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Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 450 posts.
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Stack Overflow users deleting answers after OpenAI partnership
In this ever changing and evolving world of user generated versus AI generated content, the recent announcement of Stack Overflow partnering with OpenAI recently has been met with some backlash by …
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The Mafia of Pharma Pricing
4% of all the money in America flows through a few mafia-like health care conglomerates. The FTC just released a ground-breaking report on how they operate. And it is gearing up to sue.
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Is Iceland getting ready to join the EU?
A new change in Iceland’s government means that joining the EU is back on the cards for Iceland.
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We need technology that is less immersive, not more
How come so many of the most talented engineers of our time work on making our entertainment more immersive?
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The global surveillance free-for-all in mobile ad data
Not long ago, the ability to digitally track someone’s daily movements just by knowing their home address, employer, or place of worship was considered a dangerous power that should remain only within the purview of nation states. But a new lawsuit in a likely constitutional battle over a New Jersey privacy law shows…
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Cities need more trees
A case for planting more trees in urban areas.
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Power Metal: is it really about dragons? (2018)
Some years ago, Matt Daniels [1] wrote a great article on who has the largest vocabulary in hip-hop. I thought it was brilliant: comparing Shakespeare to famous hip-hop artists. It got me thinking and gave me the inspiration of doing something similar with a genre I love: Power Metal. People …
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We Could Fix Everything, We Just Don't
[programmers frantically pulling cables out of the wall]AI: "Nuclear power. Double teachers' salaries. Build more houses. Distribute food more fairly. TRAINS—"— qntmyrrh (@qntm) November 24, 2023 I remember growing up with that same old adage of how you could be the next scientist to invent a cure for cancer, or a…
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A Post-Google World?
Another Google antitrust trial starts on Monday. If Google loses, it'll be three strikes. At some point, they will give up and realize that the writing is on the wall for their current business model.
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The man who bought Pine Bluff, Arkansas (2022)
A Hackernews comment introduces a new character
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Albertsons kills rural grocers with land use restrictions
Albertsons uses land use restrictions in Mammoth, CA to stop competition so it can be the only store in town.
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Don't squander public trust on bullshit
a tragedy of the public emergency system commons...
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Notes on El Salvador
In 1995, El Salvador had an intentional homicide rate of 139 per 100,000, the highest in the world and one of the highest rates recorded in modern history. Like all educated middle-class Americans,…
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Dear Europe, please wake up
Europe is special to me as I consider myself a proud European, but damn we need to talk. Europe please wake up.
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Why can't my mom email me?
Proton email keeps sending my non-Proton email accounts encrypted emails. I figure out why and show you how to turn it off.
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The world has probably passed peak pollution
Millions die prematurely from local air pollution, but we can reduce this number significantly.
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A16Z blogs are just glorified marketing
Taking a look at a16z’s blog posts.
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I taught the Iliad to Chinese teenagers (2021)
Several years ago I had the chance to lead two seminars with a group of high-performing Chinese high school seniors. Each seminar had between 20-35 kids; each of these students was a graduating sen…
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Quote Origin: I had exactly four seconds and Google had told me it wasn’t enough
Question for Quote Investigator: Apparently, sometime during the 1950s a popular writer of detective fiction crafted a short passage parodying science fiction. Within the passage the word “Google” appeared long before the company Google existed. The passage displayed remarkable prescience. The word “Google” referred…
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So thieves broke into your storage unit again
If you've been wondering why entries have been a little slow lately, let me tell you a story. All collectors tend to be a bit obsessive by ...
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FireChat was a tool for revolution, then disappeared
With FireChat, people were free to communicate and coordinate with each other without the message having to first filter through someone's data center. Why did the app shut down without notice?
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Trying to use Bluesky without getting burned again
Some quick thoughts on moving from Twitter/X to BlueSky and how I'll try to use social media after being burned once by Twitter.
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I love programming but I hate the programming industry
On being a faulty cog in a machine when the machine itself is faulty
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I'm funding Ladybird because I can't fund Firefox
I’ve been meaning to write this one for a while, but the announcement of the Ladybird Browser Initiative makes now a particularly good time.
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The demise of the mildly dynamic website (2022)
Early websites. In the beginning, website HTML was crafted by hand. Your average personal — or corporate — website might consist of hand-edited HTML subsequently uploaded, probably via FTP, to a web server which knew only how to serve static files.
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The Intellectual Obesity Crisis (2022)
Information addiction is rotting our brains