HNHacker News
TopNewBestAskShowJobs

adamtmca

374 karma · joined January 25, 2010

submissionscomments
adamtmca··on Be Your Own Best User
Instagram hit a million users in about 90 days.
adamtmca··on The Surrounding Game: A Documentary Film (kickstarter)
I recently started learning Go - any recommendations for beginners?
adamtmca··on Peter Thiel's unexpected job requirement
Thiel has argued that there is a "bubble" in higher education -- that is, on average, American's over value it. Not that higher education is meaningless or that going to a top school and getting good grades doesn't signal that you are: smart, ambitious, hard working and would fit in with the academic culture at a hedge fund.
adamtmca··on State paid $22K each for Internet routers
As a Canadian I find the persistance of the "small vs. big" government narrative in American politics bemusing - there is no small government party in the states, only branding.
adamtmca··on Facebook's numbers
He has facebook pay for his security detail and private aviation... like a boss.
adamtmca··on Facebook to Set I.P.O. Price Range at $28 to $35
Also, price earnings would be a pretty foolish approach to valuing Facebook - I wouldn't be so sure that you are so much more sophisticated than the imaginary bozos you are criticizing.
adamtmca··on Facebook to Set I.P.O. Price Range at $28 to $35
This is an article on dealbook - everyone reading knows the difference between market cap and price per share and the market cap is in the first paragraph. Headlines include the price per share of stocks all the time, it doesn't mean the readers or writers are stupid.
adamtmca··on Side Project: 1 Month, $10,000
I noticed you were using Shopify. You could probably add a lot to that $10,000 by selling a varient of your store's design on the Shopify theme store. It looks awesome.
adamtmca··on Paul Graham, it’s time to put your money where your mouth is
HireArt = replace universities.

It's a deceptively focused/small offering to start with but they have the key components required to become a credentialing system outside of the university/college system.

It's easy to look at YC startups and say they aren't pursuing massive visions but the truth is many of them are just starting with some tiny subset of a big problem.

adamtmca··on With EveryArt (YC W12) you don't have to be afraid of commissioning art
For the founders:

When you click on a piece of work on /browse/ it takes you directly into the "gallery view" for that piece, rather than to the artist's profile page. This is a bit jarring. I would consider taking users to the artist's profile first and letting them enter the gallery view from there.

adamtmca··on Loopt acquired by payment card provider for $43.3m in cash
Planet Money also did a follow up on one of Bain's deals that went right. TL;DR Bain bought a company, levered it up, restructured it and successfully took it public.

The company executives all got bonuses, Bain made a ton of money and the workers got to keep their jobs. The company is still running today.

adamtmca··on Steve Jobs ignored Warren Buffett's advice for a stock buyback
You are ignoring the growth in supply that would happen because of the re-issue.
adamtmca··on How Not To Sell Software in 2012
Gasoline is a poor choice of benchmark. Energy prices aren't really a proxy for inflation.

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=core+inflation+from+200...

adamtmca··on Steve Jobs ignored Warren Buffett's advice for a stock buyback
The act of re-issuing the shares would have the opposite effect on supply, causing the price to go back down. You can't create profits by retiring and then reissuing shares.
adamtmca··on Valuing A Company Without Good Traffic?
Look for the areas of your business which are complementary with theirs. For example, maybe you are able to monetize traffic at a higher CPM than they are - if they were able to drive traffic from their existing properties to your site, what would be the improvement in their total profitability? Maybe your service could increase engagement with their existing properties and drive more total page views. Etc etc. In theory the acquiring firm should be willing to pay for some of the value that would be created as a by product of integrating your site into their business.
adamtmca··on Http://(Type any keyword here).jpg.to/random
Well, I am impressed.

http://monkeyonapig.jpg.to/

adamtmca··on On Business Madness
This is a nitpick but the author has missed the historical context of Eric Reis's lean startup methodology.

"It was Japanese management theory in the 1980s. A few weeks ago, before our collective attention shifted to the Facebook IPO, it was whatever Steve Jobs had done, from hallucinogens to yelling at your employees."

His link for Japanese management theory points to "theory x" but what it should point to is the toyota production method. Eric Reis's lean startup methodology is a repurposing of lean production methods pioneered by toyota. It's an extension of the same management theory, not just a random fad in business thinking.

adamtmca··on Bat. Shit. Crazy. (MG's response to Dan Lyons)
I can't stand MG lately, I'm not sure why I even submitted this.
adamtmca··on Steve Blank's new book - The Startup Owner's Manual
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Blank
adamtmca··on The End of Wall Street As They Knew It
I wasn't "using Iceland as an example for other countries" or trying to imply that the Americans should have let their banks fail. I was simply relaying a quote which suggested that the expected result of declining pay on Wall street had also been observed in another country.
adamtmca··on The End of Wall Street As They Knew It
This is one of the benefits Iceland's prime minister claimed came from letting their banks fail -- more physicists, programmers and engineers moving from finance into technology.
adamtmca··on Why I don't use recent travel startups
Am I missing some nuance in hipmunk's interface?

I've always thought hipmunk was basically indistinguishable from ITA Matrix flight search (do a search and click "view time bars" to see what I mean) and ITA has been around forever.

adamtmca··on Facebook's S-1 Filing
I'm interested to hear why you wouldn't buy into that structure - is it a concern w/ Zuckerberg himself or an aversion to any situation where a single entity has majority voting rights?
adamtmca··on Apology to 37signals
I was the one who asked their ages. I'm 22. I was just wondering.

I knew that if I just asked "how old are you?" it would come off as a snarky comment on the situation. That's why I also included "Not making a judgement, genuinely just wondering."

While I wasn't trying to tie age to the issue at hand, I would have to disagree with your assertion that physical age doesn't have anything to do with how people react to different situations. Maybe experience is the real driver but obviously that is closely related to age. Either way that's neither here nor there.

As for the rest of your comment, I'm not totally clear on what you were trying to get across or who you were responding to but it still doesn't seem like it deserved to be down voted.

adamtmca··on Apology to 37signals
How old are you guys? Not making a judgement, genuinely just wondering.
adamtmca··on 84% of the investment gains from hedge fund went to the managers
Someone managing a pension fund is a sophisticated investor. My sister is a teacher with a claim on the sizeable Ontario teachers pension fund but she doesn't pick the individual investments they do, nor should she.
adamtmca··on 84% of the investment gains from hedge fund went to the managers
If anyone is interested, "Inside the House of Money" is a pretty enjoyable book about "global macro" hedge funds in the mid 2000's. It's just a series of interviews with hedge fund managers about their careers, their favourite trades and how they run their funds.

The interviews all take place prior to the financial crisis and it's neat to see how they were thinking about the economy. It ranges from "we're in trouble" to "I'm confused about what is driving the CDS market so I am on the sidelines."

As for the story, I am totally apathetic. If you invest in a hedge fund you are well aware of the fee structure going in and you are a sophisticated investor. Ultimately these guys only make money if their clients make money.

adamtmca··on Ask HN: Is there a repository of failed startups (re-usable startups idea)?
If I were you I would be more interested in companies that were started, got some traction and sold out for low double digit millions only to be shut down by their acquirer.

Fflick, for example, was a really interesting idea and seemed to be getting some play - now it's gone. Dodgeball -> Foursquare, etc.

Edit: Whoops - I didn't read the OP closely. I thought you were only looking for ideas/ business models, but obviously this would not work for codebases.

adamtmca··on The Dumbest Idea In The World: Maximizing Shareholder Value
This guy was on the CBC a few months ago and I was basically screaming at my radio.

One choice portion of the show was when the interviewer (who was lapping it up) asked what would be a good alternative to the stock market. He proposed bonds. He even went so far as to say that bonds would reduce the amount of volatility we see in the economy by reducing the impact of the "expectations market".

Yes. Replacing equity financing with debt sounds like a reasonable solution to reducing volatility.

What an absolute fraud.

adamtmca··on Wikipedia will be leaving GoDaddy
hell of a username. do it justice.
Page 1 of 5Next →