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New
The latest blog posts to take off on Hacker News. 629 posts.
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A realization of why email is critical infrastructure for the Internet
You're probably reading this page because you've attempted to access some part of my blog (Wandering Thoughts) or CSpace , the wiki thing it's part of. Unfortunately you're using a browser version that my anti-crawler precautions consider suspicious, most often because it's too old (most often this applies to versions…
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Down the Rabbit Hole: The world of estranged parents' forums (2015)
This page doesn’t apply to all estranged parents, only to estranged parents who are members of estranged parents’ forums. Read why.
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“Play-to-Earn” and Bullshit Jobs
In Bullshit Jobs: A Theory , David Graeber makes the case that a sizable chunk of the labour economy is essentially people performing useless work, as a sort of subconscious self-preservation instinct of the economic status quo. The book cites ample anecdotal evidence that people perceive their own jobs as completely…
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Should you contribute open data to OpenStreetMap?
Google Maps is incredibly detailed and useful. But Google uses it for tracking and deliver ads. Should you contribute for free to build its monopoly?
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Superhighway84 – a Usenet-inspired decentralized internet discussion system
Superhighway84 is a USENET-inspired decentralized internet discussion system, featuring a retro text user interface and powered by IPFS and OrbitDB.
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The Importance of Price Signals
Originally published: December 2021 When price inflation occurs, it can be a very challenging time for everyone. In that type of environment, prices of goods and services often go up faster than wages, and the public and policymakers wish to constrain them. Historically, when price inflation becomes rampant…
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You block ads in your browser, why not in your city?
There are defences against badvertising on the internet, and you should use them. But there are defences against bad advertising in real life too, and you should use them too. Put badvertising in its place: nowhere!
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Christmas shopping the IBM way: computerized gift selection in 1962
In 1962, the Simpson's department store in Toronto used an IBM computer to help customers select Christmas gifts, based on the characteris...
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Buy a coal mine, drive a gas guzzler, and other uses of reverse logic
Readers with long memories may recall the brief, inglorious UK fuel shortage of a few weeks ago, which was mostly caused by the rush to refuel for fear the pumps would run dry. Some petrol stations…
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The longest train journey in the world in 2021
IMPORTANT : this blog post is correct as of 15 December 2021, and all the text below is unchanged since then. At that time two borders - Russia to China, and China to Laos - could not be crossed due to COVID. The outbreak of war in Ukraine has also meant that trains
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The Four Desires Driving All Human Behavior
“Nothing in the world is more exciting than a moment of sudden discovery or invention, and many more people are capable of experiencing such moments than is sometimes thought.”
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Walking the World: Bucharest
A city of the grandiose, filled with the humble
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Turkey's Financial Crisis
Earlier this week, Mohamed El-Erian was lost for words.
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The Sucker Complex
One is killed every minute
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Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech
Banned by algorithm with no explanation - the dark side of big tech's automated moderation.
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Dear self: we need to talk about social media
Last year I discovered, much to my chagrin, that always-on internet socializing was costly for me. This was inconvenient both because I’d spent rather a lot of time singing the praises of social me…
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Moral lessons from free software and GNU Emacs
Video blog on the five lessons I learnt in my life as a computer user, including when I switched to free software and GNU Emacs.
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My values, howled into the wind
I’m about to leave for a family vacation—our first such since before the pandemic, one planned and paid for literally the day before the news of Omicron broke. On the negative side, sta…
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Kolmogorov Complicity and the Parable of Lightning (2017)
A good scientist, in other words, does not merely ignore conventional wisdom, but makes a special effort to break it. Scientists go looking for trouble. — Paul Graham, What You Can’t Sa…
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