how VC investment procedure works, this was a perfect complement to the main YC site. Now n.yc will become another reddit and will get flooded with all kinds of nonsense and will get a lot of "how do I haxor my ex's myspace account" since "hacker" really means cracker to like 99% of the internet population. Instead of spending 10 min to get an idea what the latest trends in investment community are, you'll have to spend 20+ minutes while. As for being bored and you're a startup founder, you're in trouble! And if you're really bored and need to read something, there's plenty of reddit & digg subdomains that are interesting.This new site will lose focus and will degrade into another digg or reddit. Second law of (thermodynamics) Internet almost guarantees it. Paul, if you want this site to become bigger and grow and become a better reddit and all that, why not get a new domain and start it there? Why destroy what works?	null	1	37	2007-08-15 18:44:45 UTC
42,758	42,627	imp	How to be a Programmer: A Short, Comprehensive, and Personal Summary	Keios	short?	null	2	40	2007-08-15 18:49:00 UTC
42,760	42,702	zach	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	That's ridiculous. It's just making clear what should have been clear from the start, which is that news.yc is news for Y Combinator people, not just about their startups.Hacker News is also much less bland. And for those hackers who don't think they're interested in startups, it's more tempting! (Muhahaha! Come, hackers, and catch the chronic startup syndrome!)	null	2	37	2007-08-15 18:53:11 UTC
42,763	42,317	rms	Hacker News	pg	Thanks Paul.	null	30	150	2007-08-15 19:02:37 UTC
42,766	42,630	electric	Disrupters are agents for change -- what makes technology disruptive?	electric	http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/business/story.html...	null	0	2	2007-08-15 19:23:03 UTC
42,772	42,730	far33d	Can't get to Siggraph? $199 gives you video access to the lectures	comatose_kid	If you are a siggraph member (I think it's $50 a year or so) you can stream the talks for free.	I'm not associated with Siggraph, I just think it's a really cool conference.	0	1	2007-08-15 19:37:26 UTC
42,783	42,782	dpapathanasiou	"Why Should Paul Graham Have All the Fun?" (Perry Metzger's talk at Lisp NYC: video & slides)	dpapathanasiou	No tomatoes were thrown (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42216), but an entertaining talk nonetheless.Otter is being released under BSD, and source will be made available at OtterLang.org, so it's more of a bazaar effort (in contrast to Graham's Arc cathedral).	null	0	19	2007-08-15 20:04:25 UTC
42,787	42,702	bmaier	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	I don't know Paul but having followed here for a while and having read most of his work I'll offer you two reasons: 1) The site was losing its usefulness for him so he made it more useful for himself and chances are others will find it useful as well.2) Because He CanPerhaps if you don't agree with the changes, then write your own news app and compete. Its how the world works after all.	null	4	37	2007-08-15 20:11:08 UTC
42,788	42,075	dazzawazza	Cross Platform Desktop Applications with Python	vlad	I've had great success (and fun) using wxPython. wxWidgets combined with python is great.	null	1	7	2007-08-15 20:17:13 UTC
42,797	42,587	Goladus	Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector	mk	Maybe it's a dupe, I know I've read this one as well. Honestly though, norvig.com is a terrific site. He writes very well and I haven't read all of it yet. Here are my favorites so far:http://norvig.com/python-iaq.htmlhttp://norvig.com/21-days.html	Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.	3	63	2007-08-15 20:40:15 UTC
42,801	42,702	webology	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	Change is good but I think you mainly just stated what the site was becoming anyways based on the content as of lately. Hopefully, everyone can keep their politics in their basements and the hacker theme stays. That's why I stopped reading reddit daily. Now there's a politics sub-reddit but it took less then a week for it to junk up their homepage again...	null	6	37	2007-08-15 20:51:06 UTC
42,806	42,702	gojomo	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	Another long-term factor to consider: startup enthusiasm ebbs with business cycles, while hacking endures.	null	11	37	2007-08-15 20:59:01 UTC
42,810	42,591	SwellJoe	BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?	RyanGWU82	I'm planning to attend at least Saturday, assuming nothing else comes up. I'll be the one in the Virtualmin T-shirt (then again, I've sent out a bunch of them, so I suppose it isn't impossible for someone else to be wearing one...). Y'all be sure to say "hi" if you see me.	null	0	9	2007-08-15 21:11:00 UTC
42,817	42,702	awt	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	I like the change.	null	9	37	2007-08-15 21:57:14 UTC
42,818	42,812	rms	Resubmission of old links now that the scope of this forum has expanded	amichail	obfuscate them by adding something like ?p=123 to the end of the url.	How should we resubmit old links that were not so relevant before but are more so now?	1	2	2007-08-15 22:06:34 UTC
42,824	42,736	blored	20+ Dating Sites For Geeks and Freaks	horatio05	cute facebook apps are the best way to impress girls if you are a geek, at least that's what happened to my friend who made a cute one involving kittens	Maybe could help out some of our struggling hackers out there ;-)	0	8	2007-08-15 22:35:32 UTC
42,831	42,585	juwo	JavaScript:The World's Most Misunderstood Programming Language	mk	the article is old! 2001	null	2	13	2007-08-15 23:11:37 UTC
42,842	42,702	daniel-cussen	Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)	transburgh	I agree with the change. After a while, all the startup articles sound exactly the same. 10 tips for starting a startup...10 tips for dealing with VCs...what it takes to succeed...	null	5	37	2007-08-15 23:57:43 UTC
42,843	42,823	portLAN	Squirrels wield a hot, secret weapon	farmer	This is the kind of thing nobody would believe if you made it up. Nature is always more interesting than we imagined."Queerer than we can suppose."	null	2	12	2007-08-15 23:57:46 UTC
42,845	42,811	josefresco	Scott Adams' startup idea: Hole Digger	andreyf	give me 2 ounces of whatever he's smoking...seriously ... hole diggers? are you serious?!?	null	3	12	2007-08-16 00:00:58 UTC
42,846	42,822	daniel-cussen	Fighting Spam for a New Startup	palish	I figure old spam should work.On a side note, how many people are making spam-filtering startups?	Heya! For my site launch I'm pretty sure I need to be ready to fight spam, but I'm not sure how ready. At the very least I'll set up a basic spam filter, but I'm unsure if I should train it myself beforehand (by copy and pasting the 1000 Gmail spam emails I have in my inbox) or wait until site launch.People will write text that other people see, so it's probable that some of it will be spam.What do you all do? Is there a big database of spam to preconfigure spam filters?	1	2	2007-08-16 00:02:05 UTC
42,847	42,398	josefresco	We are living in someone else's computer simulation	mhb	this article is like that idea I get just before I wake up or as i'm soaping my ass in the shower and think it's brilliant. Then I think about it for oh ... maybe a few hours and realize I was a big idiot for even beginning to think that I understood the concepts involved.I then usually eat a sandwich	null	12	57	2007-08-16 00:03:03 UTC
42,849	42,627	dybber	How to be a Programmer: A Short, Comprehensive, and Personal Summary	Keios	Pdf version here: http://samizdat.mines.edu/howto/HowToBeAProgrammer.pdf	null	1	40	2007-08-16 00:28:22 UTC
42,851	42,823	alex_c	Squirrels wield a hot, secret weapon	farmer	Voted up for the words "Tests with robotic squirrels".Too bad I never had that much fun in my hardware labs at university.	null	0	12	2007-08-16 00:42:56 UTC
42,863	42,854	ivankirigin	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	My partner and I will be there. Sounds great.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	14	20	2007-08-16 01:40:22 UTC
42,864	42,860	epi0Bauqu	Anyone acquainted with the MIT Enterprise Forum?	dfranke	My experience is a few years old, but it probably hasn't changed much. It really depends what you are looking for. The enterprise forum in general is more on the business side than the hacker side, in my experience. I never really made any great connections there, but that may just be me being too introverted. Note that there is also the free e-club (http://web.mit.edu/e-club/) and the free 100K competition (http://www.mit100k.org/) at MIT.	The Cambridge chapter labels all of its networking events as "members only" and membership starts at $75/year. Expecting people to pay for the privilege of meeting each other seems like a yellow flag, but if the forum actually attracts smart people then it's worth the price. Has anyone here been to any of their meetings? What's your opinion of them?	0	1	2007-08-16 01:43:37 UTC
42,870	42,868	dfranke	Chess match unveils underlying widespread belief in a soul	albertcardona	Did anyone else's mind jump to The Seventh Seal after seeing this headline?	null	0	2	2007-08-16 02:03:30 UTC
42,871	42,854	pg	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	You can't have had a news.yc meetup last June. The site wasn't launched till Feb.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	7	20	2007-08-16 02:03:35 UTC
42,878	42,822	ajju	Fighting Spam for a New Startup	palish	For email spam - http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~gvcormac/treccorpus/For web spam - http://www-static.cc.gatech.edu/projects/doi/WebbSpamCorpus....	Heya! For my site launch I'm pretty sure I need to be ready to fight spam, but I'm not sure how ready. At the very least I'll set up a basic spam filter, but I'm unsure if I should train it myself beforehand (by copy and pasting the 1000 Gmail spam emails I have in my inbox) or wait until site launch.People will write text that other people see, so it's probable that some of it will be spam.What do you all do? Is there a big database of spam to preconfigure spam filters?	0	2	2007-08-16 02:23:14 UTC
42,879	42,854	ed	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	Hey Bokonist,This sounds great. I was actually planning on getting this organized myself but wanted to give the teams some time to cool off after Demo Day.If you need any help organizing let me know (see profile). Jessica said she'd try to drop in so I'll let her know that a time has been decided. I also have the email list from the last meet-up and would be more than happy to pass that along.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	0	20	2007-08-16 02:25:54 UTC
42,880	42,509	mangodrunk	Discussion about the new voting system	mcxx	I'm new but is it part of the system to not allow new users the ability to down-vote? I like the idea of actually using the karma instead of just having karma for karma's sake.	PG, what exactly is "a louder voice"? If an article will be raised up by two or more points by a person with bigger voting power will its submitter get an adequate karma raise? Is there a limit? Is there a bonus for the up-voter? Do you take into consideration current karma? Does voting power apply to down voting (I assume it does)?I think there will be a temporary higher amount of voters on the New queue, seeking for a bigger voting power, which is a good thing because the good stories will get to the main site faster. Maybe it won't be temporary as newcommers will strive for power and the easiest/only way is voting the good stories soon.However, consider this situation: A speculator comes around, voting up at random (thinking "someone will have to raise this one up") and then another one appers, seeing that a story already has 2,3 or 4 points, he could raise it up to just because it will earn him a better voting power... Will the system be able to deal with this (altough I'm not really sure this is a real threat)?	1	6	2007-08-16 02:28:46 UTC
42,882	42,854	ed	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	(I forgot to mention) I'm in. I'll probably drop in early to do some hacking in the coffee shop so if anyone wants to just chill and code, let me know.Also, could the people attending tell us about themselves? It'd be great to see what kind of crowd we're going to get this time!	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	1	20	2007-08-16 02:37:14 UTC
42,886	42,854	ivankirigin	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	How many folks from this round are still in Boston?	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	10	20	2007-08-16 02:48:21 UTC
42,893	42,854	Goladus	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	I'd like to come, although I am not planning to apply for the next cycle.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	9	20	2007-08-16 03:13:04 UTC
42,896	42,571	procrastitron	The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)	nickb	I never had the pleasure to use one, but one of my professors in college said that when the old Lisp Machines started garbage collection you just went home for the day. Of course, even that was still more productive than using the competing systems ;-)	null	1	17	2007-08-16 03:21:14 UTC
42,900	42,854	vonsydov	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	Oh...man...I'd love to. But Sunday is bad for me, have a concert after 7pm. How about Friday ?	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	6	20	2007-08-16 03:34:38 UTC
42,902	42,816	daniel-cussen	Uses of "* is the new *" in 2005 represented graphically	david	Seriously clever.	null	1	13	2007-08-16 03:36:41 UTC
42,903	42,892	bmaier	An idea	cellis	It seems like an interesting idea but what does it do other than add one more app to facebook. It seems like work that might not add much value. jmho but if you're going to put out the effort put it into something more beneficial.	ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??	4	6	2007-08-16 03:42:43 UTC
42,904	42,587	henning	Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector	mk	Slightly OT: those who enjoyed Norvig's PAIP but wanted more AI content will enjoy Forbus and de Kleer's Building Problem Solvers. Starts out on the same subject matter as PAIP but spends a lot of time talking about truth maintenance system.The code is in Common Lisp.It's old-style symbolic AI which is fairly limited in its utility, but truth maintenance systems have interesting applications in natural language processing and and other domains, so, whatever.	Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.	1	63	2007-08-16 03:44:05 UTC
42,907	42,067	electric	Why Apple doesn't sell to the enterprise market	nostrademons	Because none of the leading-edge engineering design tools will work on the mac.	via Raganwald's submission on Programming Reddit	4	23	2007-08-16 04:06:44 UTC
42,909	42,892	ph0rque	An idea	cellis	I was just thinking about the same thing a few hours ago. I think this would be useful because if I wanted e.g. someone to introduce me to a potential investor, I could look the investor up on FB and see if I am connected to that person, and ask the "connectors" to introduce me.	ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??	1	6	2007-08-16 04:19:03 UTC
42,911	42,887	ed	Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.	thomasswift	Play to the particular technology's strengths... flash for video or performance and javascript for flash-disabled clients or working closely with the DOM	What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?	3	8	2007-08-16 04:25:33 UTC
42,912	42,887	jsjenkins168	Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.	thomasswift	I personally prefer lightweight javascript over the often slower flash equivalent. Rich UI functionality is generally easier to implement in flash though. But this can be a heated debate so watch out..Some things to consider: The iPhone supports javascript but not flash, Adobe does not have flash out for x86_64 Linux, Flash is a proprietary closed platform.	What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?	0	8	2007-08-16 04:27:34 UTC
42,915	42,884	dejb	Why the iPhone doesn't have copy+paste	david	This article's justifications for why the feature is missing typifies everything I hate about macs and their apologists. It's the whole 'we know better than you' about what you should be allowed to do. Give me an environment that is alive with all sorts of applications, methods of use and even viruses/trojans any day over this sterile Mac-world	null	0	27	2007-08-16 04:41:10 UTC
42,918	42,812	bootload	Resubmission of old links now that the scope of this forum has expanded	amichail	"... How should we resubmit old links ..."why resubmit old links, when you can simply search for different ones to add? Now if there was a decent search behind hack.yc you wouldn't even entertain the idea.	How should we resubmit old links that were not so relevant before but are more so now?	0	2	2007-08-16 04:50:45 UTC
42,919	42,887	bosky101	Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.	thomasswift	for anything that needs to push data frequently - javascript/ajax for anything that needs to pull data frequently - flashand dont worry about that javascript widgets slowing thing! the web as we know it ,is fragmented in data anyway.	What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?	4	8	2007-08-16 04:51:22 UTC
42,922	42,892	blackdog	An idea	cellis	With the current primitives, it'd be pretty hard to do. You can get a list of your friends, but you can't do get a list of their friends - the best you can do is ask if two people are connected. you'd basically have to keep an offline list of the facebook web of connections.	ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??	3	6	2007-08-16 05:09:32 UTC
42,923	42,892	ed	An idea	cellis	Wonder if you'd have enough user data exposed through the API to actually map out the relevant network... computationally it'd be fairly trivial to verify the user's guess, but you'd have a hell of a time actually calculating minimum distance with a dataset as large as Facebook's. That's why for the most part you won't see a social network telling you how two users are connected beyond a distance of two hops.	ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??	0	6	2007-08-16 05:13:53 UTC
42,924	42,317	ahsonwardak	Hacker News	pg	It's always useful to change it up a little bit. It'll give it some new life.	null	27	150	2007-08-16 05:14:02 UTC
42,927	42,825	ahsonwardak	CIA, Vatican busted for Wikipedia edits	farmer	Did anyone not expect this to happen? They got caught, as they should have. But is it bad? At least we know that they care about their image on the Web. It shows Wikipedia's significance as a credible source for information and the Web as a host for that source. Wikipedia is almost meant to be an encyclopedia driven by anarchy.	null	0	5	2007-08-16 05:21:49 UTC
42,929	42,811	danteembermage	Scott Adams' startup idea: Hole Digger	andreyf	If I could license a hole digger, the first thing I would do is connect LA to New York the short way. If I'm really lucky they will have invented a room temperature superconductor by then so my now nearly frictionless train can fall across the country at break-neck speed with near zero energy expenditure.	null	2	12	2007-08-16 05:30:33 UTC
42,935	42,933	thingsilearned	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	I've been out here (the Valley) for the summer. The crazy thing about the place is, every time I ride the BART or sit down at a coffee shop there's someone sitting next to me that's either works at Yahoo/ebay/google/etc or is also doing a startup. Its really easy to start conversations with these people upon noticing a Django error page on their laptop or an ebay employee badge. The conversations are great. Also there are lots of meetups, lectures and parties for startups. The place just breathes technology (can be frustrating as well if you additionally like other things such as frisbee or women).	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	1	26	2007-08-16 05:58:04 UTC
42,936	42,933	chadboyda	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	I used to live up in the Valley for many years until I moved down to Los Angeles about 5 years ago. Doing a startup in Los Angeles has been difficult, mostly in trying to find and network with other like minded individuals but with a little effort we're finding its not all that hard. We use meetup.com and upcoming.org a lot to find or setup local tech meet ups.It seems to be really starting to make a difference though, there's more of a sense of a growing tech community in LA now (a welcome relief from the entertainment buzz). Hopefully it'll keep growing.So while I agree its definately harder than it is in the Silicon Valley, its not impossible. There are other people out there doing startups, you just have to proactively try and find them and bring them together if someone else isn't doing so already in your area.	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	10	26	2007-08-16 06:05:41 UTC
42,937	42,933	jsjenkins168	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	Paul Graham has a good essay on this topic if you're interested: http://www.paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	6	26	2007-08-16 06:16:11 UTC
42,938	42,933	cperciva	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	I think one of the largest reasons why Silicon Valley has so many startups and other places have so few is Paul Graham's reason #15 for not starting a startup: "Parents want you to be a doctor".Not literally, of course; but rather in the general sense of social pressure against creating a startup. In the Valley, you can say that you're thinking of creating your own business, and people will tell you that they think that's cool, will talk about startups they have been involved in, and generally support the idea. In most of the rest of the world, people will look at you as if you've announced that you're planning on getting a sex change: A small amount of admiration for making such a hard decision, mixed with a large amount of skepticism about your sanity. After all, everybody knows that 50%/80%/90%/99% of small businesses fail within X years, right?I've been very lucky that, in spite of being surrounded by generally skeptical people, I've encountered a lot of support; as my girlfriend put it, "most small businesses fail, but if anyone can succeed, it will be you". If it weren't for how much my friends apparently believe in me personally, I'm sure I'd have been convinced to not even attempt this based on those same statistics about failure rates.	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	4	26	2007-08-16 06:19:33 UTC
42,943	42,933	henning	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	While we're talking about location, avoid San Diego if you don't want to live in a sprawling automobile-metropolis where the only decent jobs involve making toys for the Pentagon. The restaurants, almost all fast food or chain, with their generic soaked-cardboard food, are copied and pasted around endlessly. Jesus christ.	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	14	26	2007-08-16 06:49:06 UTC
42,944	42,317	brett	Hacker News	pg	Well, the name change at least totally ruins the effect of my animating the site title: http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=crapfaceAlso the rest of the menu did not disappear before. And you've already closed the hole so I can't fix it.	null	18	150	2007-08-16 06:49:28 UTC
42,953	42,816	LaurieCheers	Uses of "* is the new *" in 2005 represented graphically	david	"LOL I CAN HAS" is the new "is the new".	null	0	13	2007-08-16 07:30:52 UTC
42,956	42,854	davidw	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	This might be an opportune moment to mention the (not very active) IRC channel: #news.yc on Freenode.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	2	20	2007-08-16 08:18:39 UTC
42,957	42,933	robertgaal	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	DC? Try doing a startup in Europe. Now there's a challenge...	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	15	26	2007-08-16 08:21:34 UTC
42,958	42,839	davidw	This could be your fate if you don't do a startup	menloparkbum	He looks like Kim Jong Il:http://www.foxnews.com/images/229818/0_63_kim_jongil.jpg	welcome to the crushing grind of mediocrity, yahoo! style.	2	11	2007-08-16 08:27:13 UTC
42,959	42,881	JBiserkov	How JavaScript is Slowing Down the Web (And What To Do About It)	brett	The title is misleading. A somewhat more precise title would be"How & why [lots of] (poorly written) widgets slow down blogs".As Paul Graham once said: "...the closer you get to the truth, the messier your sentence gets."	null	0	18	2007-08-16 08:27:38 UTC
42,969	42,933	david927	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	The biggest reason -- the elephant in the room reason -- is the money. Angel capital won't touch you if you live farther than a two hour drive. VC's are similar. And so it's just a self-referential loop that spirals upwards.The only problem is that 90% of Silicon Valley startups are that kind of meringue and marshmallow that VC love. The record companies love Britney Spears and VC's love Twitter. It's all a big get-rich-quick scheme and a waste of time. Sadly, as a native of Silicon Valley, it means that true innovation, when it is happening, is occurring everywhere.	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	0	26	2007-08-16 09:56:36 UTC
42,974	42,631	jgamman	How to Give a Kick Ass Presentation	nreece	i was skim reading after a while but i never caught my personal favorite - 'have something "GBP$"GBP$ interesting to say', no amount of eye candy can polish a god awful boring conclusion.	null	0	12	2007-08-16 10:33:35 UTC
42,980	42,933	epi0Bauqu	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	In certain startup areas like Web apps it is changing, albeit slowly. A Web app company can be created by a few people (even one) successfully on very little (if no significant amount) of money. And it is becoming easier to find local co-founders because there are so many programmers who know or can learn the technologies at play and don't want to move to California.	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	13	26	2007-08-16 11:02:13 UTC
42,981	42,933	epi0Bauqu	Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?	ahsonwardak	Like most things in real life, the answer boils down to a set of intertwined non-linear feedback loops that you can probably identify and analyze (even quantitatively) using systems analysis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_analysis) or a similar technique. I suspect pg in his essay has nailed down some of (and probably the major) loops involved, i.e. the ones around rich people and nerds.The basic loops he identifies seem to be nerds attract other nerds, rich people attract other rich people, and nerds attract rich people as long as they are starting startups that need investment and get rich people richer (please correct me if I am wrong). These are all positive feedback loops, so they keep growing until they hit some negative ones. Some negative ones: saturation of nerds or rich people (not yet), saturation of space (getting there), high living costs (definitely close), nerds not starting startups because they work for Google (hard to tell but I doubt it), nerds not needing investment (increasingly so for Web apps), and other viable places to move (true in some areas like Biotech).	This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?	5	26	2007-08-16 11:14:30 UTC
42,982	42,317	runningskull	Hacker News	pg	You are absolutely right about hackers caring about other things than business, but we already have a hundred places to get all that information online. The reason I liked this site is that it had a purpose: to provide news about startups. With a focus like that, the site is unlikely to ever go the route of reddit (the internet version of chain letters and "my dad can beat up your dad").PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE change it back. If you want to launch another site for hacker news, I'll be the first to subscribe, but PLEASE give us back startup news!	null	11	150	2007-08-16 11:15:24 UTC
42,983	42,887	epi0Bauqu	Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.	thomasswift	Pretty much everyone has JavaScript. While for what you are doing, probably everyone in your target audience has Flash, but keep in mind for different versions the % of the general population that has it installed is not 100%: http://www.adobe.com/products/player_census/flashplayer/vers...Adobe (who has an incentive to inflate their numbers though I'm not saying they are) puts Flash 9 at 84.0%. Below that you get into the high 90s. But if your whole product is based on a viral loop, and you can achieve the same thing with JavaScript, that few % can be important when compounded over time.	What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?	1	8	2007-08-16 11:20:25 UTC
42,986	42,839	fad	This could be your fate if you don't do a startup	menloparkbum	plz tell me this is parody	welcome to the crushing grind of mediocrity, yahoo! style.	5	11	2007-08-16 11:40:33 UTC
42,991	42,854	champion	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	I'm interested and might be able to make it	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	15	20	2007-08-16 12:12:35 UTC
42,992	42,884	extantproject	Why the iPhone doesn't have copy+paste	david	I use an iPhone daily and there have only been a few times I've missed copy and paste. Usually it's been when I'm tapping out a reply email or posting on a site such as YC News and need to quote someone. To route around the lack of copy and paste my replies end up being similar to using a word you know how to spell instead of one you don't; I just write what I think rather than writing about what someone else has written and think nothing of it. There are certainly cases when this analogy doesn't hold and copy and paste functionality would be nice, but it's definitely by design that there isn't one.Constraining developers and themselves to create simpler ways to do things is smart of Apple. Emailing photos is the perfect example: I want to email this photo that is on my screen -- not open my "photo application", copy a photo, go back to the main screen, open my "email application" and paste the photo. Most of the copy and paste scenarios can be handled in a similar way: links to maps, links to phone numbers, links to URLs, and so on.Maybe there are better ways to perform actions on mobile platforms instead of following the decades-old clunky mouse way to do them?	null	1	27	2007-08-16 12:14:43 UTC
42,993	42,854	pbnaidu	news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA	bokonist	Great idea, yes I'll be there. I am also looking for a co-founder before applying for winter program.	We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.	5	20	2007-08-16 12:18:50 UTC

42,634

42,585

mpc

JavaScript:The World's Most Misunderstood Programming Language

mk

Great explanation about why the name "JavaScript" has done so much harm to the language.

null

1

13

2007-08-15 13:09:15 UTC

42,635

42,551

nreece

Request: simple story promotion algorithm

zemaj

Rank = ( ( current_time - post_time ) / number_of_votes )Simple enough!

Hi all,I recently added a karma-like voting system to posts in a phpBB forum that was having some problems with spam (we have an point incentive system that users use to bid for real items - now instead of rewarding points for posts, they're now awarded for votes).My question is; does anyone know a simple algorithm that can get a list of the "best-recent" posts based on votes. So simply if an item has a certain number of positive and negative points with each vote point made at a certain time, how can I combine that to get a list of highly voted, recent posts.I could obviously research and come up with something myself, but there's probably quite a few people here who have experience in this area, so I thought it was worth a post!Thanks, James

2

4

2007-08-15 13:12:35 UTC

42,636

42,581

yubrew

This patent application seems coherent. Then, a dedication to 50 Cent. Then...

zach

20070156594 - This number refers to a published patent application, which does not mean that a patent has been granted.I have a 98% confidence rating that you can only enforce rights from issued patents. An application means that it has a chance of being issued, but normally does not have much value until it is actually granted.When a patent has been granted, you'll see a number similar to this "5,146,634 6923014 0000001" http://patft.uspto.gov/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.htm

Scroll down to see the description.

0

3

2007-08-15 13:20:55 UTC

42,637

42,398

aswanson

We are living in someone else's computer simulation

mhb

No we're not.

null

16

57

2007-08-15 13:22:06 UTC

42,638

42,629

davidw

The nerdiest nerd test around

LaurieCheers

Not that some people wouldn't find it entertaining, but this is just the sort of thing that I was happy not to find at YC.news in the past. The question is: is it just me being a grumpus, or is it indeed not "hacker-worthy"? The expanded scope makes it a little tricker to judge content.No offense meant, LaurieCheers - it's not like it's some horribly lame and offensive site, just not the sort of 'usual fare' for this one.

null

0

1

2007-08-15 13:22:09 UTC

42,641

42,571

damon

The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)

nickb

i constantly get distracted at the day job when i have to compile, like now ;) it's amazing how much more focused i stay with a repl. (and a better language than C#)

null

2

17

2007-08-15 13:37:32 UTC

42,648

42,508

morselsrule

Can software start-ups succeed with non-programmer founder(s)?

NoMoreSnow

Constant Contact and Intuit are examples that come to mind. Intuit is debatable since the programmer was the first hire and was working partly for equity. For both companies, the founder came out of Bain Consulting. MySpace might be another example - I don't think their founders were really technical.

Can non-programmers have success at raising money for a software start-up?Also, do you know of any success stories(received more than angel funding) where the founder(s) were not programmers?Thanks, NoMoreSnow

3

11

2007-08-15 13:57:11 UTC

42,650

42,587

amichail

Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector

mk

Scala version here:http://blog.circleshare.com/index.php?/archives/61-A-spell-c...

Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.

4

63

2007-08-15 14:15:57 UTC

42,651

42,540

jkush

Does your project need a Cool Cam?

dood

I hate to be a wet blanket, but posts from www.worsethanfailure.com are really going to bring the quality of this site down.

null

2

31

2007-08-15 14:21:50 UTC

42,653

42,398

r7000

We are living in someone else's computer simulation

mhb

What about the morality of simulating an environment where sentient beings are produced by a long agonizing process of evolution? Greg Egan points that out here: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/PERMUTATION/FAQ/FAQ... (question 6). "Post-humans" should have room for a much more robust morality that would preclude someone purposely creating the world we live in - unless we were an unintended byproduct of an unintended byproduct that no "post-human" has even noticed or something.

null

10

57

2007-08-15 14:27:16 UTC

42,663

42,591

gibsonf1

BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?

RyanGWU82

It looks interesting, but what happens there exactly?

null

2

9

2007-08-15 15:26:33 UTC

42,674

42,630

run4yourlives

Disrupters are agents for change -- what makes technology disruptive?

electric

You should fix the link - it's going to the second page.

null

1

2

2007-08-15 15:58:23 UTC

42,675

42,587

ivankirigin

Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector

mk

I've decided that what is amazing about Norvig is that he is skilled in both theory and practice. A maker and a thinker.

Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.

0

63

2007-08-15 15:59:32 UTC

42,677

42,571

ivankirigin

The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)

nickb

Now that StartupNews has become HackerNews, expect XKCD to get to the front page 3 times a week.

null

0

17

2007-08-15 16:01:03 UTC

42,681

42,664

Tichy

Matt Maroon: Demo Day

toffer

Enough with the tantalizing teases: when will we finally get to know what the current YC companies are actually doing??

null

0

25

2007-08-15 16:13:52 UTC

42,685

42,676

run4yourlives

Nine Javascript Gotchas

morselsrule

I thought the purpose of javascript was to be one big giant gotcha? :-)

null

0

1

2007-08-15 16:32:47 UTC

42,686

42,587

far33d

Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector

mk

I swear this is a dupe.... did the already submitted articles list get reset when we turned into "hacker news"?

Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.

2

63

2007-08-15 16:33:25 UTC

42,687

42,652

ivankirigin

Silphium: Did Greek science die out because their elite discovered The Pill?

byrneseyeview

Here is an interesting note from FuturePundit:"Upper Class Fertility Rising Due To Competitive Birthing?" http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/004462.html

null

0

10

2007-08-15 16:34:35 UTC

42,689

42,629

bvowk

The nerdiest nerd test around

LaurieCheers

Perhaps the lamest nerd test would be a better title. Don't you all have something better to do?

null

1

2007-08-15 16:38:00 UTC

42,691

42,664

menloparkbum

Matt Maroon: Demo Day

toffer

Drunk dudes whizzing on trees, a couple shots before the meeting, "strap on some plums" t-shirts. Apparently even Y-Combinator can't escape the inevitable consequence of nerds turning into frat boys as soon as they get a little money...

null

1

25

2007-08-15 16:48:44 UTC

42,692

42,591

chaostheory

BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?

RyanGWU82

I can't make it Sat, but I'm going on Sunday

null

3

9

2007-08-15 16:49:20 UTC

42,699

42,667

randallsquared

Blueprint is a CSS framework

webology

Okay, so I looked at this. I don't get the point of the grid system. Rather, what I want to know is: if you're going to laboriously simulate tables in CSS classes, why not just use tables? It would be simpler, more easily understandable by human readers, scales up and down better (Blueprint doesn't do non-fixed layouts yet, apparently), and in HTML4, at least, would usually involve less markup.Against this, it wouldn't be quite as easily read for the tiny fraction of a percent that use screen readers. That seems like a very small price to pay for the major wins.

null

0

9

2007-08-15 17:05:01 UTC

42,700

42,602

bvowk

OLPC speed improved

qwertyuiop

What the hell. 72 seconds to boot a box with no moving bits and a wildly simplified OS? And thats the IMPROVED time. Thats pretty pathetic.

null

0

1

2007-08-15 17:06:10 UTC

42,715

42,702

hhm

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

I don't agree. I think this Hacker News idea is fantastic. Some time ago I proposed a "classic.reddit.com", the idea being the same: having a place where we could have the good old reddit, or rather, where we could have intelligent news back again.

null

3

37

2007-08-15 17:37:27 UTC

42,717

42,702

pg

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

Because we ourselves were bored with reading about nothing but startups. If our site was boring to us, it was probably boring to the audience we intended it for. This is hard for business guys to understand, but the people who make the best startup founders often don't care about business very much. Some of the most successful companies started next year will be started by people who do not currently plan to start companies.

null

0

37

2007-08-15 17:39:24 UTC

42,743

42,317

blats

Hacker News

pg

Yep, the stories are already much more interesting. I just blew an hour when I only sat down to check my email. Great. Guess I'm going to have to call in hacker to work.

null

17

150

2007-08-15 18:20:24 UTC

42,744

42,702

DougBTX

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

What would be really interesting would be some sort of hidden A/B testing...

null

10

37

2007-08-15 18:25:57 UTC

42,755

42,731

michael_nielsen

Ultrafast quantum computer uses optically controlled electrons

mk

This is a strange article, in my opinion. The point of quantum computing is to enable completely new types of algorithms whose running time scales much faster - ideally, exponentially faster - than an ordinary computer. For certain very limited classes of tasks, this can be achieved.Given this, the "running speed" of the computer, which is what this article focuses on, isn't all that important. A working 1 kiloherz quantum computer will greatly outperform a 1 teraherz conventional computer for those problems quantum computers are known to be good at, such as factoring composite integers.

null

0

9

2007-08-15 18:43:13 UTC

42,756

42,702

nickb

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

I posted this in another thread: why not start a NEW website hackernews.org or something and leave this site alone? Why mess with success?This site is, after all, a subdomain of the YC site which is an early stage investment firm. n.yc.com made sense since it dealt with YC company news stories, VC investment, angel investment etc. stories. If you wanted to get funding from YC or wanted to learn how VC investment procedure works, this was a perfect complement to the main YC site. Now n.yc will become another reddit and will get flooded with all kinds of nonsense and will get a lot of "how do I haxor my ex's myspace account" since "hacker" really means cracker to like 99% of the internet population. Instead of spending 10 min to get an idea what the latest trends in investment community are, you'll have to spend 20+ minutes while. As for being bored and you're a startup founder, you're in trouble! And if you're really bored and need to read something, there's plenty of reddit & digg subdomains that are interesting.This new site will lose focus and will degrade into another digg or reddit. Second law of (thermodynamics) Internet almost guarantees it. Paul, if you want this site to become bigger and grow and become a better reddit and all that, why not get a new domain and start it there? Why destroy what works?

null

1

37

2007-08-15 18:44:45 UTC

42,758

42,627

imp

How to be a Programmer: A Short, Comprehensive, and Personal Summary

Keios

short?

null

2

40

2007-08-15 18:49:00 UTC

42,760

42,702

zach

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

That's ridiculous. It's just making clear what should have been clear from the start, which is that news.yc is news for Y Combinator people, not just about their startups.Hacker News is also much less bland. And for those hackers who don't think they're interested in startups, it's more tempting! (Muhahaha! Come, hackers, and catch the chronic startup syndrome!)

null

2

37

2007-08-15 18:53:11 UTC

42,763

42,317

rms

Hacker News

pg

Thanks Paul.

null

30

150

2007-08-15 19:02:37 UTC

42,766

42,630

electric

Disrupters are agents for change -- what makes technology disruptive?

electric

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/business/story.html...

null

0

2

2007-08-15 19:23:03 UTC

42,772

42,730

far33d

Can't get to Siggraph? $199 gives you video access to the lectures

comatose_kid

If you are a siggraph member (I think it's $50 a year or so) you can stream the talks for free.

I'm not associated with Siggraph, I just think it's a really cool conference.

0

1

2007-08-15 19:37:26 UTC

42,783

42,782

dpapathanasiou

"Why Should Paul Graham Have All the Fun?" (Perry Metzger's talk at Lisp NYC: video & slides)

dpapathanasiou

No tomatoes were thrown (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42216), but an entertaining talk nonetheless.Otter is being released under BSD, and source will be made available at OtterLang.org, so it's more of a bazaar effort (in contrast to Graham's Arc cathedral).

null

0

19

2007-08-15 20:04:25 UTC

42,787

42,702

bmaier

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

I don't know Paul but having followed here for a while and having read most of his work I'll offer you two reasons: 1) The site was losing its usefulness for him so he made it more useful for himself and chances are others will find it useful as well.2) Because He CanPerhaps if you don't agree with the changes, then write your own news app and compete. Its how the world works after all.

null

4

37

2007-08-15 20:11:08 UTC

42,788

42,075

dazzawazza

Cross Platform Desktop Applications with Python

vlad

I've had great success (and fun) using wxPython. wxWidgets combined with python is great.

null

1

7

2007-08-15 20:17:13 UTC

42,797

42,587

Goladus

Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector

mk

Maybe it's a dupe, I know I've read this one as well. Honestly though, norvig.com is a terrific site. He writes very well and I haven't read all of it yet. Here are my favorites so far:http://norvig.com/python-iaq.htmlhttp://norvig.com/21-days.html

Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.

3

63

2007-08-15 20:40:15 UTC

42,801

42,702

webology

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

Change is good but I think you mainly just stated what the site was becoming anyways based on the content as of lately. Hopefully, everyone can keep their politics in their basements and the hacker theme stays. That's why I stopped reading reddit daily. Now there's a politics sub-reddit but it took less then a week for it to junk up their homepage again...

null

6

37

2007-08-15 20:51:06 UTC

42,806

42,702

gojomo

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

Another long-term factor to consider: startup enthusiasm ebbs with business cycles, while hacking endures.

null

11

37

2007-08-15 20:59:01 UTC

42,810

42,591

SwellJoe

BarCampBlock in Palo Alto - this weekend - anyone attending?

RyanGWU82

I'm planning to attend at least Saturday, assuming nothing else comes up. I'll be the one in the Virtualmin T-shirt (then again, I've sent out a bunch of them, so I suppose it isn't impossible for someone else to be wearing one...). Y'all be sure to say "hi" if you see me.

null

0

9

2007-08-15 21:11:00 UTC

42,817

42,702

awt

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

I like the change.

null

9

37

2007-08-15 21:57:14 UTC

42,818

42,812

rms

Resubmission of old links now that the scope of this forum has expanded

amichail

obfuscate them by adding something like ?p=123 to the end of the url.

How should we resubmit old links that were not so relevant before but are more so now?

1

2

2007-08-15 22:06:34 UTC

42,824

42,736

blored

20+ Dating Sites For Geeks and Freaks

horatio05

cute facebook apps are the best way to impress girls if you are a geek, at least that's what happened to my friend who made a cute one involving kittens

Maybe could help out some of our struggling hackers out there ;-)

0

8

2007-08-15 22:35:32 UTC

42,831

42,585

juwo

JavaScript:The World's Most Misunderstood Programming Language

mk

the article is old! 2001

null

2

13

2007-08-15 23:11:37 UTC

42,842

42,702

daniel-cussen

Why Paul? Why Did You Change It? (About Hacker News)

transburgh

I agree with the change. After a while, all the startup articles sound exactly the same. 10 tips for starting a startup...10 tips for dealing with VCs...what it takes to succeed...

null

5

37

2007-08-15 23:57:43 UTC

42,843

42,823

portLAN

Squirrels wield a hot, secret weapon

farmer

This is the kind of thing nobody would believe if you made it up. Nature is always more interesting than we imagined."Queerer than we can suppose."

null

2

12

2007-08-15 23:57:46 UTC

42,845

42,811

josefresco

Scott Adams' startup idea: Hole Digger

andreyf

give me 2 ounces of whatever he's smoking...seriously ... hole diggers? are you serious?!?

null

3

12

2007-08-16 00:00:58 UTC

42,846

42,822

daniel-cussen

Fighting Spam for a New Startup

palish

I figure old spam should work.On a side note, how many people are making spam-filtering startups?

Heya! For my site launch I'm pretty sure I need to be ready to fight spam, but I'm not sure how ready. At the very least I'll set up a basic spam filter, but I'm unsure if I should train it myself beforehand (by copy and pasting the 1000 Gmail spam emails I have in my inbox) or wait until site launch.People will write text that other people see, so it's probable that some of it will be spam.What do you all do? Is there a big database of spam to preconfigure spam filters?

1

2

2007-08-16 00:02:05 UTC

42,847

42,398

josefresco

We are living in someone else's computer simulation

mhb

this article is like that idea I get just before I wake up or as i'm soaping my ass in the shower and think it's brilliant. Then I think about it for oh ... maybe a few hours and realize I was a big idiot for even beginning to think that I understood the concepts involved.I then usually eat a sandwich

null

12

57

2007-08-16 00:03:03 UTC

42,849

42,627

dybber

How to be a Programmer: A Short, Comprehensive, and Personal Summary

Keios

Pdf version here: http://samizdat.mines.edu/howto/HowToBeAProgrammer.pdf

null

1

40

2007-08-16 00:28:22 UTC

42,851

42,823

alex_c

Squirrels wield a hot, secret weapon

farmer

Voted up for the words "Tests with robotic squirrels".Too bad I never had that much fun in my hardware labs at university.

null

0

12

2007-08-16 00:42:56 UTC

42,863

42,854

ivankirigin

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

My partner and I will be there. Sounds great.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

14

20

2007-08-16 01:40:22 UTC

42,864

42,860

epi0Bauqu

Anyone acquainted with the MIT Enterprise Forum?

dfranke

My experience is a few years old, but it probably hasn't changed much. It really depends what you are looking for. The enterprise forum in general is more on the business side than the hacker side, in my experience. I never really made any great connections there, but that may just be me being too introverted. Note that there is also the free e-club (http://web.mit.edu/e-club/) and the free 100K competition (http://www.mit100k.org/) at MIT.

The Cambridge chapter labels all of its networking events as "members only" and membership starts at $75/year. Expecting people to pay for the privilege of meeting each other seems like a yellow flag, but if the forum actually attracts smart people then it's worth the price. Has anyone here been to any of their meetings? What's your opinion of them?

0

1

2007-08-16 01:43:37 UTC

42,870

42,868

dfranke

Chess match unveils underlying widespread belief in a soul

albertcardona

Did anyone else's mind jump to The Seventh Seal after seeing this headline?

null

0

2

2007-08-16 02:03:30 UTC

42,871

42,854

pg

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

You can't have had a news.yc meetup last June. The site wasn't launched till Feb.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

7

20

2007-08-16 02:03:35 UTC

42,878

42,822

ajju

Fighting Spam for a New Startup

palish

For email spam - http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~gvcormac/treccorpus/For web spam - http://www-static.cc.gatech.edu/projects/doi/WebbSpamCorpus....

Heya! For my site launch I'm pretty sure I need to be ready to fight spam, but I'm not sure how ready. At the very least I'll set up a basic spam filter, but I'm unsure if I should train it myself beforehand (by copy and pasting the 1000 Gmail spam emails I have in my inbox) or wait until site launch.People will write text that other people see, so it's probable that some of it will be spam.What do you all do? Is there a big database of spam to preconfigure spam filters?

0

2

2007-08-16 02:23:14 UTC

42,879

42,854

ed

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

Hey Bokonist,This sounds great. I was actually planning on getting this organized myself but wanted to give the teams some time to cool off after Demo Day.If you need any help organizing let me know (see profile). Jessica said she'd try to drop in so I'll let her know that a time has been decided. I also have the email list from the last meet-up and would be more than happy to pass that along.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

0

20

2007-08-16 02:25:54 UTC

42,880

42,509

mangodrunk

Discussion about the new voting system

mcxx

I'm new but is it part of the system to not allow new users the ability to down-vote? I like the idea of actually using the karma instead of just having karma for karma's sake.

PG, what exactly is "a louder voice"? If an article will be raised up by two or more points by a person with bigger voting power will its submitter get an adequate karma raise? Is there a limit? Is there a bonus for the up-voter? Do you take into consideration current karma? Does voting power apply to down voting (I assume it does)?I think there will be a temporary higher amount of voters on the New queue, seeking for a bigger voting power, which is a good thing because the good stories will get to the main site faster. Maybe it won't be temporary as newcommers will strive for power and the easiest/only way is voting the good stories soon.However, consider this situation: A speculator comes around, voting up at random (thinking "someone will have to raise this one up") and then another one appers, seeing that a story already has 2,3 or 4 points, he could raise it up to just because it will earn him a better voting power... Will the system be able to deal with this (altough I'm not really sure this is a real threat)?

1

6

2007-08-16 02:28:46 UTC

42,882

42,854

ed

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

(I forgot to mention) I'm in. I'll probably drop in early to do some hacking in the coffee shop so if anyone wants to just chill and code, let me know.Also, could the people attending tell us about themselves? It'd be great to see what kind of crowd we're going to get this time!

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

1

20

2007-08-16 02:37:14 UTC

42,886

42,854

ivankirigin

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

How many folks from this round are still in Boston?

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

10

20

2007-08-16 02:48:21 UTC

42,893

42,854

Goladus

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

I'd like to come, although I am not planning to apply for the next cycle.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

9

20

2007-08-16 03:13:04 UTC

42,896

42,571

procrastitron

The #1 reason excuse for programmers legitimately slacking off (not if you use Lisp ;)

nickb

I never had the pleasure to use one, but one of my professors in college said that when the old Lisp Machines started garbage collection you just went home for the day. Of course, even that was still more productive than using the competing systems ;-)

null

1

17

2007-08-16 03:21:14 UTC

42,900

42,854

vonsydov

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

Oh...man...I'd love to. But Sunday is bad for me, have a concert after 7pm. How about Friday ?

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

6

20

2007-08-16 03:34:38 UTC

42,902

42,816

daniel-cussen

Uses of "* is the new *" in 2005 represented graphically

david

Seriously clever.

null

1

13

2007-08-16 03:36:41 UTC

42,903

42,892

bmaier

An idea

cellis

It seems like an interesting idea but what does it do other than add one more app to facebook. It seems like work that might not add much value. jmho but if you're going to put out the effort put it into something more beneficial.

ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??

4

6

2007-08-16 03:42:43 UTC

42,904

42,587

henning

Norvig: How to write a spelling corrector

mk

Slightly OT: those who enjoyed Norvig's PAIP but wanted more AI content will enjoy Forbus and de Kleer's Building Problem Solvers. Starts out on the same subject matter as PAIP but spends a lot of time talking about truth maintenance system.The code is in Common Lisp.It's old-style symbolic AI which is fairly limited in its utility, but truth maintenance systems have interesting applications in natural language processing and and other domains, so, whatever.

Peter Norvig does a very good job of writing a spelling corrector similar to the way google's works (although much simpler). This is done step by step in python.

1

63

2007-08-16 03:44:05 UTC

42,907

42,067

electric

Why Apple doesn't sell to the enterprise market

nostrademons

Because none of the leading-edge engineering design tools will work on the mac.

via Raganwald's submission on Programming Reddit

4

23

2007-08-16 04:06:44 UTC

42,909

42,892

ph0rque

An idea

cellis

I was just thinking about the same thing a few hours ago. I think this would be useful because if I wanted e.g. someone to introduce me to a potential investor, I could look the investor up on FB and see if I am connected to that person, and ask the "connectors" to introduce me.

ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??

1

6

2007-08-16 04:19:03 UTC

42,911

42,887

ed

Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.

thomasswift

Play to the particular technology's strengths... flash for video or performance and javascript for flash-disabled clients or working closely with the DOM

What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?

3

8

2007-08-16 04:25:33 UTC

42,912

42,887

jsjenkins168

Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.

thomasswift

I personally prefer lightweight javascript over the often slower flash equivalent. Rich UI functionality is generally easier to implement in flash though. But this can be a heated debate so watch out..Some things to consider: The iPhone supports javascript but not flash, Adobe does not have flash out for x86_64 Linux, Flash is a proprietary closed platform.

What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?

0

8

2007-08-16 04:27:34 UTC

42,915

42,884

dejb

Why the iPhone doesn't have copy+paste

david

This article's justifications for why the feature is missing typifies everything I hate about macs and their apologists. It's the whole 'we know better than you' about what you should be allowed to do. Give me an environment that is alive with all sorts of applications, methods of use and even viruses/trojans any day over this sterile Mac-world

null

0

27

2007-08-16 04:41:10 UTC

42,918

42,812

bootload

Resubmission of old links now that the scope of this forum has expanded

amichail

"... How should we resubmit old links ..."why resubmit old links, when you can simply search for different ones to add? Now if there was a decent search behind hack.yc you wouldn't even entertain the idea.

How should we resubmit old links that were not so relevant before but are more so now?

0

2

2007-08-16 04:50:45 UTC

42,919

42,887

bosky101

Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.

thomasswift

for anything that needs to push data frequently - javascript/ajax for anything that needs to pull data frequently - flashand dont worry about that javascript widgets slowing thing! the web as we know it ,is fragmented in data anyway.

What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?

4

8

2007-08-16 04:51:22 UTC

42,922

42,892

blackdog

An idea

cellis

With the current primitives, it'd be pretty hard to do. You can get a list of your friends, but you can't do get a list of their friends - the best you can do is ask if two people are connected. you'd basically have to keep an offline list of the facebook web of connections.

ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??

3

6

2007-08-16 05:09:32 UTC

42,923

42,892

ed

An idea

cellis

Wonder if you'd have enough user data exposed through the API to actually map out the relevant network... computationally it'd be fairly trivial to verify the user's guess, but you'd have a hell of a time actually calculating minimum distance with a dataset as large as Facebook's. That's why for the most part you won't see a social network telling you how two users are connected beyond a distance of two hops.

ok, so yeah I have this idea. And I don't mind telling people about it. If you want to do it, go ahead, but first let me know what you think.I'm sure everyone has heard of this, and I'm pretty sure this has already been thought of (what hasn't, right?) but I haven't seen it in my feed pop up in the myriad facebook apps my friends have added. The pitch: facebook app/six degrees of separation game (find out how many steps to a random person (if possible)). Just had this idea like two minutes ago. Any thoughts??

0

6

2007-08-16 05:13:53 UTC

42,924

42,317

ahsonwardak

Hacker News

pg

It's always useful to change it up a little bit. It'll give it some new life.

null

27

150

2007-08-16 05:14:02 UTC

42,927

42,825

ahsonwardak

CIA, Vatican busted for Wikipedia edits

farmer

Did anyone not expect this to happen? They got caught, as they should have. But is it bad? At least we know that they care about their image on the Web. It shows Wikipedia's significance as a credible source for information and the Web as a host for that source. Wikipedia is almost meant to be an encyclopedia driven by anarchy.

null

0

5

2007-08-16 05:21:49 UTC

42,929

42,811

danteembermage

Scott Adams' startup idea: Hole Digger

andreyf

If I could license a hole digger, the first thing I would do is connect LA to New York the short way. If I'm really lucky they will have invented a room temperature superconductor by then so my now nearly frictionless train can fall across the country at break-neck speed with near zero energy expenditure.

null

2

12

2007-08-16 05:30:33 UTC

42,935

42,933

thingsilearned

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

I've been out here (the Valley) for the summer. The crazy thing about the place is, every time I ride the BART or sit down at a coffee shop there's someone sitting next to me that's either works at Yahoo/ebay/google/etc or is also doing a startup. Its really easy to start conversations with these people upon noticing a Django error page on their laptop or an ebay employee badge. The conversations are great. Also there are lots of meetups, lectures and parties for startups. The place just breathes technology (can be frustrating as well if you additionally like other things such as frisbee or women).

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

1

26

2007-08-16 05:58:04 UTC

42,936

42,933

chadboyda

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

I used to live up in the Valley for many years until I moved down to Los Angeles about 5 years ago. Doing a startup in Los Angeles has been difficult, mostly in trying to find and network with other like minded individuals but with a little effort we're finding its not all that hard. We use meetup.com and upcoming.org a lot to find or setup local tech meet ups.It seems to be really starting to make a difference though, there's more of a sense of a growing tech community in LA now (a welcome relief from the entertainment buzz). Hopefully it'll keep growing.So while I agree its definately harder than it is in the Silicon Valley, its not impossible. There are other people out there doing startups, you just have to proactively try and find them and bring them together if someone else isn't doing so already in your area.

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

10

26

2007-08-16 06:05:41 UTC

42,937

42,933

jsjenkins168

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

Paul Graham has a good essay on this topic if you're interested: http://www.paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

6

26

2007-08-16 06:16:11 UTC

42,938

42,933

cperciva

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

I think one of the largest reasons why Silicon Valley has so many startups and other places have so few is Paul Graham's reason #15 for not starting a startup: "Parents want you to be a doctor".Not literally, of course; but rather in the general sense of social pressure against creating a startup. In the Valley, you can say that you're thinking of creating your own business, and people will tell you that they think that's cool, will talk about startups they have been involved in, and generally support the idea. In most of the rest of the world, people will look at you as if you've announced that you're planning on getting a sex change: A small amount of admiration for making such a hard decision, mixed with a large amount of skepticism about your sanity. After all, everybody knows that 50%/80%/90%/99% of small businesses fail within X years, right?I've been very lucky that, in spite of being surrounded by generally skeptical people, I've encountered a lot of support; as my girlfriend put it, "most small businesses fail, but if anyone can succeed, it will be you". If it weren't for how much my friends apparently believe in me personally, I'm sure I'd have been convinced to not even attempt this based on those same statistics about failure rates.

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

4

26

2007-08-16 06:19:33 UTC

42,943

42,933

henning

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

While we're talking about location, avoid San Diego if you don't want to live in a sprawling automobile-metropolis where the only decent jobs involve making toys for the Pentagon. The restaurants, almost all fast food or chain, with their generic soaked-cardboard food, are copied and pasted around endlessly. Jesus christ.

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

14

26

2007-08-16 06:49:06 UTC

42,944

42,317

brett

Hacker News

pg

Well, the name change at least totally ruins the effect of my animating the site title: http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=crapfaceAlso the rest of the menu did not disappear before. And you've already closed the hole so I can't fix it.

null

18

150

2007-08-16 06:49:28 UTC

42,953

42,816

LaurieCheers

Uses of "* is the new *" in 2005 represented graphically

david

"LOL I CAN HAS" is the new "is the new".

null

0

13

2007-08-16 07:30:52 UTC

42,956

42,854

davidw

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

This might be an opportune moment to mention the (not very active) IRC channel: #news.yc on Freenode.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

2

20

2007-08-16 08:18:39 UTC

42,957

42,933

robertgaal

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

DC? Try doing a startup in Europe. Now there's a challenge...

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

15

26

2007-08-16 08:21:34 UTC

42,958

42,839

davidw

This could be your fate if you don't do a startup

menloparkbum

He looks like Kim Jong Il:http://www.foxnews.com/images/229818/0_63_kim_jongil.jpg

welcome to the crushing grind of mediocrity, yahoo! style.

2

11

2007-08-16 08:27:13 UTC

42,959

42,881

JBiserkov

How JavaScript is Slowing Down the Web (And What To Do About It)

brett

The title is misleading. A somewhat more precise title would be"How & why [lots of] (poorly written) widgets slow down blogs".As Paul Graham once said: "...the closer you get to the truth, the messier your sentence gets."

null

0

18

2007-08-16 08:27:38 UTC

42,969

42,933

david927

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

The biggest reason -- the elephant in the room reason -- is the money. Angel capital won't touch you if you live farther than a two hour drive. VC's are similar. And so it's just a self-referential loop that spirals upwards.The only problem is that 90% of Silicon Valley startups are that kind of meringue and marshmallow that VC love. The record companies love Britney Spears and VC's love Twitter. It's all a big get-rich-quick scheme and a waste of time. Sadly, as a native of Silicon Valley, it means that true innovation, when it is happening, is occurring everywhere.

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

0

26

2007-08-16 09:56:36 UTC

42,974

42,631

jgamman

How to Give a Kick Ass Presentation

nreece

i was skim reading after a while but i never caught my personal favorite - 'have something "GBP$"GBP$ interesting to say', no amount of eye candy can polish a god awful boring conclusion.

null

0

12

2007-08-16 10:33:35 UTC

42,980

42,933

epi0Bauqu

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

In certain startup areas like Web apps it is changing, albeit slowly. A Web app company can be created by a few people (even one) successfully on very little (if no significant amount) of money. And it is becoming easier to find local co-founders because there are so many programmers who know or can learn the technologies at play and don't want to move to California.

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

13

26

2007-08-16 11:02:13 UTC

42,981

42,933

epi0Bauqu

Why is it hard to startup a company outside of Silicon Valley?

ahsonwardak

Like most things in real life, the answer boils down to a set of intertwined non-linear feedback loops that you can probably identify and analyze (even quantitatively) using systems analysis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_analysis) or a similar technique. I suspect pg in his essay has nailed down some of (and probably the major) loops involved, i.e. the ones around rich people and nerds.The basic loops he identifies seem to be nerds attract other nerds, rich people attract other rich people, and nerds attract rich people as long as they are starting startups that need investment and get rich people richer (please correct me if I am wrong). These are all positive feedback loops, so they keep growing until they hit some negative ones. Some negative ones: saturation of nerds or rich people (not yet), saturation of space (getting there), high living costs (definitely close), nerds not starting startups because they work for Google (hard to tell but I doubt it), nerds not needing investment (increasingly so for Web apps), and other viable places to move (true in some areas like Biotech).

This may sound like a dumb question to some, but I need to be edified. I'm in DC, and it seems more and more that you're probably working in something government or defense related. In other cities, like Dallas, it used to be telecom related (The Telecom Corrdior). How do these clusters start, thrive, and/or die? How does it continue to thrive in Silicon Valley after some 20 to 30 years of startup success stories?

5

26

2007-08-16 11:14:30 UTC

42,982

42,317

runningskull

Hacker News

pg

You are absolutely right about hackers caring about other things than business, but we already have a hundred places to get all that information online. The reason I liked this site is that it had a purpose: to provide news about startups. With a focus like that, the site is unlikely to ever go the route of reddit (the internet version of chain letters and "my dad can beat up your dad").PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE change it back. If you want to launch another site for hacker news, I'll be the first to subscribe, but PLEASE give us back startup news!

null

11

150

2007-08-16 11:15:24 UTC

42,983

42,887

epi0Bauqu

Javascript or Flash Widgets debate. Help me choose what to use.

thomasswift

Pretty much everyone has JavaScript. While for what you are doing, probably everyone in your target audience has Flash, but keep in mind for different versions the % of the general population that has it installed is not 100%: http://www.adobe.com/products/player_census/flashplayer/vers...Adobe (who has an incentive to inflate their numbers though I'm not saying they are) puts Flash 9 at 84.0%. Below that you get into the high 90s. But if your whole product is based on a viral loop, and you can achieve the same thing with JavaScript, that few % can be important when compounded over time.

What are your thoughts, tips, and/or best practices for either?

1

8

2007-08-16 11:20:25 UTC

42,986

42,839

fad

This could be your fate if you don't do a startup

menloparkbum

plz tell me this is parody

welcome to the crushing grind of mediocrity, yahoo! style.

5

11

2007-08-16 11:40:33 UTC

42,991

42,854

champion

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

I'm interested and might be able to make it

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

15

20

2007-08-16 12:12:35 UTC

42,992

42,884

extantproject

Why the iPhone doesn't have copy+paste

david

I use an iPhone daily and there have only been a few times I've missed copy and paste. Usually it's been when I'm tapping out a reply email or posting on a site such as YC News and need to quote someone. To route around the lack of copy and paste my replies end up being similar to using a word you know how to spell instead of one you don't; I just write what I think rather than writing about what someone else has written and think nothing of it. There are certainly cases when this analogy doesn't hold and copy and paste functionality would be nice, but it's definitely by design that there isn't one.Constraining developers and themselves to create simpler ways to do things is smart of Apple. Emailing photos is the perfect example: I want to email this photo that is on my screen -- not open my "photo application", copy a photo, go back to the main screen, open my "email application" and paste the photo. Most of the copy and paste scenarios can be handled in a similar way: links to maps, links to phone numbers, links to URLs, and so on.Maybe there are better ways to perform actions on mobile platforms instead of following the decades-old clunky mouse way to do them?

null

1

27

2007-08-16 12:14:43 UTC

42,993

42,854

pbnaidu

news.ycombinator meetup - Cambridge, MA

bokonist

Great idea, yes I'll be there. I am also looking for a co-founder before applying for winter program.

We did a news.ycombinator.com meetup this past June and the turnout was great. Let's do another. It would be great to have a mix of summer ycombinator startups and people thinking of applying this October.For a time/place, how about: Sunday, August 19th at 7 PM 1369 Coffee House in Central Square 757 Massachusetts Ave. Cambridge, MA 02139Leave a comment if you are interested.

5

20

2007-08-16 12:18:50 UTC