MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by benchly | 2025-08-21 09:14:53+00:00
I should have specified that I worked LP in the early 2000's but I doubt much has changed, since bigotry and racism do not seem to ever go away, especially when it's woven into the fabric of an institution.

Lasted a mere 6 months at that job before I decided I could no longer turn a blind eye, since by then it had become clear to me that the problem was not isolated to just a few LP associates.
by GJim | 2025-08-21 09:15:11+00:00
> So TikTok

Is a video sharing platform.

> rarely post about their social life

Note your correct use of the word rarely and consider my comment about crossover.

> Twitter

Xitter is a 'micro' blogging site.

> most people don't post about their social life

Again, note your observation of the most common uses of that platform and consider my comment about crossover.
by Cordiali | 2025-08-21 09:16:00+00:00
>Normally tariffs are collected by the receiving country when a package arrives.

For good reason too, the sender engaged the carrier. The receiver has no business relationship with the carrier, so they don't have an opportunity to pay any tariff to the carrier.

This is especially relevant when the carrier engages a local contractor for the last leg of a delivery, because they don't even have a presence there.
by rob_c | 2025-08-21 09:18:03+00:00
The argument doesn't quite hold. The mass scraping (for training) is almost never doing by a GPU system it's almost always done by a dedicated system running a full chrome fork in some automated way (not just the signatures but some bugs give that away).

And frankly processing a single page of text is run within a single token window so likely is run for a blink (ms) before moving onto the next data entry. The kicker is it's run over potentially thousands of times depending on your training strategy.

At inference there's now a dedicated tool that may perform a "live" request to scrape the site contents. But then this is just pushed into a massive context window to give the next token anyway.
by jibal | 2025-08-21 09:19:13+00:00
If I weren't already well familiar with the diverse critic reviews on RT, claims that the critics are "woke" (or equivalently, have a "Californian" "political agenda" that "overrates" movies with a message) would be reason for me to value their views over self-selecting "audience" reviews, which I find to be mostly shallow and uninformed, and with a good dose of provincial bigotry as part of the "political balance". I personally am not looking for "political balance", certainly not as that currently manifests itself in the U.S.

And if paid critics are no stranger to lobbies (or the movie industry as a massive sector with lobbies ... it's a bit hard to parse), I see no particular reason to expect them to have a political agenda that overrates movies with a message--I don't think those are the ones that make big bucks for the massive sector. (I'm more interested in indie fare, or at least stuff with more character and depth and less CGI and juvenile superheroes vs. supervillains.) Much more likely is that this spew reflects a political agenda.
by ath3nd | 2025-08-21 09:19:39+00:00
Are yahoo also a social media creation?

Cause they are now saying some similar stuff to what Ed has been saying. We'll, fun times for LLM enthusiasts. Can't wait for the inevitable enshittification of Claude, Cursor and all the others while they crank up the prices and put ads everywhere while failing to become profitable.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tech-chip-stock-sell-off-cont...
by sethaurus | 2025-08-21 09:20:51+00:00
One really nice thing about using LLMs as components is that they just generate text. We've taught them to sometimes issue JSON messages representing a structured query or command, but it still comes out of the thing as text; the model doesn't have any IO or state of its own. Then the actual program can then decide what, if anything, to do with that structured request.

I don't like the gradual reframing of the model itself as being in charge of the tools, aided by a framework that executes whatever the model pumps out. It's not good to abstract away the connection between the text-generator and the actual volatile IO of your program.
by pjc50 | 2025-08-21 09:21:28+00:00
My wife has been working on translation recently, and the LLM hit rate for novels is highly variable. It's capable of just dropping out entire paragraphs. You still need a final pass from a human native speaker editor to check that it makes sense. Which is what's happening in this article, the news site cares enough about their brand and quality to check the output.

I agree that bidirectional communication is probably going to work a lot better, because people are more likely to be alert to the possibility of translation issues and can confirm understanding interactively.
by motorest | 2025-08-21 09:22:00+00:00
> I do not and I have explained it.

You should review the sources of your confusions and personal misconceptions, as you deny design and then proceed to admit there is design.

> And part of my previous comment is that this "waterfall-y" approach in which you design first and implement second does not work and has never worked.

Nonsense. "Big design upfront" works, but is suboptimal in software development. That's why it's not used.

"Big design upfront" approaches are costly as it requires know-how and expertise to pull off, which most teams lack, and it assumes requirements don't change, which is never the case.

Once you acknowledge that requirements will change and new requirements will emerge, you start to think of strategies to accommodate them. In software development, unlike in any hard engineering field, the primary resource consumed is man-hours. This means that, unlike in hard engineering fields, a software development process can go through total rebuilds without jeopardizing their success. Therefore in software development there is less pressure to get every detail right at the start, and thus designs can be reviewed and implementations can be redone with minimal impact.

> Exactly, and not only that but usually requirements will also change along the way. The design can change and will change as you hit reality and learn while writing actual, working code.

Yes.

But you do need a design upfront, before code is written. Design means "know what you need to do". You need to have that in place to create tickets and allocate effort. It makes no sense at all to claim that writing code is the design stage. Only in amateur pet projects this is the case.
by Dylan16807 | 2025-08-21 09:23:20+00:00
Well none of those are on par with a Ferrari expense except sometimes the camera. I wasn't asking for ways a specific feature could cost a bit more than the laptop version. Yeah I can come up with those myself, and many of them cut both ways like screens and durability.

And the comparison wasn't all phones and computers, it's phones like the pixel versus a decent baseline computer.
by sschueller | 2025-08-21 09:23:23+00:00
Did you know Switzerland has a free trade agreement with China? We have the same strict/very similar strict rules as the EU does.

In Switzerland if you import dangerous junk and sell it in your store, you are liable. Of course the end consumer can also directly purchase from China as well but then it is their responsibility (Eigenverantwortung).

Customs will also confiscate fake brands and for example radios that violate frequencies rules (unless you can provide documents that you are allowed to operate such a device, ham radio license etc.)
by pilingual | 2025-08-21 09:23:37+00:00
Don't people dodge these cameras?

When I used a credit card at home depot self checkout I was asked if I wanted to have the receipt sent to a specific email address I entered previously online. Creepy. So I started using cash only.

Last year I went to get some low voltage wire. I walked for several aisles in both directions to find someone to open the cage. Not a soul. So I reached behind the cage and pulled it out, went to self checkout, began paying with cash. The machine said it couldn't issue change and to see an associate. Seemed odd as it was early in the day. Associate casually went to another register and got me change. When I went to my car (parked far away of course) there was a police car hanging out right next to it. Nothing further happened, but all too coincidental.

I discovered a smaller local hardware store and go there. The employees constantly ask you if you need help which is the complete opposite of home depot.

Under no circumstance will I shop at Home Depot again.

(And, today I drove by that HD and noticed they installed multiple ALPR.)
by blub | 2025-08-21 09:23:55+00:00
China has very many start-ups and one man shows shipping utter junk. Germany and the US are not even in the same league. The companies in those countries tend to follow the local laws because they know there are consequences.

Good luck getting compensation when that product from AJDHJk sets your house on fire or makes you sick.

In consumer products, the German and US brands do indeed manufacture in China, but then do their QC and supervision to get to an acceptable level.

You can see how this goes wrong with Anker’s recent recall, where they got blindsided by their supplier and now have to do a recall because their portable batteries can cause fires.
by roenxi | 2025-08-21 09:24:08+00:00
This looks like a cheatsheet for writing a hard-to-read Python script. I don't know who gets karmic brownie points for a f"{string:>20}" field, but under most normal cases it'd be better to use rjust() directly and not force people to remember Yet Another DSL.

Once a reader could be reasonably expected to consult reference material while working out what a print() is doing something has gone wrong. This is the programmer equivalent of wearing too much makeup.
by bazmattaz | 2025-08-21 09:24:59+00:00
Yes I was going to say something similar. I often use a blend on IMDb score and rotten tomatoes to judge whether I should watch a movie.

The only thing I will say is that IMDB scores are also (likely) gamed by movie studios to artificially inflate their scores. You also need to be careful with certain genres and series on IMDB that attract positive ratings from the archetypal IMDB user. This is why marvel movies and such receive such sky high ratings.

Basically if the movie is not a mainstream superhero type blockbuster full of cgi you can use the IMDB score if your judgement
by pwnSh | 2025-08-21 09:25:47+00:00
Hi HN, I'm excited to share a project I've been working on called PropPhoto. It's a marketplace designed to connect real estate agents with professional photographers.

The Problem

Anyone who has sold a property knows that great photos are non-negotiable. However, the process of finding and booking a good photographer is stuck in the past. It's a mess of manual Google searches, back-and-forth emails about pricing and availability, and inconsistent quality. Most national platforms are just generic booking systems. you don't even know which photographer you're going to get.

For photographers, it's a constant hustle to find clients, especially when starting out. They spend more time on marketing and admin than on their actual craft.

Our Solution

PropPhoto is a two-sided marketplace that modernizes this process:

For Agents: You can discover local photographers, see their unique portfolios and styles, view transparent pricing, and book them in just a few clicks. No more mystery photographers or scheduling headaches.

For Photographers: We give you the tools to showcase your work, manage bookings, handle payments, and deliver assets securely. This lets you focus on what you do best—taking amazing photos.

One of our key differentiators is our focus on photographer identity. We believe agents should know exactly who they are hiring.

Tech Stack The platform is built with Nuxt 3, and we use Supabase for the backend, database, and auth. The UI is built with Tailwind CSS and Shadcn UI.

This is just getting started and would love to get feedback from the Hacker News community on the idea, the platform, and any suggestions you might have.
by xiangyu9 | 2025-08-21 09:26:20+00:00
"The Grow A Garden Calculator (GAG Calculator) is your ultimate tool for maximizing plant values in the popular garden simulation game. This advanced calculator helps you understand the complex grow a garden base value system and master the intricate grow a garden mutations mechanics that can dramatically increase your plant's worth. With our comprehensive Grow A Garden Calculator (GAG Calculator), you can explore over 120 different plants, each with unique base values and growth characteristics. The calculator automatically handles the complex mutation system, including 43 different mutations that can be combined in various ways to create powerful value multipliers. Understanding grow a garden base value is crucial for success in the game. Each plant has a fundamental value that serves as the foundation for all calculations. Our Grow A Garden Calculator (GAG Calculator) shows you exactly how this base value interacts with mutations, weight adjustments, and friend boosts to determine your final plant value. The grow a garden mutations system is where the real strategy comes into play. Different mutations can multiply your plant's value by various factors, but they also have complex interaction rules. Some mutations are mutually exclusive, while others can be combined for even greater effects. Our calculator automatically resolves these conflicts and shows you the optimal combinations."
by pjc50 | 2025-08-21 09:28:11+00:00
Paradoxically, the problem with an "alternative net" (which could be tunneled over the regular one) is keeping it alternative. It has to be kept small and un-influential in order to stay under the radar. If you end up with an "alternative" which is used by journalists and politicians, you've just reinvented the mainstream, and you're no longer safe from being hit by a policy response.

Think private trackers. The opposite of 4chan, which is an "alternative" that got too influential in setting the tone of the rest of the internet.
by dale_glass | 2025-08-21 09:28:47+00:00
How is it going to hurt those?

If it's an actual botnet, then it's hijacked computers belonging to other people, who are the ones paying the power bills. The attacker doesn't care that each computer takes a long time to calculate. If you have 1000 computers each spending 5s/page, then your botnet can retrieve 200 pages/s.

If it's just a cloud deployment, still it has resources that vastly outstrip a normal person's.

The fundamental issue is that you can't serve example.com slower than a legitimate user on a crappy 10 year old laptop could tolerate, because that starts losing you real human users. So if let's say say user is happy to wait 5 seconds per page at most, then this is absolutely no obstacle to a modern 128 core Epyc. If you make it troublesome to the 128 core monster, then no normal person will find the site usable.
by robertlagrant | 2025-08-21 09:29:08+00:00
Doctors keep patient notes, and EHRs and patients can recall histories separately to that doctor. Doctors also go through relatively standardised training. That single individual is important, but it's not the same.

What's more the same would be if they were practicing healthcare on a species that they had invented, and no one knew anything about it, and the species was crucial to a company's survival.
by Tmpod | 2025-08-21 09:30:01+00:00
I run a service under the protection of go-away[0], which is similar to Anubis, and can attest it works very well, still. Went from constant outages due to ridiculous volumes of requests to good load times for real users and no bad crawlers coming through.

[0]: https://git.gammaspectra.live/git/go-away
by thecupisblue | 2025-08-21 09:30:12+00:00
Technically yes, and I've caught myself in a bit of a paradoxal conundrum :)

Think there is a curve of "reason" to apply when someone is advocating something like this, especially about technology and abstractions.

While in most places adding abstractions to core technology makes sense since "it makes it easier to use/manage/deploy" and it is reasonable to use it, LLM's are a quite different case than usual.

Because usually going downstream makes it harder (i.e. going 100% assembly or 100% JS is a harder thing), but going 100% pure LLM is an easier thing - you don't have to learn new frameworks, no need to learn new abstractions, it is shareable, easy to manage and readable by everyone.

In this case, going upstream is what makes it harder, turns it into code management, makes it harder to reason about and adds inevitable complexity.

If you add a new person on your team and they see that you are using 100% assembly, they have to onboard to it, learn how it works, learn why this was done this way etc etc.

If you add a new person to your team and you see that they are using all these tools and abstractions on top of LLMs its the same.

But if you are just using the core tech, they can immediately understand what is going on. No wrapped prompts, magic symbols, weird abstractions - "oh this is an agent but this is a chain while this is a retriever which is also an agent but it can only be chained to a non-retriever that uses UTCP to call it".

So as always, it is subjective and any advocacy needs to be applied to a curve of reason - in the end, does it make sense?
by michaelt | 2025-08-21 09:30:55+00:00
When I order things from China to the UK, on AliExpress, they arrive 'delivered duty paid' - i.e. aliexpress collects certain taxes from me at checkout, then the item doesn't get held up at the border.

So there does seem to be some mechanism for closing the buyer-seller-taxman loop. Unfortunately I have yet to find a reliable way to send things using this system.
by HelloNurse | 2025-08-21 09:31:09+00:00
> Instead of only offering the traditional “overwrite cloud with IaC” fix, we built the reverse. A back-sync. > No diff. No surprises. Just your IaC, in sync with reality.

This is obviously bad because, even if there was a good reason for manually altering something, the reconciliation between "reality" and the written configuration should force someone to review the changes. Otherwise sooner or later bad changes will be made by accident and automatically adopted as official.

> What if that drift was a deliberate, urgent hotfix made under fire to keep production alive? What if the organization is still in that messy transition between ClickOps and IaC, where already swamped teams simply cannot afford to be slowed down by more process police?

Until the authoritative IaC sources have been updated and tested, the hotfix is not done.

Shortcuts to repair a production environment slightly faster are extra effort that can be worthwhile, but pretending to be unable to afford a sustainable process is a terrible attitude and being actually "swamped" is a worse problem than a software malfunction.
by ForHackernews | 2025-08-21 09:31:29+00:00
One billion years ago there were no animals or plants and only barely multicellular organisms:

> And here’s another cool thing: a little over a billion years ago, life started experimenting with multicellularity. Imagine single cells deciding to team up and work together! A fossil discovered in Scotland, a tiny ball-shaped thing, is the oldest known example of a multicellular organism.

https://geoscience.blog/was-there-life-1-billion-years-ago/

I know OP was just kind of throwing out a big number but it's worth highlighting the orders of magnitude involved here. To put it in terms HN might grok more easily, if modern humans have existed for 300 kB we're talking about one gig.
by RugnirViking | 2025-08-21 09:32:09+00:00
> A high-trust society cannot be built by force.

Imo we're kinda in the worse quadrant of whats possible.

You can either have high visibility/force of prevention efforts or low. And you can have high actual rates of crime or low.

Imo we currently have low actual rates of crime (you see people saying oh its rampant in California or whatever but im not there and can't make an accurate assessment of it over the internet) and highly visible (damn near pervasive) efforts at preventing crime in almost every corner of our lives. "please don't abuse our staff" "cctv in operation", facial recognition, constant assumptions that you are a threat. If I didn't know better its almost like they "want" people to be criminals -- it seems like according to some other threads there are at least some people whose jobs it would make easier
by foldr | 2025-08-21 09:32:17+00:00
Truss wasn’t ‘aware’ because she ignored the warnings that she received.

Why hasn’t the same thing happened under Labour? For various reasons, (not least that their economic policy isn’t stark raving bonkers), but largely because they’ve taken very explicit care to reassure the markets and make sure that no-one is surprised or alarmed: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/oct/18/infrastructu...
by marcyb5st | 2025-08-21 09:33:01+00:00
There is also to say that Chaebols (i.e. Korean conglomerates) can do basically whatever they want because the Korean government will bail them out/give them the financial support they need.

With this, the "I need to be extremely profitable" burden is somewhat lifted, giving them the freedom to do hard R&D.

And it is true now still, with the last bribery in exchange of favors dating back to 2018 [1]

[1] https://bruinpoliticalreview.org/articles?post-slug=south-ko...
by dale_glass | 2025-08-21 09:33:11+00:00
To the best of my knowledge, it never really worked.

Yes, it probably works in the lab, in carefully picked conditions, but in the wild I've yet to see any effect whatsoever. Nobody in the AI communities seems to be complaining about it, models keep getting better, and people even intentionally trained on poisoned images just to show it can be done.

IMO on the long end it's a complete dead end of a strategy. Models are many, poisoning can't target everything at once. Even effective poisoning can be just dealt with by finding the algorithm that doesn't care about it.
by lifthrasiir | 2025-08-21 09:33:19+00:00
Emoji can be seen as a bait for implementations to support under-represented or ancient scripts as a side effect. In fact, emoji worked so well that we now have a universal full non-BMP support everywhere. For example, MySQL used to have the cursed BMP-only utf8 charset aka utf8mb3! It lasted until everyone started to complain about emojis.
by 2d8a875f-39a2-4 | 2025-08-21 09:33:40+00:00
Maybe it's just me but I find the complaint confusing and the suggested remedy absent in TFA, despite reading it twice.

Data comes from outside your application code. Your algorithms operate on the data. A complaint like "There isn’t (yet?) a format for just any kind of data in .class files" is bizarre. Maybe my problem is with his hijacking of the terms 'data' and 'object' to mean specific types of data structures that he wants to discuss.

"There is no sensible way to represent tree-like data in that [RDBMS] environment" - there is endless literature covering storing data structures in relational schemas. The complaint seems to be to just be "it's complicated".

Calling a JSON payload "actual data" but a SOAP payload somehow not is odd. Again the complaint seems to be "SOAP is hard because schemas and ws-security".

Statements like "I don’t think we have any actually good programming languages" don't lend much credibility and are the sort of thing I last heard in first year programming labs.

I'm very much about "Smart data structures and dumb code works a lot better than the other way around" and I think the author is starting there too, but I guess he's just gone off in a different direction to me.