eah13

multi-planetary.

Though I'm skeptical that humans being born and dying on e.g. Mars will happen in the next couple hundred years. The economics seem strange. Maybe there's some amazing technologies that require rare minerals or something but I'm unsure how a Martian economy could sustain itself. Why would people go actually live there when so much of the work could be automated? There will be more uninhabited inhabitable space on Earth than on any planet for a long time to come.

If you know Python, it's an amazing language. Ruby and Javascript are incredibly useful for web dev, but like angersock said, the key is to build projects. Period. If Python's the language you feel most comfortable in, get going with it and don't switch until after a project is complete.

I'd suggest Flask as a starting point if you're looking for web framework experience. Twisted might be more your style if you're looking at highly concurrent networking projects.

'Distributed systems' is a little broad almost- are there any software projects in particular in that space that you're interested in and could develop expertise in? If so, I'd focus there.

Great news!

Looks like a landing page to gauge interest. Consider me interested.

Just thought it was an interesting way to do it. He says it took him extra time but lets one repo represent all the states of the sample app they build in the book.

Nice! I dig it.

This tech can be used for multiple purposes but it's a subset of Python so perfect for the restricted needs of a beginner. Plus it supports turtle, which is an awesome and proven way to give beginners a more intuitive sense of what's going on. Comments, suggestions, and new use cases welcome!

Patience, dedication, and the ability to defer enjoyment in service of a bigger goal are things I've observed at greater than normal quantities in those of our team who have kids.

Don't get me wrong; as I mentioned above I've found his lectures on both introductory physics and gravitation to be extremely enlightening, as did many of the Caltech students he taught (who were, by the way, just normal intro physics students, albeit at a selective university). His teaching can be highly effective when matched to the proper audience.

But that's just my point: there is no 0 to 100 scale of 'goodness' in teaching. And Feyman, regardless of his brilliance, doesn't sit at the top of hierarchy of teaching excellence. It's about fit between the student and the delivery the instructor. The Feynman lectures in video form can not be the pinnacle of physics instruction because they're fixed, not adaptable to the needs of different learners.

The only solution to negligent teachers is visibility into these behaviors. This also seems like a way that the conditions could be improved: showing them off.

Agreed that lectures need to die.

Author here. Thanks for the kind words. Udacity's pivot is a shot across the bow for Startups that can't figure out the difference between teaching and media. Their coaches are a good start- step in the right direction. If they had perfected that with academics they might not have had to pivot.

Absolutely- I agree wholeheartedly. Motivation to learn is the raw material that a good teacher can induce forma student and use to prompt learning. Software can be a part of increasing how often this process happens.

[Citation needed.]

This. Software as augmentation or preparation for human interaction, just as books have been (and are still).

> Feynman caliber instructor

Feynman was brilliant, and I have a set of both his lectures for freshman and the ones he did on gravitation. But he was not a gifted teacher. He was a gifted learner. Those of us who can follow him can see an amazing mind at work. But gifted teachers will look into students minds and help them build new understandings.

OP here, and I think I agree with what you've written. Lecturing and textbooks are both means of conveying information. Students can seek out information on their own time, but the act of teaching is helping someone else construct an understanding. That's the key thing software can't do.

namecheap.

Hey there- cofounder of coursefork here.

Other types of media are very important to successful teaching, so they're very important to us. We're rolling out updates soon that will support not just other media types but nested organization of courses so you can have multiple sessions. All part of refining that alpha :)

this.

You are correct- it was an amendment, not a bill. Live by the snark, die by the snark :)

Point of order: the bill may pass the House of Reps. Senate would have to pass it and president sign it before it becomes law. Big difference.

Crappy headlines like this promote a misunderstanding of how gov't works... OP should read up on civics a little

I found this from a link from Jason Mendelson's blog. It's kind of amazing that the class is free, being that it's Brad Feld teaching it. Then again he's an investor in Sympoz :)

The interesting thing is the interactivity piece. When talking about something as general as a startup idea it's difficult to engage in a general way. Sympoz attempts to solve this with questions indexed to the video playhead. This is interesting and its very cool that Brad has engaged in some of these discussions. I think I'd much prefer to watch these and have someone lead discussion or answer questions in person though.

'Real' or not, there's just not enough stuff priced in BTC (regardless of the exchange rate) and not enough volume of trade by market making sized traders yet. The more of that stuff that happens the more 'real' it gets.

I love the honesty and the spot on diagnosis.

For a site that resonates with artists, check out Reverb Nation:

http://www.reverbnation.com/

A sample artist page here:

http://www.reverbnation.com/evangibb

Instead of buying their music, the site is focused on you listening to it via the embedded player and then going to see them live. You can even buy them a gift card so that they can buy advertising. They're growing like crazy with a marketing budget close to zero.

Thanks for sharing your hard learned lesson. It reminds us all to get out of the building and talk to users.

I really believe that the open will push out the closed in lots of areas. It's happening with software first, content is next, and information has been in transition for years. Just like everyday people are adjusting to having their addresses and phone numbers available on the internet (not to mention things like their mortgages and car loans), the business community will have to adapt to more information being out there.

This doesn't mean that there isn't a role for privacy or trust, just that the frontier of openness will push beyond all non-essential info, making the game a lot more fun to play.

The simple answer is that sellers kept taking the 'ask' prices on the exchange until the only ones left were significantly lower. See this graph of current 'market depth' (existence of bids and asks): http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/mtgoxUSD_depth.html

In a double auction market, there are bids (offers to buy) and asks (offers to sell). The 'market price' is the last price at which a bid or an ask was taken by a market buyer. Taking a bid or ask removes that bid or ask, queueing up the next in line. In an illiquid market, there aren't many bidders and/or askers, leading to price volatility. In a liquid market (such as for US Govt bonds) there are many bidders and askers, meaning the price swings are much more likely due to a significant change in information.

Hence my contention that daily volume is the most important stat to watch on the BTC market. It's a proxy for market depth, which is a precondition for liquidity and relative price stability.

As I've said before, daily volume is the stat to watch. There's been a huge spike in trading today: 2.3m btc on Mt Gox alone, up from 150k yesterday. If markets stay this liquid (or some multiple of their normal liquidity) it'll be a hugely positive sign. We're up to $200m+ of BTC traded on Mt Gox today, and that's a huge fraction of the total value of bitcoin (~$1b). Great sign if volume stays high from here on: the volatility should be dampened quite a bit.

http://bitcoincharts.com/markets/

Big improvements. Nice progress.

I've also found walks to be super valuable. They're times where you can't get distracted because there's nothing else to do but think, like in the shower (which is why so many great ideas happen in each). They also get a little physical activity into your day which helps the brain work.

When I take walks with my wife we have great convos that won't happen on the couch when we're exhausted. We walk this circular path around Duke's East campus, which is about 2 miles. Having a defined path like that helps too- you don't have to get distracted by where you're going or be temped to end it early.