Hacker News Reader

marescaon It's official: developers get better with age. And scarcer.

My guess is that the older developers have more time to comment and follow up. Plenty of times I have looked for solutions on stackoverflow, but have been too busy to post responses because of looming deadlines. This is like saying my grandparents would make for better farmers because they spend their whole day on Farmville.

marescaon Why Microsoft has made developers horrified about coding for Windows 8

Back when WPF/WCF and Silverlight was being pushed, I was initially cautious. I gave the technologies a few tries and ended up not liking them. I didn't like WPF because it seemed like an over-engineered version of SVG. I didn't like WCF because I was used to Remoting and didn't need another layer on top to learn. I didn't drink the Silverlight cool-aid because I knew javascript would get faster and Silverlight would eventually get overtaken by more open options. My guess is many microsoft devs felt the same way and didn't adopt these technologies because if they did, these technologies probably would have made it into Windows 8.

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

Both really good sites. Sunlight labs has a great API for state data. They don't have every state nailed down yet, but still a very good amount of data. All of their stuff is in python, but I'm a .NET guy, so I did everything in C#.

opencongress is a good site. Sites like those need more exposure to the general public.

Other honorable mentions:

http://www.govit.com/

http://www.mygov365.com/

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

I am working on creating a good landing page right now.

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

Good point. I will definitely be providing an API at some point, and will also open source everything after some independent code reviews. The design was an afterthought. I spent so long gathering data that that was my main focus. Now that I am done, I can really focus on marketing and design.

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

This is only a MVP. Traction or not, I will still be working on it in another 3 years because I feel that Americans' voices in politics fall on deaf ears, and this is too important to give up on.

Targeting a market of only people of above average intelligence is wrong and undemocratic. The purpose of the site is so that EVERY American can understand the legislation that governs them. Based on the current political setting, this site is exactly what America needs. Sure it may be rough around the edges, but it will get there.

But damn me for trying, right?

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

That's exactly what I did. I created bots for every single state. I wanted to scrape as much data as possible so I went for all the data available that every state had. Writing each bot took only a day or two, but running them took much longer. I also did all of this in my spare time on top of a full time job. If I worked on it full time, I probably could have done it in 6 months.

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

Where do you suppose one gets all of the legislative data to a site like this? Saying this can be done in a weekend is a huge underestimation.

marescaon Ask HN: Rate my startup: openpoll.us

Clickable: https://openpoll.us

marescaon Show HN: share your June side project

https://openpoll.us - A platform that allows people to vote and comment on legislation. I am just putting some finishing touches on my MVP. Feel free to give it a try. All feedback is appreciated.

marescaon Ask HN: How does sharing trademark or copyright ownership work?

I filed on behalf of my business, of which I am the owner. The online process has a spot where you list your business name.

Check out http://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/teas/initial_app.jsp

At the bottom, Collective Trademark/Servicemark Application

marescaon Ask HN: How does sharing trademark or copyright ownership work?

I just filed for a trademark. It took about an hour to do on the patent trademark office's site. It costs about 300 per class of trademarks. The owner of the trademark is listed as the LLC, not me individually.

marescaon Ask HN: What do we do with an iPad app built on a recently shutdown Google API?

We haven't been able to find any great news API alternatives.

avoid the (perfectly valid) question of whether it's wise to build an app entirely reliant on some third party's good graces.

In my opinion, it isn't wise to build an app entirely reliant on a 3rd party API. Looking for a new API to migrate to says you haven't learned from the mistake you made. I've made the same mistake with an attempt at a SMS to Social Message tunnel on facebook/myspace back in the day. Then facebook made it a native feature. It was an important lesson to learn.

If I were you guys, I'd stop looking for APIs and start building your own backend. This way, you can pull in more than one source of data. Also remember that there are other ways of getting data.

marescaon Change.org: Inviting 50 hackers who believe they can change the world

Sorry to sound pessimistic, but how much could you change in a 24 hour hackathon? I've seen a surge lately of hackathons and they seem to discredit the entrepreneurs that spend weeks, months, and even years on their projects. Furthermore, they perpetuate the notion among non-techies that you can build the next google or facebook in a weekend.

marescaon Ask HN: Low pressure programming jobs?

There are programming jobs in every industry. You just have to look harder. Find a job in an industry that uses technology, but isn't reliable on it in a matter of life or death fashion.

My last place of employment was a 30 mile commute one way, was stressful, and I worked 40 to 70 hour work weeks. My current place of employment is about 5 miles away, not nearly as stressful, and I rarely work over 40 hours a week. What did I have to sacrifice? 10% of my salary. Would I do it again? In a heartbeat.

marescaon Ask HN: What are your side projects?

http://openpoll.us is a platform that will allow people to vote and comment on state and federal legislation. It will launch some time this summer.

marescaon [dead]

April Fools

marescaon You can't do that

For many years I would bounce my ideas off of people, and they would look at me like I was delusional. This made me think I was delusional. After working on my MVP for the past 3 years, I have finally figured out that the best ideas are the ones that people say can't be done. With enough time and dedication anything is possible. Disregard the naysayers and keep on truckin'.

marescaon Show HN: I jumped on a meme - SheenMe.me

I never could understand how short-lived sites built off of memes can make any real revenue. Anyone care to enlighten me with stories/numbers?

marescaon Challenge HN: Can we please solve the 'voting online' problem?

There are two sites I know of so far dedicated to online voting.

My site: http://www.openpoll.us (shameless plug, still needs a ton of work)

Also http://opengovernment.org/, they just opened in January.

marescaon Ask HN: Why all the rejects?

The sooner the better, because .Net along with most Microsoft technologies are a dead-end.

As opposed to Java, which has a bright future with Oracle?

marescaon When 9 Trillion dollars from Fed Reserve goes missing what can we do about it?

If you heard of a website launch with partial data without your state, how often would you go back to check if your state was added? My opinion is that users would initially see the site, and not visit again for a few months. You have a larger target-able market by waiting.

The truth is they have a lot more than 5 states in github. They could have probably gotten away with launching 20 or 25 states.

marescaon When 9 Trillion dollars from Fed Reserve goes missing what can we do about it?

OpenGovernment is a great idea and I wish the team building it all of the best. OpenGovernment will be the only competitor so far to a startup I've been working on the past 3 years: http://www.openpoll.us. It's exciting to see other people prove your idea is a good one. That being said, I think a release of OpenGovernment with only 5 states is a little premature.(I'm waiting to have all states complete before releasing my MVP.) I am very interested in seeing what they come up with.

marescaon A Typical Day for PFC Bradley Manning

Home of the brave.

marescaon Ask HN: Am I doing wrong?

Worrying about the development language you use is like worrying about using a Stanley hammer versus a Craftsman hammer when building a house. The brand doesn't matter as long as the house gets built.

I've worked in the .NET stack for about 5 years now. It is a real pleasure to work with. When I need to get something done, I know I can do it easily, and without problems. And seeing the recent developments of Java with Oracle, I feel my decision was that much better.

marescaon Eliminating Political Parties

Thanks for the heads up. I typically view it in firefox, chrome, and IE. I am in the data acquisition stage right now. I am going to do another redesign right before the alpha release.

marescaon Eliminating Political Parties

They use an e-democracy or electronic direct democracy. This is exactly what my startup is focused on. An e-democracy for America.

http://www.openpoll.us

/shameless plug

marescaon "Rate My Startup" Post Policy

Investing time does not equal karma. I have posted about 10 comments so far and only have 2 karma. Most of the threads I post in never make it past 20 total posts. Requiring people to have a certain amount of karma will make them only post more comments to achieve said karma. And the more unnecessary posts there are, the lower the quality is of those posts.

marescaon Ask HN: Building a successful startup on the side?

I believe it depends on the atmosphere of your full time job. I've been working on my current project for the past 2 years now and have had 2 different full time jobs in that period. My previous job had me working at 120% of utilization, with a bunch of overtime. Needless to say, not much of my side-project got done. When I got home from work every day, I wouldn't even think about touching a computer. My current job isn't nearly as stressful. Although I get a lot done, I still salivate about programming when I get home. I think it all depends on how much of a workload you can handle past your full time job and how stressful your full time job is. Having positive and motivated people at your full time job also helps your motivation on your personal project.

marescaon Ask HN: Show me your Half Baked project

http://www.openpoll.us/

openpoll is an electronic direct democracy that will allow Americans to vote on state and federal bills and elections. It is currently in development and has been for the past 2 years (I work on it in my spare time as getting funding isn't a viable option). I am in the data acquisition stage right now. That means writing parsers to pull legislation information from every state's website. As of right now, the site isn't much more than a UI slapped on top of a DB. It has registration, basic voting, and commenting. I would like to hear any potential ideas from the internet community for this site.

I plan on having beta testing in the first quarter of 2011. Some point after that, I will open source the code. Then I will add a Web API that will allow smartphone applications to be built. And if I get enough traction, eventually turn my LLC into a non-profit. My target market is every single American. My eventual goal is to turn phone booths into voting booths. Pretty lofty goals, but I believe it will make America a much better place.