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A Wave of Fear in American Commerce
Hi! Welcome to Big, a newsletter about the politics of monopoly.
Topics /
Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 8,148 posts.
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Silence Is a Commons by Ivan Illich (1983)
Ivan Illich is doing to computers what he did to education (De-Schooling Society, 1971), to energy (Energy and Equity, 1974), to medicine (Medical Nemesis, 1975), and to sex roles (Vernacular Gender, 1983). Each time it has been radical analysis that changes our perception of what is really going on. Each time, and…
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Scaring People into Supporting Backdoors
Back in 1998, Tim May warned us of the “Four Horsemen of the Infocalypse”: “terrorists, pedophiles, drug dealers, and money launderers.” I tended to cast it slightly differently. This is me from 2005: Beware the Four Horsemen of the Information Apocalypse: terrorists, drug dealers, kidnappers, and child pornographers…
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Midcentury North American Restaurant Placemats
Like so many past ephemera finds I’ve shared here, I bought these midcentury North American restaurant placemats at Brimfield Flea this July from a vendor who had around 500 in a big plastic tub. I bought 25 for $75 (a steal!) but I did have to talk myself out of asking how much it would be for the whole box. Most of…
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Why are there no good dinosaur films?
running on jurassic park's fumes for over 30 years
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Do U.S. ports need more automation?
On October 1st, 47,000 members of the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), primarily dockworkers on East and Gulf Coast ports, went on strike after failing to agree contract terms with USMX, an alliance of port operators and employers.
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The Charisma Machine: The life, death, and legacy of One Laptop per Child
Winner, 2020 Best Information Science Book Award Winner, 2020 Sally Hacker Prize Winner, 2021 Computer History Museum Prize
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It’s impossible to work your way through college nowadays
Randy Olson explains why it's impossible to work your way through college nowadays.
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Vanced Discontinuation
Since many users are having trouble understanding the reason for the discontinuation of vanced, we wanted to brief you on all the expected theories with their answers. Vanced NFT/LTT theory: 1. Vanced NFT:- Some users believe that Google had sent cease & desist letter because the Vanced Team had posted NFT to earn…
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Employment, construction, and the cost of San Francisco apartments
Everyone agrees that housing in San Francisco is expensive, and that the high costs are hurting the city. But there is a lot of disagreement...
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Interrail: 6,379Km and 13 Countries over 7 weeks
Last year, my wife and I went on a 5,025 Km Interrail adventure. We got the month-long unlimited pass and saw 10 Countries in 30 Days. That was a bit too intense. So this year we got the 15 travel days in 2 months package. We grabbed the 1st class tickets when they went on sale in December. Here's how our journey…
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When Interfaces Kill: What Happened to John Denver (1999)
How poor design killed John Denver dead.
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AT&T Learns Exactly the Wrong Lesson About Data Usage
AT&T says that 65% of its users use less 200 megabytes per month; a whopping 98% use less than 2 gigabytes. (NYT) AT&T looked at these numbers and concluded it was time for tiered pricing; …
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The Private Capture of Public Genius
Essay I of Upstream of Everything
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The Human Is the Loop
After a few weeks away from AI, I see my usage wasn't always productive or healthy.
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The New York Times uses the dark patterns it derides
New York Times op-ed recently decried tricks websites use to manipulate users… but have you ever tried to cancel your NY Times subscription?
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Explain it to me like I'm ten
In 2012, the creator of the xkcd cartoon Randall Munroe unveiled Up Goer Five — a detailed diagram of the Saturn V rocket, annotated using only the most common 1,000 (sorry, “ten hundred”) words in…
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Micropayments as a reality check for news sites
In Digital Media Lost the Newsstand. Micropayments Are the Obvious Way Back , Rick Bruner makes the case for giving micropayments another try.
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This time is different
3D TV, AMP, Augmented Reality, Beanie Babies, Blockchain, Cartoon Avatars, Curved TVs, Frogans, Hoverboards, iBeacons, Jetpacks, Metaverse, NFTs, Physical Web, Quantum Computing, Quibi, Small and Safe Nuclear Reactors, Smart Glasses, Stadia, WiMAX. The problem is, the same dudes (and it was nearly always dudes) who…
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Nuclear power is the only green solution (2004)
We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources, writes James Lovelock – civilisation is in imminent danger. Published in The Independent , 24 May 2004.
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On Mr. Beast and being alone in a circle for 100 days
culture by algorithm in the 21st century
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