4681
Punch yourself in the face with reality
Who can punch themselves in the face with reality the most? This is who will win in the age of AI.
Topics /
Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 13,064 posts.
4682
No longer loving Google
I stopped working at Google in 2006 but I only stopped loving it this month. I’ve frequently defended the company in public, explaining unpopular actions from what I imagine their side is. Google has often been in the right but the company is terrible at explaining itself. I felt with my understanding of the company I…
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Communities are not fungible
Why we can’t go home again
4685
Santa Claus Confirms NSA Attack on Naughty or Nice Database
A press conference was organised this morning on behalf of Mr Santa Claus. At the conference, a spokes–elf confirmed that there had been repeated attempts to hack the “naughty or nice (NON)” database. The NON-database was thought to be used by Mr Claus to keep records of young inhabitants of planet earth, in order to…
4686
Sleepwalking into censorship
The essential detail is that they will assume you want filters enabled across a wide range of content, and unless you un-tick the option, network filters will be enabled.
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The advertising cartel coming to your web browser
The three companies (along with Mozilla, which is on one of their “ad features in the browser” kicks again) are drawing up a built-in advertising measurement system, called Attribution Level 1 , as a standard feature of web browsers. The system is intended to measure the effectiveness of advertising by enabling…
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4690
We need a GitHub of Science
Publishing is central to Academia, but its publishing system is outclassed by what Open Source software developers have in GitHub
4691
MIT professor's hack to recruit students
The Library Innovation Lab is growing knowledge and community by bringing library principles to technological frontiers.
4692
Release of the Full TPP Text Confirms Threats to Users’ Rights
Update [11/9/2015]: President Obama formally notified Congress of his intent to sign the TPP on Thursday November 5—90 days after which he may sign the agreement and send the agreement to Congress for ratification. Trade offices involved in negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement...
4693
Grief and the AI split
TL;DR: AI-assisted coding is revealing a split among developers that was always there but invisible when we all worked the same way. I've felt the grief too—but mine resolved differently than I expected, and I think that says something about what kind of developer I've been all along.
4694
No, you couldn't have made more money than the Twitter hacker
Analysis of various approaches to monetizing the Twitter hack
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Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice (2014)
Robert O'Callahan. Christian. Kiwi. Software guy. All content human-authored unless otherwise noted.
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The great blogging collapse: What happened to 100 successful blogs?
A 4-year study of 100 successful blogs reveals how Google's updates and AI transformed blogging. See which sites survived and which disappeared.
4699
Is Apple checking images we view in the Finder?
Can it be true that Apple is sent information about every image we browse in the Finder? Analysis of Visual Look Up and Live Text and when it happens.
4700
You must read at least one book to ride
The first is going to sound bad in a culture where engineers are encouraged to apologize for existing while it is totally acceptable for a grifter that can't code to insist that they're a "thought leader". It is that, in my immediate professional environment, I am consistently acknowledged to be one of the best…
4701
Verification Is Not Knowledge: Science needs more than answers
Science needs more than answers
4702
Stop Killing Games: It's time to sue Sony, join us
Heb jij een PlayStation? Dan betaal je onterecht een Sony Tax op al je digitale games. Stichting Massaschade & Consument voert collectieve actie voor een Fair PlayStation.
4703
Microsoft Office is using an artificially complex XML schema as a lock-in tool
A document format is a tool for sharing knowledge and, as such, should be as simple and accessible as possible in relation to the complexity of the document content itself. This remains true even when the format is based on an XML schema that is hidden from users when the document is displayed on screen…
4704
Generative AI and Wikipedia editing: What we learned in 2025
Like many organizations, Wiki Education has grappled with generative AI, its impacts, opportunities, and threats, for several years. As an organization that runs large-scale programs to bring new e…
4705
The demo scene is dying, but that's alright
The demo scene was recently proclaimed a UNESCO Living Cultural Heritage in Sweden, following several other European nations. As a scener, I'm not quite sure how I feel about that. It's amusing on some level, there's maybe even a bit of pride involved, but also fear that it might bring unwanted attention to a Good…
4706
What, Me Worry? The Art and Humor of Mad Magazine
What, Me Worry? The Art and Humor of MAD Magazine This exhibition explores the unforgettable art and satire of MAD, from its beginnings in 1952 as a popular humor comic book to its emergence as a beloved magazine that spoke truth to power and attracted generations of devoted readers
4707
Why NSA Surveillance Scares Me
Nothing To Hide explains why you should care about surveillance even though you have nothing to hide. But it missed the point that most con...
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Freenode IRC operators now engaging in routine abuses of power
There have been several allegations of this since the handover of the Freenode infrastructure to its new custodians, but I can now provide a first-hand account of one incident — because I am the victim of it.
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No Matter What the FBI Says, Compromising Encryption Is a Technical Issue
What does the FBI want when it comes to the encryption “debate”? At an oversight hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, FBI Director James Comey offered what he called the “good news” that it’s not a debate at all. In fact, he said, government and the tech industry all want the same...