I use the OData interface to power streamingcriterions.com, which is totally niche but still get a couple hundred hits a day. I built it to scratch my own itch, but I guess it'll stop working pretty shortly. Bummer.
Had a similar project based on OData called qwikstant.com, by no means a hit, but still trafficked. It's depressing to have to shutter it.. As I was developing I did notice that the OData DB was always slightly behind and the api forums were a ghost town - guess I should have seen it coming, but I had an itch. Got burned when google shut off services before as well, pretty sure I'm finished with free corporate APIs at this point, experimentation and one-offs aside.
Just a friendly mention that if your would-be neighborhood is Belltown or SLU, you may want to investigate some other options (unless of course you already have, in which case please ignore me!). Belltown has become worse and worse for crime (unless Phoenix Jones happens by to save you from being mugged). SLU, while nice and pristine and new, is now very overpriced due to Amazon's recent relocation there. Both neighborhoods absolutely have their positives as well, but I wouldn't move to them just for CondoInternet. :)
SLU is a former industrial neighborhood now filled with Amazon offices and cookie-cutter apartments. Basically the positive there is that you're close to work, the neighborhood itself is severely lacking in culture.
Belltown is "dangerous" only for people who have never lived in a city with a real dangerous neighborhood. I have never so much as felt even uncomfortable walking around Belltown alone at night. I can't say the same about most downtowns of other cities I've been in, let alone sketchier neighborhoods.
Maybe I've just been desensitized, but I really feel like there is no cause for alarm in Belltown.
It's relative -- among Seattle hoods, I would (anecdotally and out of my ass, of course) say there is more violent crime there than in others. I'm also a fairly big guy and I've felt uncomfortable plenty of times there at night when the streets are semi-abandoned.
In the past year I've seen ambulances taking away normal citizens who've been beat down (twice) and I've had a stabbing perp run by me as he was chased by the cops. And this is with me almost never going to Belltown. I've never seen anything remotely like that while I lived in First or Capitol Hill (although I've definitely seen plenty of car break-ins).
I have worked in or around Belltown for years. My feelings are...mixed. There is a lot of minor urban annoyances. Panhandlers, junkies, drug deals, public urination, etc. I don't feel unsafe (in daylight hours) but it does feel sort of bleak and depressing.
I respect that other people have different tolerances for urban annoyances.
The problem with Belltown isn't so much with crime as its antiseptic feel. Endless highrises with nothing interesting for retail underneath. No supermarket. The coffee shops have no character. On a Sunday morning the streets are barren of people, and even the lone park is cold and uninviting. It's just a classless hunk of neighborhood where bridge and tunnelers drink, and boring people live. I would far prefer to live in Capitol Hill or even Ballard.
Isn't HBO already in the "writing and supporting software player" business with its HBO Go apps? It's already circumventing business like Netflix today.
Kinda. In order to get HBO Go you need to be a subscriber, through your cable company. And not ever cable network is providing access to HBO Go, though I hear Time Warner Cable, is close to doing so.
The McDonalds map has more than one interpretation. Population density is much greater, and city-to-city distance much smaller, in the eastern half of the US. In other words, the great black areas in Nevada are not due to healthful zealots, but empty space where nobody lives.
For purely non-technical (but still very educated and inspired--it helps to be well-rounded): www.newyorker.com, www.givemesomethingtoread.com, www.longform.org, and soon www.grantland.com.
The paper's origin was that the author mailed a copy for review to some very high-level folks in the field (Cook, Mazirani, Sipser, etc). Here's the mail:
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 2010 21:28:39 +0000
Subject: Proof announcement: P is not equal to NP
Dear Fellow Researchers,
I am pleased to announce a proof that P is not equal to NP, which is attached in 10pt and 12pt fonts.
The proof required the piecing together of principles from multiple areas within mathematics. The major effort in constructing this proof was uncovering a chain of conceptual links between various fields and viewing them through a common lens. Second to this were the technical hurdles faced at each stage in the proof.
This work builds upon fundamental contributions many esteemed researchers have made to their fields. In the presentation of this paper, it was my intention to provide the reader with an understanding of the global framework for this proof. Technical and computational details within chapters were minimized as much as possible.
This work was pursued independently of my duties as a HP Labs researcher, and without the knowledge of others. I made several unsuccessful attempts these past two years trying other combinations of ideas before I began this work.
Comments and suggestions for improvements to the paper are highly welcomed.
Sincerely,
Vinay Deolalikar
Principal Research Scientist
HP Labs
Somewhere, deep in a dark corner of my heart, I hope and pray that this paper is correct, just so we can keep and revere the immortal words "I am pleased to announce a proof that P is not equal to NP, which is attached in 10pt and 12pt fonts."
Sounds a little like the line in Watson and Crick's first paper about DNA. They said "It has not escaped our notice..." to introduce the idea that the subject of the paper might be the secret to life, the universe, and everything.
I find the sentence comical in its humility and practicality; I assume leif did too. Acangiano puts it in the same league as Fermat's famous note in the margin of his copy of Arithmetica.
I assume he included the paper in two font sizes to suit the reader's preference; no deeper meaning.
Yeah, basically I found it funny juxtaposing the announcement of such a magnificent result (should it end up proving true) with such a mundane, utilitarian comment.
At 66 pages, coming from a well regarding researcher, and with its professional style of writing, I'd be shocked if this wasn't reviewed and slotted for publication before the end of the year.
In fact, one may argue that by FOCS we'll have had so many graduate students, reading groups, and reviewers pour over this paper that we'll have either a consensus or have found an error.
Indeed. But, fortunately, this is seldom a problem in math.
I mean, often people discover problems in proofs --- but if the result was beautiful enough, they are usually able to repair the proofs. It's like debugging. (And I mean it, thanks to the Curry-Howard isomorphism.)
Also, from the blog post: "I see someone else has uploaded the paper. I should point out that in the email thread I got, Stephen Cook said “This appears to be a relatively serious claim to have solved P vs NP.". I would love to see that email thread.
