MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by delusional | 2025-08-01 13:12:31+00:00
> From the main critical opponent Justitia which consists of law professionals:

You're moving into some pretty specialized terrirory here. I'm not a lawyer, and I suspect you aren't either. We're quite frankly not equipped to have this discusion. I'll muddy up the picture a little for you to make that point clear.

It's true that Justitia wrote that in their opinion about the proposal. An opinion the relavant authority actually asked for and then incorporated into the proposal. What you're looking at there is part of the process of defining a law, not a critique of a finished law. In the their comments to the responses, justitsministeriet (the relavant authority in this case) writes[1]:

"Justitsministeriet finder det dog afgørende, at dette sker på en måde, hvor de nuværende regler i PET-loven ikke lempes i de tilfælde, hvor PET’s behandling af oplysningerne i et datasæt får en mere målrettet karakter"

Translated: "The relavant authority believes it is critical that this processing of data does not relax the current rules where the processing is more directly targetted"

Let me be clear. I don't intend to make a point for or against that law. I'm quite frankly not qualified to make that assesment. I don't understand most of what they write, nor do I care to. I read stuff like "it may have a chilling effect on freedom of speech" and think "well that's sort of the point. If you were going to write something about how you'd like to bomb a school, I'd like you to not write that", which is obviously missing the point of the discussion, but they're also not talking to me.

In cases like this I prefer to fall back to my trust in the process. I didn't vote for Peter Humlegaard, I'm much more anti capitalist than that, but I also have no reason to believe that he's some hitler-esque proto-facist. PET is calling on more tools, and two independant experts helped our authorities draft a law that looks roughly like something Norway and Great Britain has. That seems reasonable to me. I'm sure they'll land this in a somewhat reasonable way, and then I'm sure we can change it if it turns out it sucks.

[1]: https://www.ft.dk/samling/20241/lovforslag/L218/bilag/1/3009... (page 11)
Show HN: I built a YouTube Thumbnail generator with your face
by timzhangyuxuan | 2025-08-01 13:12:51+00:00
I've been making YouTube videos for a while now, and honestly? My thumbnails sucked. I'd either spend way too much time in Photoshop trying to make myself look presentable, or just slap some text over a random screenshot and call it a day.

The worst part was trying to get consistent shots of myself. I'd end up taking like 50 selfies just to find one that didn't look completely awkward.

So I thought: what if I could just describe the thumbnail I want and have it generate one with my face already looking good?

I built something simple: you upload a few photos of yourself, we train a personalized AI model, and then you can just describe your thumbnail idea in plain English.

You can try it here: https://newhero.ai or see some examples: https://newhero.notion.site/ai-poster-showcase

Main questions I have:

Do the generated thumbnails actually look good enough to use?

Does this actually save time for creators making multiple videos per week?

Let me know how it goes, happy to answer any questions you have!
by jve | 2025-08-01 13:12:52+00:00
Many countries at least in europe have digital identity systems. For example ID card which replaces passport and is a smartcard. You can sign documents and authenticate online services. All gov + many other services let you log in with this ID. I can also have an app on mobile for auth purposes which gives strong guarantees that the person A is actually the person A.

Anyways, I wonder if there is a service that unions all those official auth methods for countries so there would be a global solution for website login. Certainly there would still be countries left in the dark, like USA :(
by FirmwareBurner | 2025-08-01 13:12:56+00:00
On a scale, how much do you trust your fellow countrymen from the bad parts of town not to rob you? Then how much do you trust your politicians not to lie to you? Then how much do you trust other countries' politicians not to invade you?

There's your answer right there.

Trust only works locally throughout family and closely knit communities, but globally trust is like fiat currency, on a large global scale it is completely worthless on its own, without any higher form of enforcement through violent means to defend and enforce the relationship where the winner dictates the conditions and everyone else has to follow.

Countries don't trust the US government, but they trust and use the USD because they trust the US will do everything militarily to protect it. That's as far as trust goes.
by grafmax | 2025-08-01 13:12:57+00:00
This “abundance” ideology which aims to influence Democratic policy promotes YIMBYism to address housing shortages by deregulating construction. It’s this claimed benefit I’m criticizing. Public housing does address this issue, which is why I bring it up.

Similarly, gentrification is enabled by this narrow focus on YIMBYism. Upzoning increases land value. Developers build profitable market rate houses there. This increases prices in the neighborhood leading to gentrification. This in turn leads to displacement - a key phenomenon that this ideology purports to address.

My issue is not YIMBYism in particular but that it’s offered as a solution to these problems.
by 1718627440 | 2025-08-01 13:13:05+00:00
I've read Wikipedia about William James, which includes a quote from "Pragmatism". It indeed seams to state the same you are claiming. That's how I perceive the argument:

We assume there is no absolute truth. (This is ex-ante, an assumption you can't argue about that.)

Therefore we take the word "truth" to mean "social consensus about facts". (Ok, but that's not truth, that is social consensus about facts.)

Given that we proclaim: "The reasons why we call things true is the reason why they are true [...]" (Yeah, that's consistent, but only because you redefined truth to mean exactly that.)

As you see, all the truths are simply random linguistic agreements; there can't be real absolute truth.

Ok, I can see that. But that will lead you to a reductio ad absurdum, because that's just a random thought you have, there is no reason, why I should accept it's the truth. I mean you just told me yourself that it is not the truth.

Also that is really a circular argument.
by vharuck | 2025-08-01 13:13:24+00:00
But government funding was set up in a way meant to counteract fickleness. Government actions are supposed to be proposed publicly, accept and consider public comments, and then allow legal arguments about the process and motivations. And funding is assigned by Congress, two legislative bodies with hundreds of members that follow extensive rules and procedures to do anything.

The current "fickleness" is from a single individual. The other branches of government are refusing to check out even criticize his actions. This is what would happen with any funding from individuals. The lesson we should be taking from this situation is either (1) controls on the government need to have more teeth and not rely solely on politicians, or (2) the US accepts authoritarianism right now and no Constitution would stop that.
by codeflo | 2025-08-01 13:13:25+00:00
I don't think those explanations are mutually exclusive.

Yes, there's a large cohort of "senior" software engineers who can't actually code. They bullshit their way into jobs until they're fired and then apply for the next one. These are the people you want to filter out with live coding.

But also, someone can fail a live coding interview for reasons other than belonging to that group.
by kayodelycaon | 2025-08-01 13:13:47+00:00
Unfortunately, this kind of thing isn’t exactly new. I nearly ended up in jail in high school because of an accusation. The only thing that stopped the school police officer from dragging me out the door in handcuffs was me knowing the principal of the school.

He was able to figure out where the rumor came from. I’d bumped into a girl during gym class and since I was a sheltered Christian kid new to public school, I didn’t know “second base” had another meaning.

I’ve also had a friend who struggled with depression kill himself after there was an accusation of him having illegal images. I don’t know if it was true. I just knew I couldn’t mourn his death while everyone I knew was celebrating it.

I also know a friend who stopped doing foster care after a child with a long history of compulsive lying and false accusations accused them of sexual abuse and CPS believed the child.
by wilkommen | 2025-08-01 13:13:58+00:00
I have the same view on it as you. The "abundance" people are carrying water for the establishment while trying to co-opt disaffected voters (who might otherwise find their way to the populist left) into a way of seeing things that won't meaningfully alter the status quo. Any solution to the real problems our nation is facing will require a shift of who holds power. The "abundance" folks are doing anything to distract people from the fact that this is all about power.
by PopAlongKid | 2025-08-01 13:14:30+00:00
>Opportunity Zones have shown a lot of promise at helping to direct capital to under-developed regions,

Not really. All of downtown Portland, OR has been designated an Opportunity Zone[0]. "the Ritz Carlton Hotel that’s going up in downtown Portland was partly funded with these tax breaks."

[0]https://www.opb.org/article/2021/10/22/new-book-looks-at-por...
by icedchai | 2025-08-01 13:14:32+00:00
Yes. You stepped over the line trying to do the manager's job. ;) One manager told me he didn't believe person X's performance was a problem because the work was getting done. The work was getting done by other people. I once had a guy open a PR when 5000 lines of code, tell me "I couldn't get it to work, but here you go", then I and another person had to spend another 2 weeks fixing and rewriting it.
by em-bee | 2025-08-01 13:15:08+00:00
i have 5 tmux sessions with a total of 19 windows on my laptop, one of which contains a localhost ssh connection to a second account where i have another tmux session with half a dozen windows. not to mention the tmux sessions i have on my servers.

the key benefit is i only need to learn one set of commands to switch sessions and windows, and to create new windows.

the sessions all run in a single terminal window, so when i have multiple other windows, i don't have to switch between them to find the right terminal window. terminals have tabs, but they don't group tabs into sessions. a single terminal with 19 tabs would not work.

i use the gui to start the terminal. i would have to find out how to script starting a terminal with multiple tabs. tmux is more easily scriptable, and again, i can't avoid learning tmux, since i use it remotely, and so when using it locally too, i don't have to learn a different way for my local machine.

finally, although rarely needed, i can log out, or my gui can crash, but the tmux sessions survive. i can also connect to my laptop from a different device and attach to the tmux sessions that way.

for a gui terminal to replace tmux the foremost feature i need is for it to remember my windows and tabs, just like the browser does. i have not come across any terminal that does that (but i admit, i haven't done a exhaustive search either). gnome (or any WM) can remember which apps i have open, but it can't remember the state inside the apps.

being able to reproduce state is really the key. i have a few vim sessions for example, easily remembered and recalled from my command line history. i could use gvim if i could figure out how to connect a gvim window with a terminal such that they form one unit, because every vim session is connected a number of commandline operations. (i believe BeOS/haiku can potentially do that based on the way its window tabs work)
by cmrdporcupine | 2025-08-01 13:15:14+00:00
This. Someone like this could maybe come up here to Canada, and enjoy slightly a more sane political/cultural climate, but they won't be getting this kind of funding. Academics here are already barely holding on, and even in the best of times there has never been the kind of flow of cash available in the US for scientists and intellectuals.

I imagine a similar story applies to the UK and other places in the Anglosphere
by Aurornis | 2025-08-01 13:15:34+00:00
I do not know anything about this author’s situation and won’t pretend to, but I did watch a sexual misconduct accusation play out in person once. The speed at which everyone assumed the story was true and turned against the accused was basically instant.

However there were some key details about the accusation that didn’t add up. The accuser tried changing the details of the story once they realized others were noticing the problems with the claims. It also became clear that the accuser had an ulterior motive and stood to benefit from the accused being ostracized. The accuser also had developed a habit of lying and manipulation, which others slowly began to share as additional information.

This was enough to make the situation fall apart among people who knew the details. However, word spread quickly and even years later there are countless people who only remember the initial accusation. Many avoided the accused just to be safe. The strangest part was seeing how some people really didn’t care about the details of the situation, they viewed it as symbolic of something greater and believed everyone was obligated to believe the accuser in some abstract moral sense.

It remains one of the weirdest social situations I’ve seen play out. Like watching someone drop a nuclear bomb on another person’s social life and then seeing how powerless they were to defend against it. In this case it didn’t extend to jobs or career. Their close social circle stuck with them. However I can still run into people years later who think the person is a creep because they heard something about him from a friend of a friend and it stuck with them.
by danesparza | 2025-08-01 13:16:19+00:00
Having been on the other side of the table ... Live coding interviews measure how the brain works under stress -- you are absolutely correct. So do other interview questions. Interviews suck in general for this reason.

I won't use live coding questions (usually) because I don't see much value in trying to code under that much stress.

But I will ask hard questions to see how well a candidate communicates in a stressful situation (which I think is a far more valuable indicator of their brain's "default" mode in stress). I want a candidate that talks honestly about stuff -- especially the stuff they don't understand -- even in a stressful situation. Sometimes stress can bring out the asshole in somebody -- and that's an immediate red flag.
by mil22 | 2025-08-01 13:16:52+00:00
The logical consequence of this would be that all it takes to destroy someone's reputation is collusion between just two people who decide to make false allegations against someone. That is, frankly, ridiculous. Inadequacy of the justice system and the difficulty of prosecuting cases where there is a lack of (or in this case, no) evidence, doesn't justify abrogating the principle of "innocent until proven guilty."
by justinhj | 2025-08-01 13:16:55+00:00
I remember following this story, and finding it a remarkable case study in mob justice. If you search for Scala on this site you will find it is still among the top 5 stories on the topic and nearly all the comments assume guilt and berate the author.

Similarly, r/scala condemned Jon and when the defending testimonials from his female friends were posted there they were removed.
by sokoloff | 2025-08-01 13:17:19+00:00
> where the mortgage payment on a house would be $2600/mo but the rent for the identical one next door is $2000 is going to swing heavily toward renting

I think those figures point towards buying being favored, especially if the mortgage payment is PITI, but even if it's principal and interest only, I think buying is likely to be better in the long-term if the spread is that small.

Maintenance is not going to run 5% of the purchase price on average, except in the most extreme low-cost housing situations. A house that sold for ~$500K (as would be implied by a $2600 mortgage payment) is not going to cost $500K in maintenance over the next 20 years (as 5% would imply) and certainly not over the next 10 (as 10% would).

You may have an individual year that's over 10%, but that's a cashflow issue not an overall cost issue.

The advantage of renting is the flexibility, lack of commitment to a specific house or area, and the lack of need for a large upfront sum (in this example, renting might need $6K upfront [$2K of which is the first month's rent], while buying might need traditionally $100K to avoid PMI or ~$20K on an FHA first-time buyer mortgage and associated transaction costs).
by the__alchemist | 2025-08-01 13:17:22+00:00
Interesting! That was my experience in Europe even 10 years ago, but they haven't caught up in NC, Vegas, and the other US cities I've been to lately. Interesting hearing the NYC takes in this thread! Both cash, and modern chip/tap readers at restaurants, neither of which I see.

I heard this mess has to due to banks and CC companies (Visa etc) fighting over who implements the changes, while the system in Europe (and Asia, and South America...) doesn't have that division, so they get the tech mainstream fast.
by XorNot | 2025-08-01 13:18:25+00:00
This is hardly historically true. What actually happened was Europe was devastated by two industrial total wars which is what led to this circumstance.

And then in the aftermath faced a Russia which promptly seized a whole bunch of Baltic states.

Or to put it another way: up till this year Canada was not planning it's strategic defence strategy with the US as a possible threat actor.
by nkrisc | 2025-08-01 13:18:30+00:00
Pretty frightening, really. These kinds of experience have absolutely though subtly changed how I interact with people. Particularly, as a man, with women and children.

Once my parents were visiting me and we took my kids to a playground. While there, my dad noticed a girl sitting on the ground crying, and seemed to be hurt. He looked for a moment to see if anyone was coming, and then went over to her and asked if she was alright, if she needed help, and where her parents were. He didn't get a clear response from her so he started walking around to the various adults around the playground inquiring if the hurt girl crying was theirs. Finally he got to one group of women and after asking one of them said something along the lines of, "yeah, I saw you over there bothering her" in an accusatory tone. Seeing where it was going, he put his hands up and just walked away without saying another word. The girl remained there crying, alone.

It was actually kind of a scary because later that day I realized how in that moment that woman, who my dad had never met before, could probably have destroyed his life right then and there if she wanted to.

These days, in the back of my mind I'm always considering how my actions, particularly towards women and children, could be misconstrued. When I'm at the playground with my kids, I don't talk to kids I don't know, at all, for any reason, even if they talk to me. I just smile and make myself busy with my own kids.
by apwheele | 2025-08-01 13:18:52+00:00
I do simple questions similar to the quoted LinkedIn post. (So less leetcode and more "do you know how to code anything".) While I can agree it is harder under stress, what is the alternative to knowing if someone can code at all? (My pass rate is similar to the quoted LinkedIn post.)

I have done the entry interview as well. For example have had very good conversations with managers who were applying for senior IC roles. They then go and fail the tech interview basic "can you do write and execute a python hello world script from the command line".
by pc86 | 2025-08-01 13:18:58+00:00
There is a very clear different from the consumer's point of view between paying a 20% delivery fee with no tip (and realistically having most drivers still expect an in-person tip) and a 5% delivery fee with a tip amount of your choosing (and maybe only 1/1000 drivers expecting/requesting yet more).

I have always been a generous tipper and I try to always put myself in that person's shoes when deciding how much to tip but even I notice the psychological difference. If you don't ever think about it, have never had a job waiting tables or dealing with the public, it'd almost be a nonstarter to have a higher delivery fee regardless of tip expectation.
by hermitcrab | 2025-08-01 13:19:11+00:00
I've never really understood the relationship between the US and Israel. The US gives Israel pretty much whatever it wants and in return the US gets ... nothing? Israel even (deliberately?) attacked a US ship during the 6 day war, with little (if any) consequences:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Liberty_incident

>While millions of American evangelical Christians have long been fervent supporters of the Jewish state because of End Times prophecies

Is that the main reason for this incredibly one-sided relationship?
by lelanthran | 2025-08-01 13:19:22+00:00
> He's not "obligated" to do anything but it's still immoral to abandon maintenence of something like that. If he can't be bothered to maintain it, then he should delete it.

Morality is subjective (that's why we have courts; which don't respect the individual and differing moralities of the parties involved, it has its own moral bar, for better or worse).

In this case, I feel it is more moral to record all the members of the mob. Maybe this would cause them to think twice before joining the next mob.

I mean, if we are going to have witch-hunt mobs, then the lesser evil is to not allow anonymous mobbers.
by dandanua | 2025-08-01 13:19:23+00:00
It's ok, USA doesn't need mathematicians after the AGI is built. If you need to compute something just ask AGI. The subscription, of course, will cost you multiple lifetimes' worth of the minimum working wage (luckily you could take a credit that will be payed off by multiple generations of your descendants), but you know, the progress can't be stopped!
by DanielVZ | 2025-08-01 13:19:45+00:00
I once had a friend that was cancelled by an ex-girlfriend for petty and political reasons. I knew it was false because I had been present in most of the situations she described to cancel him and her story was full of lies. She was also a distant friend and her only comment was “I know why I do what I do”, which was pretty weird.

My friend was devastated, he had to stop going to his classes and feared that nobody would hire him, professors would hate him (since students already did), and that his life had ended. I spoke with him and assured him that wasn’t the case but to be honest I wasn’t sure either.

I don’t know the details but one year later she was suspended for a year for falsely accusing him, my friend graduated and promptly found a job.

All this to say I’m awfully scared now of the risk of my interactions with women being used in the future as a false narrative to cancel me. I’m happily married and due to life stuff I do have to interact with young girls and women. Because of this I try to be as distant as I can and limit any interaction that doesn’t involve multiple other adults.

I learnt that even if you do nothing wrong you can always be at risk, so I just try to minimize that risk as much as I possibly can.
by animal531 | 2025-08-01 13:19:46+00:00
Ah, back in university I wrote a paper comparing Perl, Python and Tcl/Tk.

Tcl was by far the easiest to use, while Perl sat on the other end of the spectrum for both skill needed to write it as well as to just be able to read it.

As the mantra goes, "Power, but at what cost?!?"