Screenshots on the homepage are a bit confusing - seems like you should be able to sign up right from the homepage, but then you have to click through.
This seems like a really valid and important point. Yet companies who do build their entire business on other companies' info / APIS (Think Greplin, Trendrr, Tweetdeck, etc.) still get tons of interest from investors. While it is easy to realize the importance of developing an independent business when commenting on HN, I think the startup community as a whole needs to start displaying this in its actions.
Once more large internet companies realize that their users (both of their services and API) are not necessarily their customers (Think Twitter's denial of new 3rd party clients), the API free-for-all which we're experiencing right now will dry up, and we'll see at least one of the companies-who-are-built-on-other-companies fail. This might be the kick in the pants that the startup community needs to realize the importance of building unique, independent businesses.
While not the perfect situation, I think companies like Greplin, that use multiple APIs across multiple third parties, are at least able to offer a service should one (or a few) of those APIs become inaccessible for any reason.
Much better than your business relying on a single third Party (as in the featured article), where should you cease to have access you are completely screwed.
Greplin et al always have the exit scenario where their product is so much better than whatever (say) Facebook has in-house that Facebook buys them as a social-search talent-acquisition play.
This sort of scenario might be easier to identify and invest in than "the next Facebook".
Wouldn't it be a bit worrisome for a company to bargain to be purchased by Facebook when that company is in the position that Facebook could put them out of business at any point by cloning their stuff?
Creating an app as a "talent-acquisition play" seems reasonable but wouldn't you want to position yourself for multiple offers? If Facebook buying for talent, it doesn't have to restrict itself to the creators of Facebook apps.
There are definitely two conflicting forces at work here - social networking making every action seem both insignificant (in comparison to the barrage of updates we receive every day) while also making almost every event quite significant (Hundreds of comments, comments on comments, etc). But one force might not necessarily prevail over the other - they can work it tandem, leading to interesting results.
One issue with jdietrich's initial comment is that his views on social networking revealing our true insignificance assume that the selves we display in the "unreal" world of social networking are, in fact, accurate representations of our "real world" selves; in reality, this is hardly the case. I know I've caught myself thinking "How will this Tweet or that FB update make me look to my friends/followers..." - hardly a parallel of how one lives and presents themselves in the unpredictable, variable real world.
This, in my mind, is the product of the conflicting forces of exaggerated significance / insignificance - the intense crafting of our online personalities. We've seen the blue marble - have realized that with all of the white noise, we must seem better, funnier, more interesting, to break through the noise. Yet at the same time we know that, should we actually get noticed, we will get noticed in a serious way - hundreds or thousands of people might see our update. The pressure is on.
As I see it, this is the product of these two conflicting forces: A high-pressure culture, a culture of scrutiny wherein every action and sentence is specifically crafted and cultivated. Orwell's 1984 comes to mind, but rather than Big Brother watching over everyone, it is the public that constantly watches each other.
A great trick I've found w/r/t your first tip (going to unproductive websites when feeling initial frustration) is to stop using the "Keep me logged in" option on those sites. If I hit a problem and habitually go to Facebook or Gmail, having that buffer layer of needing to log in makes me stop and think "Wait, I should really focus on the problem I've avoided by coming here."
Good one. Randall Munroe trained himself to turn off his computer whenever he switched tasks, so that the handful of seconds worth of power down, and then boot up, would break his habitual distraction. http://blog.xkcd.com/2011/02/18/distraction-affliction-corre...
This is a great article to show business cofounders who might be reluctant to learn how to code. Wonderful evidence that even folks with 0 experience can increase their coding knowledge (and thus ability to work effectively w/ hackers) by great strides in a short 6 months.
DreamIt Ventures started in Philly and is launching in NYC this Summer. They take applicants for both startups as well as hackers interested in being matched up with a startup (Somewhat like being a Techstars "Hackstar")
Foursquare is something that became wildly popular at the same time smart phones were becoming more and more ubiquitous. It is a cool sort of "Hey check out what my new phone can do" kind of tool.
As smart phones are becoming more the standard and less the shiny-new-thing, though, Foursquare and the like are turning out to not actually provide that much value, and are losing their stickiness.
