This is something I've dealt with as well. My usual strategy, when asked, is to ask what the employer plans on offering and if they push to see what I was making before I'll give them a ballpark figure of what I'd like to be making in the new position (usually what I was making before +10-20%). I've found that in the US in certain industries (such as finance) this question is almost always asked and if you refuse to answer, they'll just find out in the background check and will revoke the offer if they find too much of a disparity in the numbers. I've always been told it's better to be honest about it up front than to have them find out after the background check that you've exaggerated your numbers.
Yes, I've run into this many times as well. Personally I'd love to get into some type of programming job (esp. at a startup), but I didn't major in CS or Computer Engineering nor have I had any professional experience in the field (read: haven't had a job programming professionally, therefore not qualified for a senior position). Maybe it's just the current economic climate but I've found this true of many startups as well (looking on job boards like Startuply, for instance).
Yeah you really wouldn't want to convert anything but WAV or any other lossless format into FLAC (mp3 and Ogg are lossy formats). Converting a lossy format (mp3 or Ogg) to a lossless format (FLAC or WAV) wouldn't recover any of the lost data and would be rather pointless. Converting WAV to FLAC, however, will reduce the original filesize to about 50-60% of its original size, while still maintaining the exact same audio quality as WAV. Converting FLAC to mp3 or Ogg will reduce the filesize even more but will remove some of the actual audio data (higher bitrates retain more of the original data but still remove some, though typically out of the range of what you'd notice listening to the song). At bitrates like 96kbps or even 128kbps, you'd probably notice a difference in audio quality, whereas with a 256kbps or 320kbps mp3 you probably wouldn't be able to tell much difference between it and the FLAC unless you have excellent hearing or it's being played on high-grade equipment.
Hey guys, thanks for the great suggestions, this is definitely the kind of stuff I'm looking for. I checked out most of the links so far and BarCamp (definitely plan to attend), Betahouse, and Open Coffee look cool, I'll have to try those out. Any good presentations/events are also of interest, I'll keep on top of those and check as many as I can.
Also, as many pointed out, my e-mail was indeed not visible in my profile (it was in the e-mail field instead). It's now in the profile.
I'd also second the idea of the "hacker network" within/in place of the profile section. Fields for geography, interests, programming experience/language preferences would be great, though I'd still like to see it left to each person to provide as much/little of that info as they'd like. Also, in the geography area, people could post links to fun/interesting events so others in that area would have a quick way of finding out about them while reading HN.
I'd definitely like to attend, I'm a soon-to-be (full-time) entrepreneur and avid HN reader living in Boston. I'm strongly considering applying for the next YC round, so it'll be cool to see what pg and the YC summer '08 folks are up to, and hopefully meet you all in person!