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Accountability sinks
In The Unaccountability Machine, Dan Davies argues that organizations form “accountability sinks,” structures that absorb or obscure the consequences of a decision such that no one can be held dire...
Most cited
Posts that commenters keep linking to, ranked by how many different people have cited them in Hacker News comments. 1,213 posts.
Society, Policy & Culture
Any year
422
Invisible Electrostatic Wall at 3M plant (1996)
SESSION 7: SPECIAL SESSION, 17th Annual EOS/ESD Symposium THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1995, 8:00 am SESSION 7: SPECIAL SESSION: ELECTROSTATIC CONSIDERATIONS IN INDUSTRY MODERATOR: D. Swenson, 3M 7.7 CASE STUDY - LARGE PLASTIC WEB ELECTROSTATIC PROBLEMS, RESULTS, AND CURE, D. Swenson, 3M Company Tremendous static charge…
423
I think the military commissary's freezers were hacked
The frozen pizza aisle has become the national security risk du jour
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Using Silk Road
History, background, visiting, ordering, using, & analyzing the drug market Silk Road 1
426
WeWTF, Part Deux
So, the mother of all party crashers took a dump in the We IPO punch bowl. The crasher? Math. The autopsy will show the shelving of this IPO was death by S-1.
427
The TikTok War
How TikTok exposed Facebook’s blindspot, thanks to its Chinese roots, and why those Chinese roots make TikTok a genuine concern.
428
Facing reality about the EU is a core requirement for good management
Writing at the end of the world, from Hveragerði, Iceland
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Confessions of a Necromancer
Kind people already sent donations that will make my childrens' lives easier, when I'm not there any more. Thank you enormously! :-)
431
Forget privacy: you're terrible at targeting anyway
I don't mind letting your programs see my private data as long as I get something useful in exchange. But that's not what happens. A forme...
432
The Wire in HD
This tale begins and ends with a fellow named Bob Colesberry, who taught me as much as he could about filmmaking in the three or four years I was privileged to work with him. To those who knew Bob, it will provoke warm memories to say that he was not a language guy; he understood image, and story, and the delicate way…
433
Money Laundering and AML Compliance
A brief overview of what money laundering is, what financial institutions do about it, and why.
434
Using ChatGPT is not bad for the environment
And a plea to think seriously about climate change without getting distracted
435
Benjamin Button Reviews the New MacBook Pro
The new MacBook Pro shows that Apple is finally becoming serious about developers.
436
How I became Leonardo da Vinci on the Blockchain
Yesterday at the CogX conference, I sat in a room listening to companies pitch their blockchain based startups. Because I hate myself. One in particular caught my attention. On the surface it seems to solve an important economic problem - art forgery and provenance. By putting your artwork on the "BitCoin Blockchain"…
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How printers and Photoshop detect and refuse to process images of currency
Professor Steven J. Murdoch
440
Facebook is a Ponzi Scheme
Quill Grid: The Starlink for AI becomes a network. An optional, opt-in distributed AI grid where idle Quill One devices share spare capacity, earn credits, and donate AI hours.
441
On me, and the Media Lab
(Please be sure to read the addendum at the end of this post.) A week ago last Friday, I spoke to Joi Ito about the release of documents that accuse Media Lab co-founder Marvin Minsky of involvement in Jeffrey Epstein’s horrific crimes.* Joi told me that evening that the Media Lab’s ties to Epstein went… Read More »On…
442
Something Is Rotten in the State of Cupertino
Who decided these personalized Siri features should go in the WWDC keynote, with a promise they’d arrive in the coming year, when, at the time, they were in such an unfinished state they could not be demoed to the media even in a controlled environment? Three months later, who decided Apple should double down and…
443
Can Apple read your iMessages?
About a year ago I wrote a short post urging Apple to publish the technical details of iMessage encryption. I’d love tell you that Apple saw my influential crypto blogging and fell all over t…
444
Archive.today: on the trail of mysterious guerrilla archivists of the Internet
Do you like reading articles in publications like Bloomberg, the Wall Street Journal or the Economist, but can’t afford to pay what can be hundreds of dollars a year in subscriptions? If so, …
445
Futurist prediction methods and accuracy
I've been reading a lot of predictions from people who are looking to understand what problems humanity will face 10-50 years out (and sometimes longer) in order to work in areas that will be instrumental for the future and wondering how accurate these predictions of the future are. The timeframe of predictions that…
446
The first serious infowar is now engaged
by John Perry Barlow Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not welcome among us. You have no sovereignty where we gather.We have no elected...
447
Excess Automobile Deaths as a Result of 9/11
People commented about a point I made in a recent essay: In the months after 9/11, so many people chose to drive instead of fly that the resulting deaths dwarfed the deaths from the terrorist attack itself, because cars are much more dangerous than airplanes. Yes, that’s wrong. Where I said “months,” I should have…
448
The curious history of NovaMin toothpaste (2018)
I buy my toothpaste from overseas through eBay. Wonder why?
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The Just-World Fallacy
The Misconception: People who are losing at the game of life must have done something to deserve it. The Truth: The beneficiaries of good fortune often do nothing to earn it, and bad people often g…