1021
AI is impressive because we've failed at personal computing
AI is impressive because we’ve failed at semantic web and personal computing | exotext
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The latest blog posts to take off on Hacker News. 8,148 posts.
Society, Policy & Culture
Any year
1022
Exit Tax: Leave Germany before your business gets big
Learn what triggers Germany’s exit tax for business owners, how it’s calculated, and why growing a profitable company can make leaving Germany costly.
1023
AI Ethics is being narrowed on purpose, like privacy was
A few days ago, OpenAI released an open-source language model for the first time in a very long time. It had been promised for a while, but the deadline kept being pushed for “safety” concerns.
1024
LLM Inflation
One of the signal achievements of computing is data compression 1 : we take in data, make it smaller while retaining all information (“lossless” compression), transmit it, and then decompress it back to the original at the other end.
1025
AI promised efficiency. Instead, it's making us work harder
AI tools were supposed to free up our time—but they’re increasing our cognitive load and making us less productive. Here’s what’s really happening (and how to use them without burning out).
1026
The Dollar Is Dead
When belief dies, fiat dies with it.
1027
Palantir: The Most Evil Company
At the cutting edge of dystopia and genocide
1028
Facts will not save you – AI, history and Soviet sci-fi
AI, history, and Soviet sci-fi
1029
The untold impact of cancellation
Warning: towards the end of this post are references to suicide, which may be distressing to some readers. Discretion is advised.
1030
The anti-abundance critique on housing is wrong
Antitrust critics say that homebuilding monopolies are the real culprit of America’s housing woes. I looked into some of their claims. They don’t hold up.
1031
The hype is the product
Large publicly traded tech companies seem to no longer consider their customers – that is, people and organizations who actually buy their products or pay for access to their services – their core foc
1032
The leverage arbitrage: Why everything feels broken
Something fundamental has shifted in how power works, and most of our institutions haven't noticed. We're living through what might be called "leverage arbitrage divergence"—a growing gap between...
1033
Face it: you're a crazy person
OR: why your brain needs a boxcutter
1034
GPT might be an information virus (2023)
Obligatory: the views and opinions expressed in this post are my own and do not represent the views and opinions of my employer. In light of all the hype going around about ChatGPT, I wanted to offer my “hot take” on what the next 2-5 years
1035
1036
Where are vacation homes located in the US?
As of 2023, the US has around 142.3 million housing units: roughly one home for every 2.4 people in the country.
1037
The Tabs vs. Spaces war is over, and spaces have emerged victorious
The great indentation war is over and it seems like we have a clear winner.
1038
Against the censorship of adult content by payment processors
This is a furry blog, where I write about whatever interests me and sign it with my fursona’s name. I sometimes talk about furry fandom topics, but I sometimes also talk about applied cryptog…
1039
Two narratives about AI
I want to present you with two narratives about AI. Both of them are about using this technology to automate computer programming, but they point ... Read more
1040
When swiping supplants scissors: The hidden cost of touchscreens
The history of technology is full of innovators who got their start creating with their hands. Steve Jobs cites a calligraphy class at Reed
1041
A list of changes to make it easier to build beautiful and walkable places
If you're still using this page, please email me at [email protected] and I'll send you a copy.
1042
Open Sauce is a confoundingly brilliant Bay Area event
This is the second year I brought my Dad (a now-retired radio engineer and co-host of Geerling Engineering) to Open Sauce, a Bay Area maker faire-like event, dreamed up by William Osman and featuring hundreds of exhibits ranging from mad science, to vintage electronics, to games, to world-record-breaking Rubik's Cube…
1043
A media company demanded a license fee for an Open Graph image I used
A media company demanded a license fee for an Open Graph image used on my twitter archive. I gave in and paid it, but what does that mean for open graph images and copyright?
1044
Facts don't change minds, structure does
Why do facts bounce off some people? It’s not about logic; it’s about structure. Your worldview isn’t a list of opinions—it's a living network. And right now, it's at war.
1045
Compression culture is making you stupid and uninteresting
why the death of nuance should scare you -your fav gen z philosopher xx
1046
Solar-plus-storage technology is improving quickly
On how plummeting battery prices make 24/7 solar power a reality today.
1047
What happens when housing prices go down?
A reflection on affordability, finance, and the deep contradictions we struggle to face.
1048
Peep Show is the most realistic portrayal of evil I have seen (2020)
Peep Show, a British tv series running from 2003 to 2015, starring David Mitchell and Robert Webb as a pair of miserable, co-dependent roommates living in Croydon, London, is the most realistic por…
1049
Giving Up on Element and Matrix.org
The Matrix.org network has great potential, but after years of dealing with glitches, slow performance, poor UX, and one too many failures, I’m done with it.
1050
It's rude to show AI output to people
Feeding slop is an act of war