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The fuck off contact page
How to get people to NOT contact you
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Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 13,064 posts.
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Millions are visiting the European Alternatives site. What trends are we seeing?
Millions are exploring European alternatives for privacy-friendly tech. Which are the top categories, top tools, and the global demand driving this shift.
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I hate telephones
I hate telephones. Some rational reasons: lack of authentication, no spam filtering, forced synchronous communication. But also just a visceral fear.
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Dear Dr. Stallman: An Open Letter
Dear Dr. Stallman, Thank you for coming to Penn and giving a talk on A Free Digital Society; it was an honor meeting you. You mentioned that what you expected of us was to help the Free Software Foundation however we could; I'd like to take you up on that and offer both yourself and the FSF the following advice: Stop…
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Nobel Peace Prize for 2026 to Navanethem Pillay
The Nobel Peace Prize 2026 was awarded to Navanethem Pillay "for her efforts to promote peace and international law"
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Taiwan's digital minister on combatting disinformation without censorship
Audrey Tang prefers precise language. During an interview, Taiwan's minister without portfolio - Tang's name card simply says "digital minister" - makes a swift correction when we mention the term "fake news." The preferred term is "disinformation" because, Tang says, it has a legal definition in Taiwan: "That is to…
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How America's universities became debt factories
This essay first appeared in my newsletter. Sign up here if interested in F'ing up the status quo and fixing education. Here's a puzzle: how do you create a trillion-dollar debt bubble that can't be popped? Answer: make student loans non-dischargeable in bankruptcy. Now, here's a trickier one: how do you fix this mess…
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There is a shadow hanging over this Fable thing
Man, I was just trying to relax and (have my agent) code on a Friday
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Patreon Lays off 17% of Staff
A note from Jack about the recent layoff and what went into the decision.
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GDPR enforcer rules that IAB Europe’s consent popups are unlawful
EU data protection authorities find that the consent popups that plagued Europeans for years are illegal. All data collected through them must be deleted. This decision impacts Google’s, Amazon’s and Microsoft’s online advertising businesses.
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macOS Golden Gate Is a Buggy Mess
In June 2008 Apple announced Mac OS X Snow Leopard, proudly boasting that it would have "no new features". Instead of piling on new things, Snow Leopard aimed to build on the success of its predecessor, Leopard, opting to focus on under-the-hood performance and stability improvements throughout the system.
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People don't work as much as they say
There is a persistent idea that people work 40 hours a week. They don't, and if you try to do this it will break you. Here are some more reasonable guidelines.
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Potential organized fraud in ACM/IEEE computer architecture conferences
Many of you are likely to have seen the post by Huixiang’s Voice on Medium showing that Huixiang Chen’s laptop contained downloads of most…
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Will Spotify Ruin Podcasting?
Hi, Welcome to BIG, a newsletter about the politics of monopoly.
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Mendon, Missouri
Mendon, Missouri. Population 171. There’s really nothing here. The tiny town is located off Route 11, just south of Yellow Creek. You’re three hours west of Saint Louis, two hours […]
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Anatomy of a Moral Panic
On September 18, the British Channel 4 ran a news segment with the headline, 'Potentially deadly bomb ingredients are ‘frequently bought together’ on Amazon.'
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China collecting Apple iCloud data
Fighting censorship with technology since 2011. We use AI to monitor censorship and expand free speech worldwide.
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Elon Musk Just Gave Europe a Reason to Replace American Technology
I’ve been in London for the last month and have heard policymakers react to the wake up call Elon Musk just delivered. The decision of the U.S. to shut off intelligence and throttle the military v…
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US boy names that became girl names and vice versa
Explore 125 baby names that shifted between boys and girls, from Leslie to Ashley. See how each one’s split between boys and girls changed from 1936 to 2025.
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The Eternal Sloptember
I’m calling it now, the adoption of AI agents into software development will be one of the most costly mistakes in the field’s history. Agents cannot program, and it’s taking longer and longer to realize that they can’t. They are a highly sophisticated statistical model designed to mimic the distribution of…
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Embezzlers Are Nice People (2017)
We spend a lot of time suing embezzlers. All over the world. Week in and week out. Big embezzlers, small embezzlers, smart embezzlers and very smart embezzlers… That’s right, no dumb embezzlers because almost all the embezzlers we encounter are smart. Some are very smart. Some are brilliant. And, almost always, most…
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2014 Gates Annual Letter: Myths that block progress for the poor
Annual letters from the Gates Foundation.
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Six companies control 90% of what you read, watch, and hear
Six companies control 90% of what you read, watch, and hear. Here's why that's dangerous.
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Google collects metadata from Android phones
[German]It seems that Google has established a surveillance function for Android phones. They are claiming the right, to collect and store meta data from incoming/outgoing phone calls and SMS from…
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