There is a cool startup on this space called findthebest.com - clearly, there is a lot of interest in making all sorts of public data available in a more "browsable" format. I'd like to know how other people feel about startups like factual or findTheBest.

Some friends and I are climbing some of the tallest mountains in the world (including Everest) to raise money for cancer research. I must say that these pictures certainly scare me a bit, but I really believe in our cause. We are starting our quest this January, in south America where we will climb Aconcagua, the tallest mountain in the western and southern hemisphere, and the tallest outside Asia.

We would love some donations from HN community www.climb4coloncancer.org

We are also looking for cancer survivors interested in joining and sponsors. Email us if interested!

Ivan

Is it possible to donate you so that you don't climb?

My friend's dad and also one of the original members of our organization died of cancer. They both asked to have their ashes brought to Everest and I think this is a worthy pursuit. We are tryingto raise 100k by climbing 100k feet, so we will go through a lot of hard work. We would love your support.

I did not mean to be mean. I was trying to say I would feel uneasy donating to a cause which may put other people in danger.

Ramit, I noticed a pattern in HN: people who are trying to make it share their work (articles, webapps, ideas), self-promote, and ask for help. While people, such as yourself, who already enjoy significant success, come to HN to help, mentor, offer jobs, etc. So I am wondering... How is it that most of your contributions here are about you and how well you are doing? You figure at this point, if the community was interested in your work, someone else would be posting it. I am mainly curious to know HN policy on self promoting and spamming, because I see it as detrimental to the quality of the site.

To his credit, Ramit knows business and finance to a tee, but I question his social marketing savvy. I've been following Ramit's work when his IWTYTBR blog was just starting and his bootcamp programs and Scrooge Strategy mailing lists were not yet released.

While his message is strong, I doubt he values individual readers very significantly. He runs multiple mailing lists which recycles his content between them, all of his output he turns into a commodity to be sold or leveraged to further his interests. He maximizes for the best results with the least amount of effort to achieve them. As for the content he's generated, his message hasn't changed in a long time and I haven't seen too many new thoughts from him in a while, though I've stopped paying attention, too. I'm not knocking his strategy. He's an excellent business man who has worked the 20-something niche for all its worth. I would guess he's finding that doesn't pay the bills and is simply broadcasting his message for a different demographic (seemingly ANY demographic that will listen).

Your point is appropriate, but to answer your question the policy is very ad hoc. Those with a personal agenda get noticed and drowned out by the community. It's up to the community to decide.

I also think that there are similarities here to the 'sister' Reddit community/mentality (especially r/programming which is cross-posted back and forth regularly), in that people are willing to support people that they personally identify with or like. I don't see that as detrimental to a community, but rather as a key element in fostering community (unless it gets too insular and discriminating in who is able to get that treatment). Any news about a Ycomb grad will rise to the top because of the tight-knit culture and identifying with each other from the early stages of their respective companies, so I don't see any issue with someone posting to the community with a transparent "this is my post" statement by someone from outside the group of grads.

Regardless of previous success, I think we can appreciate someone who is still excited by a new opportunity and sharing his content for anyone who might find value and/or support his quality content. Many financial fundamentals have been taught before, but can be repackaged and interesting and valuable to readers, especially those who haven't read his book (which I haven't). Like Mike says here, some overly promotional agendas get drowned out, but there is also a certain amount of community appreciation for people who just come out and say "this is something I made, what do you think?" Of course, in a social voting system, if people think "wow that sucks" then they downvote the content and leave a "that sucks" comment.