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Topics /
Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 629 posts.
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The Framework is the most exciting laptop I've used
This month marks the publication of "The Actual Star," a new, wildly ambitious, wildly successful novel by Monica Byrne, spanning 3,000 years of history from the ancient Maya to a distant future.
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Just Be Rich
No one wants to be the bad guy. When narratives begin to shift and the once good guys are labelled as bad it's not surprising they fight back. They'll point to criticisms as exaggerations. Their faults as misunderstandings. Today's freshly ordained bad guys are the investors and
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It Can Happen to You
A few days ago, a fascinating article about Grand Theft Auto Online made the rounds of the tech news ecosystem.
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Firefox is the alternative to a Chrome hegemony
Supposedly today we have a lot of browsers to choose from - Google Chrome, Safari, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, etc. Having choices is a good thing, right? Nobody wants to relive the time of almost complete Internet Explorer domination again. Unfortunately our choices are significantly fewer than…
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Reddit’s disrespectful design
An overview of Reddit's adversarial and seemingly counter-productive changes.
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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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Are Xiaomi browsers spyware? Yes, they are (2020)
Xiaomi browsers collect not merely your browsing history but also searches, downloads, YouTube videos watched and much more.
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How Silicon Valley destroyed Parler
In the last three months, tech giants have censored political speech and journalism to manipulate U.S. politics, while liberals, with virtual unanimity, have cheered.
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On Apple’s “Expanded Protections for Children” – A Personal Story
These efforts will evolve and expand over time. – Apple on their “Expanded Protections for Children” I am broke “non-liquid” right now. Normally, that sentence doesn&#…
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European Parliament approves mass surveillance of private communication
Today, the European Parliament approved the ePrivacy Derogation, allowing providers of e-mail and messaging services to automatically search all personal messages of each citizen for presumed suspect content and report suspected cases to the police. The European Pirates Delegation in the Greens/EFA
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Who Owns My Name?
Does my name belong to me? Does my face? What about my life? My story? Why is my name used to refer to events I had no hand in? I return to…
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The mermaid is taking over Google search in Norway
A weird thing is going on with Google search in Norway right now. Spammers are taking over.
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I tried to report scientific misconduct. How did it go?
This is the story of how I found what I believe to be scientific misconduct and what happened when I reported it. Science is supposed to b...
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Killing TurboTax
An API to compute the tax position in real time, reaching consumers via neobanks and challenger banks like Cash App, Chime and others.
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The All-Seeing “i”: Apple Just Declared War on Your Privacy
“Under His Eye,” she says. The right farewell. “Under His Eye,” I reply, and she gives a little nod.
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Plans you're not supposed to talk about
When does talking about a plan ruin it? Marriage, CO2, religion, self-promotion, edgelords, and Chinese medicine.
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Apps Getting Worse
Too often, a popular consumer app unexpectedly gets worse: Some combination of harder to use, missing features, and slower. At a time in history where software is significantly eating the world, this is nonsensical. It’s also damaging to the lives of the people who depend on these products.
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Overly analytical guide to escorting
The Overly Analytical Guide to Escorting
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On the Experience of Being Poor-Ish, for People Who Aren't
Meta-Note: I’m sorry it’s been so long between articles; for better or worse writing here is something that I do for fun, and sometimes work and family get in the way.
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Inside a viral website
Peeling back the curtain of running a viral meme website for 5 days. More details than you could ever hope for.
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Intuit sabotages the Child Tax Credit
When people call the US Supreme Court "corporate-friendly," it's often hard to know what that means in concrete terms. But here's an example of what it means when the highest court in the land is in the tank for big business.
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If it will matter after today, don't talk about it in a chat room
Live chat is for things that can get lost.