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Tech Industry & Business

The most popular blog posts about tech industry & business on Hacker News. 920 posts.

2011
331

Klout Is Odious

The positioning of Klout is gross, turning ordinary social interactions into some sort of game with a competitive score. Of course there are meaningless achievements . But what’s most loathsome is the primary purpose of Klout is to offer “Perks” (aka “ads”) to you based on your Klout score. Yes, I can get a free…

336

How Elite Firms Hire: The Inside Story

I highly recommend Lauren Rivera’s “Ivies, Extracurriculars, and Exclusion” (Research in Social Stratification and Mobility 2011). Not only is the piece careful, edifying, and interesting; it’s even emotionally affecting. Learning more about elite hiring actually replaced my apathy toward elite firms with sour grapes…

348

Why I'm Rooting For Google+

The day Google+ launched, I sent a friend at Google who was involved in building the service an email requesting an invite. I got the invite late that day and started playing with the service. Here's my profile. I'm not sure if this page is public or you need a Google+ login to see it. […]

349

Free Kindle This November

[Translations: Japanese] In October 2009 John Walkenbach noticed that the price of the Kindle was falling at a consistent rate, lowering almost on a schedule. By June 2010, the rate was so unwavering that he could easily forecast the date … Continue reading →

350

Why Microsoft bought Skype

There is so much to write about but I’ll begin with Microsoft buying Skype for $8.5 billion. The pundits are debating whether this move by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer makes good business sense, but that’s the wrong way to look at it. The better approach is to wonder what would have happened had Microsoft not

351

Mainstream Failure

The media’s telling of the Japan story has been inexcusably bad. I can’t count the number of pieces about confinement breaches and radiation surges; where they are not information-free they are wrong, and where they are not wrong, they bypass what matters. Here are a few specifics.