151
I Am Deleting the Blog
[EDIT 2/13/21: This post is originally from June 2020, but there’s been renewed interest in it because the NYT article involved just came out. This post says the NYT was going to write a posi…
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
152
The FAA’s Hiring Scandal
Inside a decade of struggle to bring a scandal to light
153
The Ultimate Guide to Inflation
Originally Published: May 2021 Inflation is a controversial and complex topic. This article looks at 150 years of data across multiple countries to provide a general idea of what inflation is, what to look for, and how to invest with inflationary and deflationary risks in mind. Read from the beginning, or jump to the…
154
Kind of Screwed
TL;DR version: Last year, I was threatened with a lawsuit over the pixel art album cover for Kind of Bloop. Despite my firm belief that I was legally in the right, I settled out of court to cut my losses. This ordeal was very nerve-wracking for me and my family, and I’ve had trouble writing […]
155
Why we are unlikely to ever leave the solar system.
Fill this in yourself.
156
Dude, you broke the future
Back to: PSA: Please don't nominate the Laundry Files for a Best Series Hugo Award (this year) | Forward to: New Book Week!
157
Debanking (and Debunking?)
Crypto advocates kicked off a recent, somewhat politicized, discussion of debanking. Strap in for scintillating banking compliance trivia.
158
Engineering Pornography (2002)
This is one of my favorite geek stories of all time. I know I've mentioned it to a few of you recently, and you hadn't seen it, so here it is for posterity. Date: Wed, 27 Sep 89 10:27 PDT. From: "Thomas L. Mc Mahon" <tlm@riverside.scrc.symbolics.com> Subject: Cuts and jumpers (on a different scale) To…
159
The Premium Mediocre Life of Maya Millenial
A few months ago, while dining at Veggie Grill (one of the new breed of Chipotle-class fast-casual restaurants), a phrase popped unbidden into my head: premium…
160
Rat Park drug experiment cartoon
Comic about a classic experiment into drug addiction science: Rat Park. Would rats take drugs if given a stimulating environment and company?
161
Against Tulip Subsidies
I. Imagine a little kingdom with a quaint custom: when a man likes a woman, he offers her a tulip; if she accepts, they are married shortly thereafter. A couple who marries sans tulip is considered…
162
Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
Adria Richards was an attendee at PyCon, a tech conference, as part of her job as a developer evangelist at Sendgrid, a tech company that manages emails. She took offense to a conversation two men,…
163
Why is it hard to buy things that work well?
There's a cocktail party version of the efficient markets hypothesis I frequently hear that's basically, "markets enforce efficiency, so it's not possible that a company can have some major inefficiency and survive". We've previously discussed Marc Andreessen's quote that tech hiring can't be inefficient here and here…
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165
Too Much Dark Money in Almonds
Everyone always talks about how much money there is in politics. This is the wrong framing. The right framing is Ansolabehere et al’s: why is there so little money in politics? But Ansolabehe…
166
Conflict vs. Mistake
Jacobite – which is apparently still a real magazine and not a one-off gag making fun of Jacobin – summarizes their article Under-Theorizing Government as “You’ll never hear…
167
DHH Is Worse Than I Thought
DHH's politics are not normal. Maybe they used to be, I don't know, but as of right now the dude is way outside of what most people would consider moral or acceptable.
168
The Ruby community has a DHH problem
The Ruby community can no longer afford to stand silent in the face of DHH and his toxic ideas.
169
This is Water by David Foster Wallace (Full Transcript and Audio)
David Foster Wallace's remarkable 2005 commencement speech, This is Water, is a timeless trove of wisdom for living a meaningful life. Here is a full transcript along with audio.
170
n-gate.com. we can't both be right.
Does anyone have any questions about NAFTA for my PSYCHIC PIG?
171
The Anti-Reactionary FAQ
[Edit 3/2014: I no longer endorse all the statements in this document. I think many of the conclusions are still correct, but especially section 1 is weaker than it should be, and many reactionarie…
172
Welcome to Gentoo is Rice, the Volume goes to 11 here.
Welcome, this page is dedicated to the Linux Community's greatest ambassadors, Gentoo users. Like the annoying teenager next door with a 90hp import sporting a 6 foot tall bolt-on wing, Gentoo users are proof that society is best served by roving gangs of armed vigilantes, dishing out swift, cold justice with baseball…
173
The Perils of JavaSchools
Lazy kids. Whatever happened to hard work? A sure sign of my descent into senility is bitchin’ and moanin’ about “kids these days,” and how they won’t or can’t d…
174
Percentage of Bachelor's degrees conferred to women, by major (1970-2012)
Randy Olson charts out the percentage of Bachelor's degrees conferred to women (by major) and makes some startling findings.
175
176
Galactic-Scale Energy
[ An updated treatment of this material appears in Chapter 1 of the Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet (free) textbook , and also appears as part of an article in Nature Physics in 2022.]
177
Verizon doesn't know Dollars from Cents
Click here for Audio (27 minutes - PutFile is reporting the time wrong) Here's the background: I have a Verizon unlimited data plan in the ...
178
Apple has locked my Apple ID, and I have no recourse. A plea for help
Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison20251,750 points1,049 commentscited by 16Society, Policy & Culture details
Summary: A major brick-and-mortar store sold an Apple Gift Card that Apple seemingly took offence to, and locked out my entire Apple ID, effectively bricking my devices and my iCloud Account, Apple …
179
A Protocol for Dying
Kind people already sent donations that will make my childrens' lives easier, when I'm not there any more. Thank you enormously! :-)
180
Software Disenchantment (2018)
Everything is going to hell and nobody seems to care