MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by miltonlost | 2025-04-06 18:51:36+00:00
Neither NYT nor the EU is wrong. Elon's companies are, to him, fungible, with employees able to be used in any company, like when Elon borrowed engineers employed at Tesla and SpaceX to work on Twitter when he bought it. These are all separate companies on paper, but Elon treats the workers as interchangeable. He acts as if they are all owned by him, so the EU is treating them as he treats them.
by mrandish | 2025-04-06 18:51:39+00:00
Sure but at least it shipped with an OS that had a GUI and multitasking in an era when the vast majority of personal computers had neither. Let's not forget how early this was. Any personal computer that shipped with a GUI OS at the time shipped it in a state that wasn't yet fully realized or completely documented. Everyone was still figuring out what a GUI OS should be. It wasn't until years later when Unix-based workstation OSes migrated down to consumer desktops that things started stabilizing. Before that we were pioneers roughing it on the frontier.

I had an Amiga 1000 and did hobby programming on it starting in 85. At the time everything friends and I wrote only used the OS to open a custom screen because all the fun was experimenting with graphics. Most of the apps for the first couple years either used the CLI or just put up a window with a few drop downs and otherwise rendered their own UX inside it.
by ChrisMarshallNY | 2025-04-06 18:52:10+00:00
HeathKit Programmable Calculator, circa 1974 or so.

Lots of messing around with things that go bang; Then, I attended a redneck tech school, where I learned Electronic Design, Machine Code and "microprocessors" (what they called CPUs, back then). That was around '82-'83.

All the rest has been seminars, OJT, and just plain ol' messing around at home.
by contact9879 | 2025-04-06 18:52:38+00:00
well, that would be up to Alex. but as that would require a pretty substantial organizational and responsibility shift, I imagine, no, he would not.

As it is now, Alex is editorially responsible for all output of Standard Ebooks. Changing that would require someone with the time and experience willing to take on all the responsibilities that Alex currently has for each of those other languages.
by bombela | 2025-04-06 18:53:28+00:00
I have been following rust very closely since 2013.

As Rust is both evolving and spreading wide, we; the programmers, users of Rust; are also leveling up in how we approach correctness and design with it.

Maybe the next evolution will be something like Haskell but fast like Rust is fast like C without the pain of C++.

But it takes a while for the world to catch up, and for everybody to explore and find ways to work with or around the abstractions that helps with correctness.

It's a bit like the evolution from a pointer to some malloc memory, then the shared/unique pointer of C++, to the fully safe box/(a)rc of Rust.

It might be obvious today how much more efficient it is programming with those abstractions.

I see some similarities with functional programming that still seems so niche. Even though the enlighteneds swears by it. And now we actually seem to be slowly merging the best parts of functional and imperative together somehow.

So maybe we are actually evolving programming as a species. And Rust happens to be one of the best scaffold at this point in history.

Thank you for reading my essay.
by sepositus | 2025-04-06 18:53:39+00:00
> it is true leadership and collaboration

This is a great outlook, but I think it's slightly short-sighted if you don't consider that there are several ways to achieve the same outcome outside of USAID. I think the US can lead the world through public example rather than trying to set that same example through the government.

For example, I treat my charitable donations with the same seriousness that I apply towards my 401k. I am researching organizations, determining their overall efficacy, and splitting my funds to where I think they would be the most beneficial, given the current global climate.

I would love to see this principle applied more broadly to the public. There might be services out there that already provide such "charity portfolios," but I'll admit that I'm pretty content doing it myself, so I haven't looked much. But, given our government's history of mismanagement, I think this sort of approach would have far more impact than funneling everything through a large organization like USAID.
by scarface_74 | 2025-04-06 18:53:55+00:00
Alternate anecdote:

Competence and being someone they want to work with again is usually enough.

I got my first remote job in 2020 working at the Professional Services (cloud consulting) department at AWS. When I saw the writing on the wall, every single customer I worked with remotely and maybe flew out to see once that had some type of opportunity was more than willing to give me either a permanent position at their company or at least a contract.

I met one of my coworkers in person maybe twice. He had left AWS a couple of months prior to be a director of infrastructure at a well known non tech F500. He said if I was interested, he would create a position for me to be over the cloud migration and infrastructure and that it would pay more in cash than I was making in cash + RSUs at AWS. I didn’t take him up on his offer just because I was over the big company thing.

When I posted on LinkedIn that I had gotten another job, I had three former coworkers who had moved on reach out to me and say why didn’t I let them know. They would have brought me on their companies. These were all decision makers who could push me through without too much hassle.

I had met most of these people in person maybe two or three times.

Unless my performance really craters at my current company where I work remotely where I’m a staff architect, I can almost guarantee that anyone I reach out to that has worked with me will be more than happy to give me a referral about my skillset and work ethic.
by shw1n | 2025-04-06 18:54:22+00:00
Hmm maybe I'm misunderstanding, but each red dot represents the average of a collection of views

The idea behind PG's article (as I understand it) is that "the left" and "right" have some degree of arbitrary positions they support, so the chances of any individual independently coming up a set of positions that perfectly matches is extremely low.

But individual positions could very well be scattered across the spectrum, some very left, some very right, but together would likely average out to near the middle
by theandrewbailey | 2025-04-06 18:54:43+00:00
> We’ll simply create a single class, d-js-required to indicate that JavaScript needs to be enabled for us to display this element.

You can run some JS to prove you're running JS. Can't you write in your site's CSS:

.d-js-required { display: none; }

and (in JS) remove that class on each element it's on?
by Symbiote | 2025-04-06 18:55:28+00:00
That looks like an "Apple tax".

The principle of the AUI port was that the three Ethernet connections (10Base5, 10Base2, 10BaseT) could all be used with a 'cheap' change of "MAU" adapter. For 10Base5, it would have been impractical to have the thick cable brought right up to the computer.

The 10Base5 MAU was relatively expensive, I see a card sold with it costing £50 more than the same card with a 10Base2 interface in a price list from 1993 [1].

I don't see a price for a 10BaseT interface alone, but it should be much cheaper — it's just a couple of low-pass filters and some isolation. Even back then I think these main components were sold as a single package ("chip"), so the 10BaseT MAU is two plugs, one "chip" and a couple of capacitors.

Anyway, Acorn¹ computers were sold from around 1991 with an optional Ethernet card. Basic TCP/IP was included in ROM on the card, and it works fine between my Linux and Acorn computers.

[1] https://chrisacorns.computinghistory.org.uk/docs/IntInt/II_P...

¹ Acorn as in "Acorn RISC Machine" → "Advanced RISC Machine" → the ARM chip in your phone.
by fatherzine | 2025-04-06 18:55:38+00:00
Long term median purchasing power, especially of essentials eg housing / food / energy / education, matters more to the health of a nation than the price of hitech on open global markets at a specific time instant. Furthermore, while the health and wealth of a nation are correlated, they are not the same. I wonder if there is a sensible way to prioritize health over wealth.
by corysama | 2025-04-06 18:56:33+00:00
My grandfather saw that computers were going to be important. So, he got me a Commodore64. Inflation adjusted, that was probably a $600 gift for an 8 year old. I tried copying the code from the magazines. But, it didn't click until that same grandfather sent me to a summer camp that was mostly sports, but also had a class in LOGO (TurtleDraw). Thanks, Grandpa!

In high school, the IT guy got bored and started a class teaching Pascal. The whole class timeshared a Linux 386 via amber Wyse terminals. He also had a follow-on class that taught C. But, his attitude was "If you made it through the first class and came back, you're cool. Here's a book on C and a compiler. Go make up your own assignments and I'll be busy teaching Pascal to the new kids over there." I've been programming C/C++ for over 25 years now. Thanks, IT Guy!
by paulsutter | 2025-04-06 18:56:51+00:00
Im able to get substantially more coding done than three months ago. This could be largely in the tooling (coding agents, deep research). But the models are better too, for both coding and brainstorming. And tooling counts, to me, as progress.

Learning to harness current tools helps to harness future tools. Work on projects that will benefit from advancements, but can succeed without them.
by happytoexplain | 2025-04-06 18:57:01+00:00
As much as we would like otherwise, law is a subjective tool. We implement objectivity as much as is feasible, e.g. using careful wording and precedent, but ultimately it would be a fool's errand to attempt to make it 100% objective/deterministic.

All this to say, we tend to oversimplify in our criticisms when more objectivity would have given us a result we agree with.

We tend to agree that we want laws to stop businesses from "tricking people". The specifics vary widely, but the goal itself is unavoidably subjective, so there will always be some subjectivity in its application.
by georgemcbay | 2025-04-06 18:57:14+00:00
As someone who was wildly disappointed with the hype around Claude 3.7, Gemini 2.5 is easily the best programmer-assistant LLM available, IMO.

But it still feels more like a small incremental improvement rather than a radical change, and I still feel its limitations constantly.

Like... it gives me the sort of decent but uninspired solution I would expect it to generate without predictably walking me through a bunch of obvious wrong turns as I repeatedly correct it as I would have to have done with earlier models.

And that's certainly not nothing and makes the experience of using it much nicer, but I'm still going to roll my eyes anytime someone suggests that LLMs are the clear path to imminently available AGI.
by lucianbr | 2025-04-06 18:57:48+00:00
The computer isn't saying anything. It does not think or have agency. It just replicates what people might say in a context. And people might say what you put in quotes, without it being hilariously inappropriate.

Of course if you tink of the computer as a person you get strange results. A compiler error isn't the compiler telling me anything. It's the compiler writer telling me something. So a compiler error might contain a joke, and the joke might make sense, although obviously computers and compilers don't have a sense of humour.
by happymellon | 2025-04-06 18:58:32+00:00
And how many of these "game" services don't work with controllers.

For fucks sake, what decade is it?

I especially hate games that work 99% on Steam, but have a 1% issue with them requiring cookie banner dismissal (fuck you Rockstar) even after dealing with the logins.

Steam is just so much better than everyone else that they can have a cut of Rockstar and Electronic Arts money.
by JumpCrisscross | 2025-04-06 18:58:40+00:00
> "Heterodox" is a term of art in economics, it doesn't mean what "heterodox" means in English

Seriously, where are you getting this?

The first consequential word in the article! It’s literally a link to an article about heterodox economics [1]!

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heterodox_economics
by photochemsyn | 2025-04-06 18:58:51+00:00
Will LLMs end up like compilers? Compilers are also fundamentally important to modern industrial civilization - but they're not profit centers, they're mostly free and open-source outside a few niche areas. Knowing how to use a compiler effectively to write secure and performative software is still a valuable skill - and LLMs are a valuable tool that can help with that process, especially if the programmer is on the steep end of the learning curve - but it doesn't look like anything short of real AGI can do novel software creation without a human constantly in the loop. The same argument applies to new fundamental research, even to reviewing and analyzing new discoveries that aren't in the training corpus.

Wasn't it back in the 1980s that you had to pay $1000s for a good compiler? The entire LLM industry might just be following in the compiler's footsteps.
by mikrotikker | 2025-04-06 18:59:27+00:00
I think that Russia was omitted to give something to use in the peace talks alongside the secondary sanctions that have been threatened. Regardless there should be zero trade happening with Russia because of the sanctions so why would tarriffs make sense.

I also feel that this is a ripping the band aid off approach to destroying globalism. The Biden administration was already toning down the globalism of Peter Ziehan was correct, as we saw with their tepid responses to the red sea fiasco but now Trump has upped the attacks on the houthis too so I'm not quite sure what to think.
by MrMcCall | 2025-04-06 18:59:38+00:00
> a charlatan is a person who invents what they insist is a truth and then labels all who do not believe as fools.

I completely agree, but the truth is that I am not a charlatan, nor am I a liar. A charlatan does his dirty deeds in hopes of some wrongful gain at the expense of others. My efforts here benefit me without negative effect for anyone else. That is a key indicator of a person acting solely on behalf of Love.

You are free to believe that that which you already believe is the truth, or you can learn some new truths that expand your consciousness. I am just here to plant seeds, and it makes me happy and at peace to do so.

I really don't care what you do, for only you are responsible for your choices, not me. I love you anyway, and, while I have recommendations for you that would improve your life's happiness and that of those around you, I have no ill feelings toward anyone here about how they treat me. I, unlike Boltzmann, am only responsible to the truth of love and the love of truth, not to naysayers who have yet to accept greater truths than they currently comprehend. I was once in the same situation, if not more ignorant.

As with all things human, the choice is ours, each of us, utterly freely, but within a sublime system of cause and effect that is relentlessly impersonal.

Peace be with you.
by roskelld | 2025-04-06 18:59:41+00:00
Specialization I presume, so one produces the metadata that can be consumed by another.

Also, the thing from the above post that stood out to me would be to act as a reminder for the reader. Not so much the location and emotion, but the character data. I've often found myself wondering who the character is that's appeared in a scene, forgetting that they previously appeared earlier.
by dionidium | 2025-04-06 19:00:04+00:00
In the United States we have a long, foundational legal tradition in support of Free Speech and free enterprise for this very reason.

The bar is set very high precisely because we know where things go when it's not.

This specific case wouldn't clear a low bar, much less a high one. I, too, have been turned off by Musk's behavior over the last year, but the idea that this case has nothing to do with that is risible.
by kowabungalow | 2025-04-06 19:00:14+00:00
Federal agencies suggesting easy to enact laws that should be affected by both parties is a strange bogeyman to have when you actually have private companies dictating legislation with a BS cash as speech argument and federal storm troopers illegally acting within the jurisdiction of states. Why are the republicans so afraid of agencies with no teeth and all for federal agencies that could really illegally enter their state and kidnap them?

(I think this is the end of the thread so I will answer you question here.. You have always had perfectly reasonable local options if the FDA code has something you disagree with, because everything is a partnership with your local government, you have absolutely no power to stop a group like the CBP from illegal road stops in your state because your State would have to start succeeding. Therefore, I find the republican claims of priorities as hypocritical as democrats given indifference appearing where it would matter if the priorities were real.)
by microtonal | 2025-04-06 19:00:36+00:00
with special treatment for rivals like the EU

Until three months ago we were also strong allies. But there has been nothing but contempt from the current administration towards the EU and Europe.

That said, the EU usually prepares these cases very meticulously. As the article says, they already started in 2023 and issued a preliminary ruling last year. Also, it seems like the issue can still be settled without a fine:

The European Union and X could still reach a settlement if the company agrees to changes that satisfy regulators’ concerns, the officials said.

That said, it's likely that there have been many deliberations about this and other fines (e.g. Apple) and there were rumors that the EU was going to play softer to appease Trump. But I guess Vance's speech at the NATO conference, the disdain for Europe in the leaked Signal chats (which was completely misplaced because Houthis are attacking vessels as a revenge for Israel's attack on Palestine), and then the high tariffs on EU exports (where Trump only takes into account goods and not services) made the EU decide to show teeth instead.

IMO in the end it's the best thing to do, worst thing is to appear weak with these bullies (apparently Trump called Jean-Claude Juncker 'a brutal killer').
by badlucklottery | 2025-04-06 19:00:59+00:00
I think every major console already has software calibration. IIRC PS5 likes to hide calibration inside each game vs. having it system wide like other systems.

Unfortunately, recalibration only "fixes" minor stick drift and, due to how the sticks wear, drift tends to go from "minor" to "major" really quickly.

The issue is that the stick will eventually report an increasingly unpredictable position. So it's not an issue of it predictably reporting (-1, -5) at rest, it's more like random values from -5 to 5 in both axes. This also affects the direction when actually pressing the stick so pushing the stick "north" may cause you to move N, NNW, _or_ NNE and unpredictably so.
by 1vuio0pswjnm7 | 2025-04-06 19:01:07+00:00
"What if we banned all advertising?"

This sounds like someone who was born intoo an era of internet advertising. As opposed to someone who has been expoosed to adevrtising over many forms of media, the internet being only a recent addition.

The early internet had no advertising. Commercial use of the computer network against the rules.

The web-based companies comprising "Big Tech", while they dominate today's internet by acting as allegedly "necessary" intermediaries and conducting surveillance, appear to have no viable business model to stay "big" in this scenario: where the computer network does not allow advertising, let alone commercial use.

Thus, the question "What if we banned all advertising" sounds extreme, unrealistic, the product of myopia, all-or-nothing thinking. Advertising will always be "legal". But historically man has regulated where it can be disseminated/placed.

A more interesting question might be "What if we had a computer network where advertising was prohibited or limited". About 35 years ago we did. Then the rules against commercial use were removed. Now people are complaining. People who never used the network in the time before advertising was allowed.

Imagine what it would be like to have a computer network without advertising using the computer and networking technology we have today.

Maybe this network could be built on top of the internet, as an overlay.

Make no mistake, there will always be computer internetworks that allow advertising. But the first ones didn't. And there could be ones in the future that don't.
by jonahx | 2025-04-06 19:01:29+00:00
My personal experience is right in line with the author's.

Also:

> I think what's going on is that large language models are trained to "sound smart" in a live conversation with users, and so they prefer to highlight possible problems instead of confirming that the code looks fine, just like human beings do when they want to sound smart.

I immediately thought: That's because in most situations this is the purpose of language, at least partially, and LLMs are trained on language.
by the_mitsuhiko | 2025-04-06 19:01:33+00:00
There is an weird tradition of putting random art into the middle of roundabouts in the German speaking world. There is even an Austrian rapper who made a song about an artist unveiling his creation in the middle of a local roundabout [1].

If you look for "Kunst im Kreisverkehr" you can find all kinds of weird cases of the years.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MSTWMx-b8Y
by bruce511 | 2025-04-06 19:01:37+00:00
Who's your target market here? People who want to donate or people who want to receive donations?

Is this a business or a hobby? Ie do you expect it to get revenue? Or are you just doing it to pass the time until something more interesting comes along? (Both are OK, but it helps to know.)

If a business where do you expect your revenue to come from? Separate donations? A commission on donations?
by bastard_op | 2025-04-06 19:01:48+00:00
> 0 - I haven’t visited SF since early 2020. On that trip, my hotel was near the Tenderloin and things were pretty rough vis-a-vis public intoxication, indecent exposure, homelessness, etc.

That was my same opinion of SF when I lived in the bay area for 2 years in '99. Moving there, I first went into SF as tourists mostly do, and it was a filthy, nasty place then coming from Phoenix Arizona, after avoiding going anywhere close to downtown SF again, and moving back to Phoenix 2 years later.

I can only imagine (or read, daily) how much worse it is now. Why anyone stays is beyond me.
by jagged-chisel | 2025-04-06 19:01:53+00:00
Mom was a COBOL programmer. She saw the direction things were headed with computing. The family got an Apple //c for Christmas in 1984. In the spring, she enrolled me in a six week one night a week course for computer programming at the local high school. We learned BASIC on Apple ][ e.

I took the knowledge and ran with it. Didn’t take long to want more, found a game programming book using assembly - but since I didn’t have an assembler, I entered machine code directly. That kept be engaged for years.