Hacker News Reader

smtfon Show HN: Nebula – Alarm clock where you grow stars while you sleep

Congrats! This looks really interesting. One thing I would appreciate clarity on: I'd prefer not to send data to ad networks, if I pay for the ad free version, will that not only prevent the display of ads but also any associated tracking?

smtfon Music for Programming

I've been listening to Mirror's Edge OST while programming for weeks now, never thought to look for who created that sound track. Thanks!

smtfon China's Jade Rabbit lunar rover dies on moon

Does anyone know if there are images from this rover available on-line ? I'd love to see some hi rez shots of the Earth with the Moon's horizon in the shot.

smtfon Wozniak: “Actually, the movie was largely a lie about me”

I'm in the same boat. Personally I suspect the later rather than the former.

smtfon Spider That Builds Its Own Spider Decoys Discovered

“Considering that spiders can already make really impressive geometric designs with their webs, it’s no surprise that they can take that leap to make an impressive design with debris and other things,”

Sure, but what is more interesting is how such a spider would know what itself looks like.

smtfon Astronomers puzzled over huge black hole in the middle of small galaxy

I've heard a black hole's singularity defined as 'infinitely dense and infinitely small'; I don't think such a thing can be said to 'grow'; however, as the density increases I think that the Event Horizon expands outward increasing the diameter of 'black' so the answer to your question may be yes.

smtfon The Most Epic Narrative of Ramayana on the Internet

I'm not interested in signing up to check it out. No need though as there is a quick high level overview here: http://www.f-i.com/google/ramayana/

smtfon Ask HN: losing faith in the startup where I'm employee #1

Judging by the details of the post I'd say it does not.

smtfon Ask HN: losing faith in the startup where I'm employee #1

Start cultivating offers now. If your current pay checks are still clearing you don't have to move in great haste. If you get an attractive offer: be as professional as you can but move on; offer to work hourly, if you can muster it, and on board new employees / contractors. Give as much notice as you think is prudent considering your new employers. If you were still enthused my advice would be different; I've spent enough time in start-ups without direction to know how frustrating and exhausting it can be. Don't languish for the sake of a broken organisation, find a healthy one and move on. I sympathise with caring about the welfare of your current employers but you can't do their job and yours at the same time.

smtfon The Problem With Marc Andreessen

I had similar thoughts while reading the article. If the market is rewarding people who are not creating long term value, where does that leave innovators that do?

smtfon Canonical to remove all Sun JDK packages from the Partner archive

I'd rather have the old stuff removed in an obvious way rather then have my machine attempt to 'fool' me into thinking that it was still running along as expected, meanwhile I'm hunting for inexplicable bugs and performance penalties introduced by the open JDK. Even worse is to leave it and 'fool' me into thinking the old packages are still being updated only so that I can find out sometime later that my machine is now part of a bot net. Bottom line is removing it and forcing everyone to transition is the most obvious way for users and administrators to deal with what has obviously become a problem. With this news people will have to make a slight change in how they deploy Java apps. it's better to confront them with that choice rather then hide it from them.

smtfon Why I Told CBS Corporation To Sue Me Without Wearing A Shirt

Here is a direct link to the youtube video. The video in page on Marshall's site wouldn't load for me:

http://youtu.be/hhVJl-OBEY4

smtfon Hacked Texan Water Infrastructure Had a 3 Character Password

Ah. You may want to double check that:

http://www.bmo.com/home/about/banking/privacy-security/prote...

Maybe your the victim of a Phishing attack or something, for example maybe a fake site told you you had to use 4 digits.

Honestly I've heard of a lot worse then this:

http://www.bmo.com/home/about/banking/privacy-security/how-w...

smtfon Node.js is good for solving problems I don’t have

If by real you mean yours fine; however, your projects are not everyone's. If you'd like you could respond with specific cases you've used javascript for system or server level programming.

smtfon Node.js is good for solving problems I don’t have

I agree that js does support the async paradigm for the reason you mentioned; however, at the risk of sounding like I'm speaking for the op js would not be my first choice for system or server side programming. The simple reason being that javascript's behavior is often near inexplicable, many examples can be found here: http://wtfjs.com. I'm tolerant of that strangeness while manipulating the DOM but really only because there are no other choices.

smtfon Half of China's millionaires want to leave country

That is an excellent point. I have many second and third generation friends who's grandparents, and even parents have only assimilated local culture when absolutely necessary. Their children however are as 'home grown' as you like, to the point where most laugh at their for-bearers (reverse?) xenophobic behavior. This is a phenomenon not exclusive to people from the far east either. The same can be said for many families I know from eastern Europe and the Middle East.

smtfon Israel to Get Electric Car Battery Swap Stations

There is a very informative overview (video presentation) of this model at Ted:

http://www.ted.com/talks/shai_agassi_on_electric_cars.html

by the Better Place CEO Shai Agassi.

smtfon EveOnline CEO: a letter to the followers of eve

CCP's CEO is acknowledging that he was, in his words:

I was impatient when I should have been cautious, defiant when I should have been conciliatory and arrogant when I should have been humble

He aims to resolve all the nonsense of the last few months by:

doing what we say and saying what we do

He addresses and apologies for all the ways CCP seemed to have become EvilCorp™ over the last few months.

smtfon “I hate almost all software” — Ryan Dahl

Fantastic. Thanks for that. Any idea if the whole talk is going to make it online soon? I'd be very interested in watching it.

smtfon No, HP, you’re off the mark

You may have hit on how they could go about making money even after they open source webOS. "Here is the source. Do what you will; if you make money, expect to pay royalties under the following terms". If none of the 'old guard' licenses work for them, they could tailor a new license to their purpose.

I don't think that such an arrangement is in HP's character; however, letting the investment die seems foolish in any case.

smtfon TouchPad 16GB on Sale for $99

Amazon is only showing the price after the item is in your cart:

http://www.amazon.com/HP-TouchPad-9-7-Inch-Tablet-Computer/d...

Does that not circumvention services like that?

smtfon No, HP, you’re off the mark

Sure, but how does mothballing WebOS make them any money?

smtfon Get Out While You Can

The pervading opinion I've seen over the years is that University degrees are mainly arbitrary hurdles for professional jobs. I don't necessarily agree, but that is besides my point. If people at large really think University is an extravagant waste then we are now in a position, to do as the op suggests, and implement the technology to "fix" that "problem". Technology optimizes many other areas, even ones as deeply entrenched as post secondary education. It's not as if we will have to throw all the tenure profs. to the wolves either, someone is going to have to be curator of the online material after all. Things change, sometimes even in academia.

smtfon It’s Official: HP Kills Off webOS Phones and the TouchPad

I'm not clear as to if you were trying for irony with that statement so I'll call you on it:

Seriously, I doubt it's 5%

...they should at least make up numbers that are marginally ...

If your going to mock someone for "making up" numbers try not to make up numbers of your own in the same post. The op provided data, you did not. Unless you were going for irony; in that case, well never mind.

smtfon HP To Apple: You Win.

I really hope WebOS finds safe harbor. We lost Maemo or Meego or whatever it's (was) called last week and now this. The players are dropping out too early. Maybe the iPad "won" but the space will be big enough to support other players. I want more choices at this early stage, not fewer.

smtfon Ask HN: Can someone please recommend interesting startup/tech documentaries?

Available on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NRL7YsXjSg

smtfon Microsoft's office: Why insiders think top management has lost its way

Can someone explain why this was down-voted? Opening with the somewhat inflammatory remark about Redmond might not have been the best choice; however, I thought it was well argued none the less.

smtfon Cω

I had to look it up: it's pronounced "cee omega" according to Wikipedia.

smtfon C? Go? Cgo

Care to elaborate a little? I'll settle for links to previous posts if you have them.

smtfon Canonical to take 75% of Banshee Amazon Sales

Agreed. This seems like win win all around. If you want Banshee to take more of the cake, patch in their affiliate code or throw your own affiliate code in there if you want ... actually, that doesn't sound like a bad idea ...