MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by lo_zamoyski | 2025-10-17 15:08:36+00:00
You can find the abuse of animals morally objectionably (I do), but comparing it to human slavery rests on a grossly false moral equivalence between human beings and other animals. Indeed, it usually rests on sentiment or convention rather than a sound and rationally grounded objective ethics.

Chattel slavery was first and foremost morally objectionable, because human beings have rights that conflict with its practice. Rights are rooted in two properties human beings have, namely, the ability to comprehend one's actions and one's situation, and the ability to freely choose between alternatives. If I can understand my actions and I can freely choose to act one way or another, then I am, in principle [1], a moral agent and thus morally responsible for my actions. But for me to be able to fulfill those responsibilities as a moral agent, certain conditions must be met and this claim on others to supply me with those conditions we call rights. Without those conditions, I cannot do what I have a responsibility to do. Non-human animals [2] lack these properties, which is why we do not hold them morally accountable, and because they don't have responsibilities, they do not have rights. (I realize that it has become customary to pull rights out of thin air without the slightest moral scruple or justification about doing so.)

Of course, it would be morally objectionable for us to torment animals, but we are free to make use of animals in ways that do not contract the human good, rightly understood.

[0] The only sound, objective basis for morality is human nature, which determines what actions accord with it and which contradict it. So, it is morally objectionable to torment animals, even though they have no rights, because - in short - it contradicts human nature and thus my good as a human being. Sadism is a serious defect.

[1] I say "in principle", because in practice, as you'll recall, mens rea has legal significance for a reason. If I kill someone by accident, then I did not choose freely to kill him, and so I have not committed murder, only involuntary manslaughter or whatever. If I kill someone, because I believed he was a monster from the 7th dimension trying to kill me, then I did not comprehend my situation and thus the nature of my action. So, in practice, I may fail to exercise what in principle I have the power to do by virtue of my nature as a human being. But other animals do not have this power by nature.

[2] To preempt the inevitable petty drive-by pedant, I define "human" as any animal with these two properties, so according to this view, an intelligent alien from another planet would also be human, despite occupying a place in a separate phylogenetic tree or whatever.
by aftbit | 2025-10-17 15:08:58+00:00
I recommend that people don't install networked cameras unless they build a dedicated air-gapped network for them. If you want to know who is at your door ... look out a window.

Unpopular take, I know, because it demands that people actually understand the technology they're using and where their data flows, and almost nobody has the skill, time, attention, money, and mindspace for that... but that's the only way to be a responsible networked camera user.
by krapp | 2025-10-17 15:09:34+00:00
>I've removed the rate limit from your account now.

SNפIƎɹ SO∀HƆ

I mean thank you. I know I complain a lot but that's because I care, and I think I've mellowed out over time anyway. I think my greatest sin is just spending too much time here posting.

>The counterargument though is that most accounts just don't change that much, so this ends up being globally the right call even though it fails in specific cases.

If so, it seems to make more sense to apply it by thread rather than by account. Maybe to threads that trip the flamewar detector. For serial trolls the effect would be the same, but it wouldn't interfere with honest participation.

>and no, we didn't bump it up

Fair enough, it can be difficult to tell from the comment timestamps. As long as you're prompting the user anyway maybe add a cooldown timer?

I don't envy you or the other mods your jobs but I do think you put more effort into tone-policing than you need to.
by kragen | 2025-10-17 15:10:17+00:00
Apple says they are counting the emissions produced to make it and all the packaging that comes with it, the vehicles used to transport it, lighting used in the warehouse where it sits, and also the consumption of the device during its lifetime. You wouldn't want to count the carbon emissions of making the appliances used to keep the warehouse clean too because with that procedure the carbon emissions of anything would be infinite.

It ought to be obvious, but I'll say it anyway: the carbon emissions of shipping things like a smartphone are quite small, and the carbon emissions of things like warehouse lighting and warehouse cleaning are utterly insignificant.
Show HN: Was winging important meetings. So I built an AI that briefs me in secs
by uchibeke | 2025-10-17 15:10:31+00:00
Hey HN,

I'm Uchi, and I just spent 3 days building something I wish existed 2 years ago: an AI that briefs you on meeting attendees in seconds.

The Problem: I was winging important meetings because researching attendees took too long: 1) LinkedIn stalking = 10-20 min per person 2) ChatGPT prompting = "Who is Sarah Chen at Sequoia?" → back-and-forth → 10 min 3) Google search = buried in SEO spam

I'd show up to pitches/sales calls knowing nothing about who I was talking to. Felt unprepared. Lost deals.

What I Built: Briefing AI = Paste calendar invite → Get CIA-style dossier in seconds.

It extracts attendees from your calendar text, generates: 1) Executive summary 2) Attendee profiles (role, background, priorities) 3) Company and Attendee insights 4) Talking points 5) Red flags to avoid

The Tech: 1) Next.js 15 + Cloudflare Pages (serverless) 2) Brave Search API for Attendee and company insights 3) Mix of GPT + DeepSeek models for calendar parsing, Attendee enrichment + briefing generation 4) Stripe for payments ($49 Founder's Lifetime Deal) 5) Device fingerprinting for 1 free briefing (then paywall)

Why Not Just Use ChatGPT?: You can! But: 1) ChatGPT = 10 min of prompting ("extract attendees" → "research Sarah" → "summarize") 2) Briefing AI = seconds (paste → done) 3) ChatGPT = loses history 4) Briefing AI = saves to dashboard

I'm not trying to compete with ChatGPT. I'm just making one specific workflow 10x faster.

What's Next: Right now, we do some research with Brave Search API but everything else is 100% AI-generated. I'm adding: 1) Real-time LinkedIn/Google search (v2) 2) PDF export 3) "Share briefing" for viral growth 4) Get Text/SMS briefing before an important meeting

Honest Feedback Request*: This is my first HN launch. I need brutal honesty: 1) Is this actually useful or am I solving a fake problem? 2) Would you pay $49 for this? 3) What features am I missing?

Try it free (no credit card): [getbriefing.io]

(I'm offering a $49 Founder's LTD for 7 days, then switching to $19/month. Trying to validate quickly before building more features.)

Thanks for checking it out!
by amiga386 | 2025-10-17 15:11:02+00:00
That's why it's called Churnalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churnalism

Also, if any news orgs are listening: when you are regurgitating a press release about, say, a report or scientific paper, please make it your house style to hyperlink to the report or paper. That way I can see your sources and judge the claims for myself.

Also, people who write reports or papers and then make press releases: please upload them to your own damn websites, and make them easily findable by the public. Don't just email the press release to your pals in the media, and not put your words anywhere else.
by ACCount37 | 2025-10-17 15:11:07+00:00
A Starlink V2 Mini sat (what they're currently launching with Falcon 9) has a total solar panel area of about 10.5 * 2.5 *2 = 105 m^2.

Solar irradiance in LEO is about 1350 W/m^2 when unobstructed. A space-grade solar panel reflects 5%-10% of that back as light, with the rest absorbed as either heat or electricity.

This should give you an idea of what kind of thermal flux the satellite is designed to be dealing with.
by Zigurd | 2025-10-17 15:11:32+00:00
2/3 of Falcon 9 launches are for Starlink. No outside revenue. SpaceX continues to require new investment rounds. So the whole "driving costs down" thing might only work until investors expect some actual free cash flow.

There have been 11 test launches of starship. You might've missed the last one because it didn't do anything new, except shedding parts and exploding less. There's a pretty good chance that program will never beat the cost of Falcon Heavy, or that the technology, like multiple refueling flights to get beyond low Earth orbit, is ever made workable.
by wishfish | 2025-10-17 15:11:37+00:00
>I think the only way desktop Linux will ever approach something an "ordinary" computer user could use is if a corporation puts significant money behind the development effort.

I think you're correct, but I also think this has already happened. Valve has put large amounts of money and development time into Linux. With a huge success. Gaming on Linux is very close to being as easy as it is on Windows. That removes a barrier for many home users.

I do wish there was more commercial software. Getting Photoshop ported over would be the last hurdle for me personally. Everything else I can do through Steam, various open source programs like Calibre, Electron apps, and Web.
by theamk | 2025-10-17 15:11:40+00:00
> Time is a pair (seconds, nanoseconds),

I expect something diffferent, but isn't this just timespec_t[0] with different epoch? It's been in in POSIX since 2001.

The upside of timespec_t is it uses regular Unix epoch for seconds time, so thre is no need for things like "time_get_year", you use regular time_t APIs for that.

[0] https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man3/timespec.3type.html
by TheCraiggers | 2025-10-17 15:12:09+00:00
> I feel like BDFLs are akin to the concept of village elders; they're not immune to corruption or scandal, but they often have this beloved status that can paper over a lot of cracks.

I think a lot of this is due to how so much is a scandal these days, for better and worse. (I'm obviously going to keep politics as much out of my response as possible.)

A few decades ago, people could have political views without ostracizing roughly 50% of the global population, or generally causing a ruckus at the holiday family dinner. (Obviously politics + holiday dinners has been an issue for a long time, but back then it was just something people tried to sweep under the rug. Now? Holiday dinners are getting cancelled or families are splitting up.)

It used to be that a scandal in the OSS community required you killing your wife (thinking back to ReiserFS). Now, a remark on Twitter is all it takes.

Again, I am absolutely not taking sides here. I'm just noticing a difference in the times, and agreeing that it is indeed interesting to watch.
by GordonS | 2025-10-17 15:12:36+00:00
I've ran into the IP deny list problem too, but for Windows VMs - you spin them up, only to realise that you can't get Windows Updates, can't reach the Powershell gallery etc.

And just deleting it and starting again is just going to give you the exact same IP again!

I ended up having to buy a dozen or so IPs until I found one that wasn't blocked, and then I could delete all the blocked ones.
by dragontamer | 2025-10-17 15:12:39+00:00
A decent newspaper today in 2025 writes slop for their website to ensure daily engagement with their readers. To the point that people are talking about AI articles, literally serving slop.

Maybe they have a few AP articles thrown in there.

We have to acknowledge what has changed in our world and why things are the way that they are. Perhaps daily news is simply not profitable enough to provide us with quality information, and our economic incentives (namely advertising dollars from websites, YouTube, TikTok and the like) are having an adverse effect on quality.
by Agraillo | 2025-10-17 15:12:50+00:00
> nested/indented comments are confusing

Let me mention my recent app for an alternative view of the HN comments (Hackeray) [1][2]. I'm sure this is not for everyone, but for me this view really helped to read the comments more clearly and basically absorb any big discussion here.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45571963

[2] https://hackeray.vercel.app
by TheRealPomax | 2025-10-17 15:12:59+00:00
These two things aren't even remotely in the same category. Committing a crime, then documenting how you committed that crime and then publishing the instructions for others to repeat that crime with the clear intent to have others repeat that crime, has nothing to do with saying a bunch of words that you haven't even acted on.

Dispute that this should constitute a crime as much as you want (and please, do. Take it to court, get the laws changed, go into politics, get the US fixed, this is bullshit) but for as long as it is: being charged with a crime for "doing crime and teaching others to do the same crime" is not a first amendment violation.
by klempner | 2025-10-17 15:13:07+00:00
Huh? There are plenty of good reasons to complain about the 5V5A thing, but "fire hazard" is not one of them.

It is even entirely within spec for a PD power supply to offer a 5V5A PDO, as long as it is only doing so with a 5A capable cable (i.e. 100W or 240W). 5V5A is no more a fire hazard than 20V5A.

The spec violation isn't that it negotiates 5V5A when available, but that it isn't willing to buck from 9V or 15V to get those 25W which means that power supply compatibility is incredibly limited.
by jraph | 2025-10-17 15:13:25+00:00
> Baguettes aren't for show/tourism, it's a staple of french food

Indeed. So much so it's often a pain to find good whole bread outside cities.

I was being a bit facetious.

More seriously, the issue with baguette / white bread, aside from drying very fast, is that it's rapid-absorption carbohydrates that are not very healthy and not very filling. Add jam and you have it all. Taking white bread for breakfast every day is not a very good habit. It increases the risk of having a crash in the middle of the morning and of making you nibble.

For this reason, it's a shame it's so spread. Bread used to be whole in France in the past. White bread and baguette appeared in France only at the end of 19th / beginning of the 20th century apparently. So, it's been a French staple, but only quite recently.

Of course I won't argue with taste. Especially that I understand both "sides" here. I used to prefer baguette / white bread and now I largely prefer whole bread (and like anything whole, you should buy it organic; if you don't, white bread might still be the lesser evil). It took some time to get used to whole bread. I still like the taste and the texture of white bread very much, but I don't like the consequences.
by 999900000999 | 2025-10-17 15:15:08+00:00
Long long ago, at the start of my career I was at a great company. We were using a Postgres DB version not supported by RDS. So I had to manually set up postgres over and over again on EC2 instances. This was before Docker was reliable/standard.

I wasted hours on this, and the moment RDS starts to support the postgres version we need it everything was much easier.

I still remember staying up till 3:00 a.m. installing postgres, repeatedly.

While this article is nice, they only save a few hundred dollars a month. If a single engineer has to spend even an hour a month maintaining this, it's probably going to be a wash.

And that's assuming everything goes right, the moment something goes wrong you can easily wipe out a year saving in a single day ( if not an hour depending on your use case).

This is probably best for situations where your time just isn't worth a whole lot. For example let's say you have a hobbyist project, and for some reason you need a very large capacity server.

This can easily cost hundreds of dollars a month on AWS, and since it's coming out of your own pocket it might be worth it to spend that extra time on bare metal.

But, at a certain point you're going to think how much is my time really worth. For example, and forgive me for mixing up terms and situations, ghost blog is about $10 a month via their hosted solution. You can probably run multiple ghost blogs on a single Hetzner instance.

But, and maybe it was just my luck, eventually it's just going to stop working. Do you feel like spending two or three hours fixing something over just spending the $20 a month to host your two blogs ?
by wredcoll | 2025-10-17 15:15:17+00:00
I mean, yes, but also I get "3 nines" uptime by running a website on a box connected to my isp in my house. (it would easily be 4 or 5 nines if I also had a stable power grid...)

There's a lot, a lot of websites where downtime just... doesn't matter. Yes it adds up eventually but if you go to twitter and its down again you just come back later.
by LeCun98 | 2025-10-17 15:15:31+00:00
Really good job! I have just finished a RAG for my business unit in my scale up. It took around 1 hours (considering also the deploy). I can define it as really easy to use. I just ask: can I contribute in such a way? Do you have any Discord platform I can join? And for more information can I contact you and your team? Can you provide an email? Thanks!
by ethanpark | 2025-10-17 15:15:51+00:00
I've been switching between Gemini and Claude depending on the task. Gemini 2.5 Pro is incredibly fast and handles large context really well, but I've noticed it can get stuck in loops during longer conversations. Claude is more reliable for iterative coding work. Really curious to see if Gemini 3.0 fixes the context issues, that would be a game changer for my workflow.
by mnky9800n | 2025-10-17 15:15:54+00:00
technology always comes for education. so far telephones, television, computers, online courses, ipads, and everything else, doesn't seem to solve the problems inherent to learning. these basically can be summed up as "does a child have a supportive environment to learn that allows for the things a child needs to become an adult?" but a main issue, rarely addressed by technologists, across all of education, is the inherent tension of what is the goal of education? why should children be educated?
What if light doesn't follow the universe – what if the universe follows light?
by f_of_t_ | 2025-10-17 15:16:22+00:00
We think light obeys physics. But what if physics obeys light?

Maybe light isn’t just part of the universe — it’s the template everything else aligns to.

If so, then “follow the light” isn’t poetic. It’s the literal structure of reality.

Posted by f_of_t
by ctxc | 2025-10-17 15:16:33+00:00
Did you say normal person? It's more like

*or just Google "convert to jpg" like a normal person, scroll through fRee cOnVerTeR results from companies that have nothing to do with image conversion (for SEO of course), click whichever is the least clowny name (with free and fast in the description), upload image, hit the convert button OOPS THAT WAS AN AD, go back, upload again, hit the right convert button, watch image appear in an animation framed by ads, click the download button (the one below the HIGH QUALITY button that's disabled with a lock.png begging for upgrades)
by Apreche | 2025-10-17 15:17:28+00:00
Their job is journalism, you would hope they have the skills, but not necessarily. The news business is not making much money, and aren’t paying big salaries. You’re not getting world renowned journalists to do a puff piece on a recently deceased celebrity. And even if they don’t use an LLM, they are still putting in the bare minimum effort for work they likely have no pride in.
by dfxm12 | 2025-10-17 15:17:38+00:00
Perhaps there's also less stringent editing on the "Showbiz & TV" or "Culture" sections of the paper than the "News" section. I mean, papers in general are working leaner than they should. Hopefully, they put the editing focus on what's most important, but still, being lazy even in a lighter section does reflect poorly on the entire publication.
by peab | 2025-10-17 15:17:52+00:00
I use it maybe once a week or every other week. It's maybe 10$ more than if I'd go pick it up myself, which isn't worth it if I'm ordering a burrito, but if I order for me and my fiance, then I'm usually getting like 50$ worth of food, and the convenience is absolutely worth it.

Also, given my salary, if I'm working late, it's absolutely worth it to order doordash if I'm tired. I wouldn't do it every day because it's harder to eat healthy and only a subset of food doesn't degrade in quality when delivered.
by constantcrying | 2025-10-17 15:18:07+00:00
For running Windows only Steam games the support is very good. And actually "regular user" friendly .

But at the same time most professional Windows software will not run at all or will only run if you put significant effort into it. The idea of giving any Linux distro to a novice and telling him "he can run Windows applications" will result in server disappoint and frustration.
by AlexandrB | 2025-10-17 15:18:39+00:00
This was always the end game for Ring. I think people were saying this since before the Amazon acquisition. The acquisition itself always struck me as Amazon attempting to reduce "shrinkage" - brick and mortar stores have their "loss prevention" team and Amazon has Ring.

The bottom line with technology is that you either host and control it yourself or you're at the whims of the vendor's business strategy.
by syawaworht | 2025-10-17 15:20:11+00:00
There's actually a decent amount of work recently in this space, some of it motivated by the wildfires.

Here's another recent paper with similar findings. The persistence of smoke VOCs indoors: Partitioning, surface cleaning, and air cleaning in a smoke-contaminated house https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10575580/
by AtlasBarfed | 2025-10-17 15:21:41+00:00
Yeah, clouds are such a huge improvement over what was basically an industry standard practice to say oh you want a server fill out this 20 page form and will get you your server in 6 to 12 months.

But we don't need one minute response times from the cloud really. So something like hetzner that may just be all right. We'll get it to you within an hour. It's still light years ahead of what we used to be.

And if it makes the entire management and cost side and performance with bare metal or closer to bare metal on the provider side, then that is all good.

And this doesn't even address the fact that yeah, AWA has a lot of hidden costs, but a lot of those managed data center outsourcing contracts where you were subjected to those lead times for new servers... really weren't much cheaper than AWS back in the day.
by bpt3 | 2025-10-17 15:21:50+00:00
A cursory internet search would back up my statement. Feel free to do that if you're interested. I note that you aren't asking the parent poster for any citations for their claim, which I would say is quite extraordinary.

And to be clear, my "argument" is that the parent poster is objectively incorrect, which is accurate. I decided not to posit on why the parent poster made an objectively incorrect statement, though I am curious.
by danaris | 2025-10-17 15:21:50+00:00
> Some workers simply aren't capable of generating $10/hr of economic value.

The only ones that I believe this can genuinely be true of are people with various types of disabilities. Which I addressed in my post.

The idea that there's this large percentage of fully able-bodied workers who are completely incapable of ever being trained to do any kind of skilled work doesn't pass the smell test. At best, it reeks of various racist/eugenicist ideas.