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> However, I wonder how much of that is changing due to the fact that most talks are now available to view online.

Interesting point. If ideas, arguments, and claims in video and audio can be visualized more effectively, that might change things even more.

shahanon Two Sources of Stress that (probably) apply to you

Skip news entirely and read only (personal) blogs. Define news how you wish. Benefits will ensue.

shahanon Why a Venture Capital Bubble Is Good for Bootstrapped Entrepreneurs

The number you're aiming for is going to meaningfully change how you act. For example, you might get an offer for $50 million. If you do, the probability of making it to $1 billion matters. (Incidentally, the creator of this community was faced with almost exactly this choice.)

It may be true that the number of $1 billion exits per year is only, say, 10 times fewer than the number of $50 million exits. It's an empirical question. The numbers matter.

Let's just raise the $1 billion number until it's a better bet to go for $50 million. At some point the argument that "both are just absurdly big numbers" breaks down.

Perhaps the reason people think that the numbers don't matter is because they believe that the skills required to build a $50 million company is no different than those required to build a $1 billion (or $100 billion) company. That I buy.

shahanon Why a Venture Capital Bubble Is Good for Bootstrapped Entrepreneurs

This is almost equivalent to saying that the expected value of a startup increases with the scale you aim for -- clearly not true after some point.

shahanon Our unrealistic views of death, through a doctor’s eyes

The fact that the destination is the same does not mean that the journey doesn't matter. Most people are not indifferent to dying in 6 hours or in 60 years.

shahanon Our unrealistic views of death, through a doctor’s eyes

It's ridiculous to think about surviving the heat death of the universe when 50 % longer life spans would be pretty cool.

In the coming decades, We may or may not be able to significantly extend life, but it's not clear why it's unlikely, or why it causes harm to even think about.

shahanon Warren Buffett: Why stocks beat gold and bonds

The benefits of diversification -- higher return and lower risk -- is a better reason to invest in gold, even if it was true that gold holds its value for millenia, which probably isn't true.

The article is about "why stocks beat gold and bonds" not "why you should own only stocks and never own any gold or bonds".

shahanon Warren Buffett: Why stocks beat gold and bonds

It's Warren Buffett, man. Perhaps he invests (long-term) in stocks because he believes what he writes, rather than writes what he does because he just happens to be invested in stocks. You really think there should be a disclaimer here?

shahanon With 8.7% market share, Apple has 75% of cell phone profits

I don't think people do treat market share as a proxy for profit share. You don't really need a proxy for profit share because it's easy to measure. And if market share is publicly avilable information, so is probably profit share. It does make some sense to treat market share as a proxy for market power, though -- business people do this all the time.

An alternative interpretation of the article is simply that Apple is targeting a more profitable segment of the market -- smartphones.

It happens to be the case that this segment has grown really fast and have both the highest margins and the highest total profits. This is perhaps not the case in most industries, which may be interesting.

shahanon How To Become A Better Programmer By Not Programming

It's hard for you to be wrong. If someone with zero programming talent does become really good, you could just say that they did have talent after all.

shahanon Just the Facts: S&P's $2 Trillion Mistake

Thanks for your answer.

> I'm not sure what happens in terms of formal default if a borrower deliberately and aggressively inlfates away its debt faster than lenders can react by demanding higher interest rates at the next auction.

This is the reason why I asked my question(s). Why would the borrower ever aggressively inflate away its debt, as opposed to gradually inflating it away? If there is no definite point of default, the US is either defaulting frequently, or can never default.

I wonder what the definition of default is, and if it's an event or a process.

shahanon Just the Facts: S&P's $2 Trillion Mistake

Oh, I think I answered my own question. The lenders probably factor in inflation when they lend the US money. That would actually mean that the loans are in real money, and that there is no such thing as a nominal obligation.

Anyone know if this is correct?

shahanon Just the Facts: S&P's $2 Trillion Mistake

I was wondering about the exact same thing. Ability and willingness to pay should mean ability and willingness to pay in real terms. Anything else doesn't seem to make sense.

Also: If the US defaults, how does it go down?

Here's why I'm confused:

Given that the US can't default on its nominal obligations, how does it default on its real obligations, so to speak? Printing money, aka inflation, is one way, but there's always inflation. Does that mean that the US is always defaulting to some degree? I'm thinking no, because lenders are compensated for higher inflation with higher interest rates. Would the US ever go "no, Chang, we're not going to give back your $10, sorry"?

Maybe someone can enlighten me.

shahanon Dropbox close to choosing investors — Round could put valuation at $10 Billion

> Basically an infrastructure company in the most elemental and violently grand sense of the word?

(a) I love this sentence, and (b) this is probably why people are so excited about Dropbox, myself included.

But, the potential of a company is not equal to the potential of its product category (unless it's a monopoly that lasts for all time).

shahanon Dropbox close to choosing investors — Round could put valuation at $10 Billion

It will be time to stop looking to growth potential as a valid reason for huge valuations, when it seizes to be a perfectly valid reason.

All else being equal, wouldn't you pay more for a company with high growth potential than one with low growth potential?

shahanon Show HN: My weekend project - Chessboard picture recognition

Agree that it will be tricky to recognize the pieces, but what's the point in doing it with 2D pieces? The app would be (slightly) more exciting if it could help you record the state of any game anywhere in less than 5 seconds -- and allow you to continue playing online.

shahanon Show HN: My weekend project - Chessboard picture recognition

Don't see the use of this as an app, but fuck the use. If the goal is fun and learning, I think it's worth going all in and do object recognition using, say, SIFT vectors (see Wikipedia). Just to see if it works.

It's easy to find SIFT implementations, but you'll have to do some work to construct a training set of images for each type of chess piece. An elegant solution will probably detect the type of piece independent of its color, or the color of the square.

This might be ridiculously easy, or not work at all.

shahanon Why We Threw out All Our Code (And Why You Should Too)

Whether their decision was right or wrong, they made a decision that big companies tend not to make. Startups should probably have a bias towards decisions like that.

shahanon Today's real life is yesterday's science fiction.

Good post, but it would have been difficult to write without including IT (or media). You'd have to use the year 1795 or something. There are probably lots of fields today where Aristotle, if he would be brought back to life, would go "meh". (But he would think it was damn cool that he could be brought back to life.)