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FOSDEM 2026 – Open-Source Conference in Brussels – Day#1 Recap
FOSDEM 2026 in Brussels highlights open source, European digital sovereignty, BSD, Linux, community innovation, and free software.
Topics /
Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 8,148 posts.
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The age of the grift shift
For a book proposal I am currently working on (German, no proposal isn’t done yet because I keep reworking stuff, my agent hates me) I am thinking a lot about late stage capitalism and technologies, about how the kinda terminal economic system shapes the technologies it brings forward etc. And there are of course a […]
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Benjamin Button Reviews the New MacBook Pro
The new MacBook Pro shows that Apple is finally becoming serious about developers.
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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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The internet is no longer a safe haven
A couple of days ago, the small server hosting this website was temporarily knocked out by scraping …
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AI's real superpower: consuming, not creating
Everyone's using AI wrong. Its superpower isn't writing for you. It's reading everything you've ever written and finding patterns you missed.
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Is Hacker News Bullshit?
The future of online media
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How I helped fix Canadaʼs Covid Alert app
On July 31st , Canada’s COVID Alert app was made available for general use, though it does not have support for actually reporting a diagnosis in most provinces, yet.
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How good are American roads?
We’re in an era where US infrastructure is getting a lot of attention.
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Mastodon is doomed?
Mastodon won't be the next Twitter, and it's not because of Bluesky. The ideals and execution won't scale.
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How to summon and sell your soul to Satan and other devils
Selling your soul has never been easier. Today, there are plenty of demonology books that teach you how to bargain with Lucifer, written by authors who have probably done this themselves on multiple occasions.
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The inexplicable rise of open floor plans in tech companies
Update: I originally quoted the average price of office space as $36 / square foot / month, where ...
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Are consumers just tech debt to Microsoft?
I’m not saying this will definitely happen, but I think we could be on the cusp of a significant shift in Windows market share for consumer computers. It is not going to drop to 2% in a year or anything, but I feel like a few pieces are coming
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"Privacy preserving age verification" is bullshit
I don't think that it's impossible for politicians, even nontechnical politicians, to make good tech policy. After all, the fact that no one in Congress is a microbiologist doesn't stop federal standards from delivering potable water (and it doesn't excuse the ghastly failures, such as Flint, MI):
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Dear Mozilla: Fix Your Damn Browser
Longtime Readers of this blog will be aware that I have been a fan of Mozilla for a long time. There’s nearly ten years of Mozilla advocacy tucked away in the JWM archives. I’ve been on the Mozilla fanboy train since before Firefox even existed — all the way back to the original Mozilla Suite’s Milestone 17 release…
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The emergence of print-on-demand Amazon paperback books
I was a pretty avid reader as a kid, but as I transitioned to adulthood, my ability to focus on the written page withered. It seems I’m not alone: PISA reports reveal unprecedented drops in reading ability , professors in elite universities claim that humanities students can’t finish books , and looking around me, it…
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Chance of Dying From Backscatter Radiation Same as Chance of Terrorism
Link to: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2010/11/16/5477568-are-airport-x-ray-scanners-harmful
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How friction is being redistributed in today's economy
AI Chatbots, Newark, and the West Village Girls
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Save Padmapper: Craigslist is wrong to shut them down. An open letter to Craig
I just found out a few moments ago that Craigslist has sent a cease and desist to one of the most valuable sites for apartment renters on the planet, Padmapper. Here's my open letter to them: ...
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An opinionated critique of Duolingo
beyond the green owl, from streaks and potions to pedagogy and politics
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What we can deduce from a leaked PDF
Matthew Butterick
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The insecure evangelism of LLM maximalists
I just can't help feeling these training wheels are getting in the way of my bicycle commute.
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Tainting the CSAM client-side scanning database
The proposal of the European Commission for a regulation on preventing and combatting the sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of children is currently discussed in Dutch parliament. I recently wrote about some concerns and the risk of a DDoS attack . It turns out it is also possible to taint the database of images of…
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Getty Images v. Stability AI – Complaint
Copyright Lately is a copyright blog written, edited and published by Aaron Moss. That's me. I'm a partner at Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp (MSK) in Los Angeles. I specialize in copyright law, trademark, and other intellectual property, media and entertainment litigation matters.
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When ChatGPT summarises, it does nothing of the kind
One of the use cases I thought was reasonable to expect from ChatGPT and Friends (LLMs) was summarising. It turns out I was wrong. What ChatGPT isn’t summarising at all, it only looks like it…
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P. J. O'Rourke, 1947-2022
Brilliant writer, beautiful soul