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Life, Learning & Writing

The most popular blog posts about life, learning & writing on Hacker News. 394 posts.

2013
94

A world without power

The 14th of August, 2003 was an interesting day in many ways. I’d just taken the family down to Toronto to spend a day there and pick up our newly minted passports at the Dutch embassy. We had some fun in the city seeing the sights, visited Niagara Falls and were on the way back on a sunny August thursday afternoon…

96

40 Days Without Booze

Recently, as a “kick-in-the-butt” motivator, I promised myself that I would abstain from alcoholic beverages until I finished the first draft of a novel I’ve been working on. I had set a target date for completing the project (June 30th), with the idea that if I didn’t finish by that date, I’d stop drinking booze […]

99

Off

Part of it was the lack of surprises, which isn’t Apple’s fault. All of the product upgrades, while nice, were incremental and predictable. None of the pricing was a surprise. In fact, the only unexpected product announcement is the zombie iPad 2 sticking around for another year, shamelessly at the same price as last…

104

Does Steve Jobs know how to code?

Our curriculum is designed with one goal in mind: to help you launch your career in technology. As a global leader in curriculum development, our programs meet — or exceed — the hiring requirements of the technology jobs you want, empowering you with Day-1 Skills. WOZ technology training features in-browser coding…

105

Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life

Two years ago this summer I read a book that changed the entire way I see the world. I had been researching various topics — law, politics, the media — and become more and more convinced that something was seriously wrong. Politicians, I was shocked to discover, weren’t actually doing what the people wanted. And the…

107

The Cost of an ACL Injury

A little over a year ago, I tore my ACL playing ultimate frisbee. I made a quick cut to lose my defender, and as I planted my foot to change directions, I felt a sudden pop in my knee. Next thing I know, I’m on the ground because my knee had given out.

112

Why I Develop For The Mac

UPDATE, 5/7/2013 : Some off-hand remarks in this article about HTML5 drawing speeds generated some controversy in the hackersphere. To read more, see Adrian Holovaty's post In Defense of <canvas> , and my response, Hackers and <canvas> .

113

30 pounds in 30 days

Listen to the Post Here Website In the past month or so, I met with a handful of groups who sought guidance on putting together an iOS minimum viable product with a fully functioning backend. These…

114

Why I’m not paying the Troll Toll

My company TMSOFT was recently sued by Lodsys in the eastern district of Texas. I initially thought I was being sued for using a hyperlink in my White Noise application (see below). I know now I’m being sued because the CEO of Lodsys didn’t like what I publicly said about their company. That’s right. I’m being sued…

120

Aaron Swartz: What Happens in The Dark Knight

As we’ve discussed, in Batman Begins 1960s-style full employment and antipoverty programs lead to skyrocketing crime while in The Dark Knight Rises 1980s-style tough-on-crime policies and neoliberal economics lead to a revolt of the economic underclass. The films are mirror images, one about the failure of liberal…