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Pollution from tire wear is worse than exhaust emissions?
Pollution from tyre wear can be 1,000 times worse than what comes out of a car’s exhaust, Emissions Analytics has found.
Topics /
Society, Policy & Culture
The most popular blog posts about society, policy & culture on Hacker News. 13,064 posts.
2132
As Feds Demand the Keys, Preparing for the Death of Public-Key Encryption
With further confirmation of the longstanding rumor that the U.S. government (and, we can safely assume, other governments around the world) have been pressuring major Internet firms to provide their "master" SSL keys for government surveillance purposes, we are rapidly approaching a critical technological crossroad.
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Personal data storage is an idea whose time has come
Data Ownership as a conversation changes when data resides primarily with people-governed institutions rather than corporations.
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The 0.5 MB of nothing in all Apple Music files (2020)
Six percentage of each music files you’ve bought from Apple Music (iTunes Store) contain, literally, nothing. Why is Apple padding their music with zero-bytes?
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Dear EU: Please Don't Ruin the Root
I love Europe, and I want to see the European Union succeed. I also love the Internet, and I want to see it thrive as well. And it therefore pains me that it now appears that the European Union might inadvertently be picking an ugly fight with “The Internet”. UPDATE: I am EXCEPTIONALLY happy to report that through…
2140
How The Chronicle is trying to malign Sci-Hub
A new article was published in The Chronicle about me running Sci-Hub, a project dedicated to providing free access to academic journals all over the world. Their goal is to present Sci-Hub and its…
2141
Wikileaks: Something is up
Sounds like the people behind Wikileaks are under some pressure. Since this is unlikely to turn up in your newspapers, I post it here to spread awareness. Wikileaks has a mission of bringing hidden information to light, when it's in the public interest. Wikipedia outlines their greatest hits, including Gauntanamo Bay…
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Housing in the Bay Area
Jerry Brown has proposed legislation that would allow a lot more housing to be built in the Bay Area, and hopefully significantly reduce the cost of housing here. More supply should lead to lower...
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US Border Patrol says they can create central repository of traveler emails
The U.S. government has taken the opportunity during the global pandemic, when people aren't traveling out of the country much, to roll out a new platform for storing information they believe they are entitled to take from people crossing the border. A new filing reveals how the U.S. Border Patrol will store data from…
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No Refrigerant Left Behind
We have a plan to prevent 2 billion tons CO2e in the next 10 years by collecting and destroying superpotent refrigerants.
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Another scientific body has debunked bitemark analysis
Even in the face of overwhelming evidence, the criminal legal system is incapable of admitting its mistakes
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Internet Archive responds to recording industry lawsuit targeting obsolete media
Late Friday, some of the world’s largest record labels, including Sony and Universal Music Group, filed a lawsuit against the Internet Archive and others for the Great 78 Project, a community effort for the preservation, research and discovery of 78 rpm records that are 70 to 120 years old. As a non-profit library, we…
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Our fundamental right to shame and shun the New York Times
What the NYT Cancel Culture Editorial Got Wrong, And What It Got Right
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Google Search Is Dying (2022)
(There is good discussion on this article on Hacker News and Reddit)
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Deterioration of local community a major driver of loss of play-based childhood
Kids growing up in close-knit communities where the social ties are thick are more protected from the harms of the phone-based childhood.
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Will vibe coding end like the maker movement?
Is your vibe-coded app a Crapject or a Gift?
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“AI promised to revolutionize radiology but so far its failing”
Geoffrey Hinton is a legendary computer scientist . . . Naturally, people paid attention when Hinton declared in 2016, “We should stop training radiologists now, it’s just completely obvious within five years deep learning is going to do better than radiologists.” The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the…
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Physical attractiveness bias in the legal system (2017)
[Download for PDF/printable version of this article] When I started looking into this subject, I predicted a person’s physical attractiveness would only have minor advantages. I was wrong. In fact, I was so wrong, that in one study, the effects of physical attractiveness on judges were so influ
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The Tyranny of Spreadsheets
Early last October my phone rang. On the line was a researcher calling from Today, the BBC’s agenda-setting morning radio programme. She told me that something strange had happened, and she hoped I…
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The best response to AI slop and online noise is from Robin Williams
There's a moment in the movie Good Will Hunting which perfectly summarizes all the problems with AI slop and online noise and infinite advice content. Sean (played by Robin Williams) is sitting next to Will (Matt Damon) on a bench in Boston Public Garden. I live here, so I know it well. The area
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An appeal to Apple from Anukari
macOS GPU clock heuristics don't recognize real-time audio work, and my spin loop workaround fails on Pro and Max chips. I need the Metal team's help.
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The Man Who Smuggles Trader Joe’s into Canada
Michael "Pirate Joe" Hallatt and his unmarked white van are Canada's number-one supplier of Trader Joe's items. And, so far, Trader Joe's hasn't been able to stop him.
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I wrote a small piece on planned death
Kind people already sent donations that will make my childrens' lives easier, when I'm not there any more. Thank you enormously! :-)