petermarks

The criteria for this project was 1) Cheap 2) high enough to rest my elbows on, 3) large enough for all my gear, 4) Good looking enough to not embarrass my girlfriend.

Comment · 16 years ago

@adamc - I understand you want to do everything you can do encourage your daughters education and I'm sure that will serve her well. I'm my experience, however, I had more to do with my own motivation in school than my parents. I tried harder when scores mattered. Throughout elementary school, I spent most of my school time day-dreaming and most of my time outside of class blowing off homework. I could deal with being scolded by parents and teachers. My parents cared how I did in school, but I didn't.

When grades started to matter in middle and high school, my competitive side came out. I decided I was going to get better grades than most because that would lead to a future with more options. I also cared more because my peers cared more and I was socially self-conscious. When I started trying harder, I started learning more and became genuinely interested in subject matter. My grades lead to me getting into a good college where students were far more motivated on average than my high school. That ended up being where I met my best friends and eventual startup co-founder.

Did my best learning experiences come from studying for tests? No, they came less structured classes and from my own programming projects during and after college. However, I do feel that grades and standardized tests lit a fire under my booty to try harder and eventually led to me meeting more motivated people.

Comment · 16 years ago

I agree standardized tests focused on memorization aren't educational, but surely tests that require problem solving ability (math) are worthwhile. Without standardized tests, how else are we supposed to quantify how well students and by extension their teachers are performing? The author doesn't suggest an alternative here.

Comment · 16 years ago

My startup -- http://feastery.com -- was founded to address these problems for great restaurants. In general the issues around retention and customer quality have been around since the beginning but have been largely ignored by most writers. We match high-quality customers with great restaurants, and economically sensible offers. We help restaurants deliver a unique experience (not merely a discount) and we track retention so we can definitively prove ROI. It's a better model for our members and our restaurant partners. If you love food, request a membership here: http://feastery.com/request_membership </shameless startup plug>

Comment · 16 years ago

This has worked well for us at http://feastery.com. No issues with the quality of the invitees.

Comment · 16 years ago

Surprising to see this on HN. Regardless, here's my favs:

2009-03-10 Jamie Jones, 2007-02-18 Danny Howells, 2006-10-14 Trentemoller, 2003-08-24 Sasha live at Creamfields

Comment · 16 years ago

Fritos and YouTube, no. Chicken McNuggets and Call of Duty, yes:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/family-and-relationships...

Comment · 17 years ago

I've been using jashkenas' ruby processing for a simple gui: http://wiki.github.com/jashkenas/ruby-processing . Processing is a pleasure to use once it's liberated from java syntax.

Comment · 17 years ago

Redmine (redmine.org) is a free, open source alternative to basecamp/trac written in rails. It's great for tracking issues for your own projects, but especially useful to small teams. There are numerous plugins available to meet individual needs (scheduling, time tracking, etc).

Comment · 17 years ago

I used prepaid sims from MTN and SafariCom when I visited Kenya and east Africa this summer. 50 cent activation fee and $5.00 for all the minutes I needed (including to the US) for 3 weeks on a network that seemed as reliable as my at&t service. Humiliates American carriers in terms of value.

People from literally all walks of life use cell phones like this. From the Masai herdsmen in Tanzania to the dirt dwelling inhabitants of the Kibera slum in Nairobi. Here's a mobile shop in the heart of that slum: http://www.flickr.com/photos/petermarks/4017875315/in/set-72...