MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by Aerroon | 2026-01-14 23:53:42+00:00
Can someone link me something that shows that attention spans are decreasing?

I looked into it briefly and the following two is what I found. The rest seemed to just be repeating or debunking these two claims.

1. An infographic that claims we went from 15 second attention spans to 8 seconds attention spans (as opposed to a goldfish having a 9 second attention span (how was this measured?)).

This seems BS.

2. A study that measured how long knowledge workers spent on a single screen. This dropped from 250 seconds in the early 2000s to 72 seconds in 2012 and 47 seconds more recently.

This data shows something, but I think connecting this to attention spans 1:1 doesn't seem quite right. It could just as well be that people work differently now. Eg they're more likely to pull information from another screen or document than they used to be.
by brewdad | 2026-01-14 23:53:55+00:00
My favored brand of coffee finally succumbed to the shrinkflation pressures. Most brands in my local grocery store moved to 10oz bags of whole beans. My favorite brand was still 12oz but some of their specialty offerings were in 10oz bags.

My last trip, they were all now 10oz bags too. As far as I can tell the bag size itself did not change, only the weighted contents. Read those labels people.
by strbean | 2026-01-14 23:54:04+00:00
If I understand correctly, message roles are implemented using specially injected tokens (that cannot be generated by normal tokenization). This seems like it could be a useful tool in limiting some types of prompt injection. We usually have a User role to represent user input, how about an Untrusted-Third-Party role that gets slapped on any external content pulled in by the agent? Of course, we'd still be reliant on training to tell it not to do what Untrusted-Third-Party says, but it seems like it could provide some level of defense.
by al_borland | 2026-01-14 23:54:35+00:00
Metrics can still be gathered without annoying the user.

If the goal is automatic exercise detection, it can log when this happens automatically without notifying the user. It can also show on the screen without the buzz. The user doesn’t need to interact for the action to be successful and recorded.

If the goal is more user interactions with the device, this detection needs to work both way, detecting when exercise as stopped. At that point it can notify with how many calories were burned and ask if they are going to keep going, so it gets a user interaction without being totally pointless. As long as it’s not bugging someone between ever set.

Of course I’d argue that “number of user interactions” is a terrible metric that almost guarantees enshitification. If the device is still being worn, it’s being used. Who cares how much the user fiddles with it?
by refulgentis | 2026-01-14 23:55:32+00:00
You overcorrected at some point. I have the same struggle in an intimate and hurtful way, it is difficult to know when to draw the line between "I was too difficult to maintain camaraderie" and "I righteously stood up for myself in an untenable situation."

But, you're repeatedly addressing someone, in service of explaining it's their fault, that the party they offered constructive suggestions to in private, made it public, in addition to suggesting they shouldn't have said anything in the first place, because their suggestion was an implied order.

I think you may be misunderstanding the story or posts, to wit, the public post you are linking is from the party you are not talking to, and was the first publicly published thing, which if I'm reading correctly, is the sin to you.
by jesse__ | 2026-01-14 23:56:06+00:00
"could" and "should" are doing some very theoretical heavy lifting here.

Sure, at the limit, I agree with you, but in reality, relying on the compiler to do any optimization that you care about (such as inlining an indirect function call in a hot loop) is incredibly unwise. Invariably, in some cases it will fail, and it will fail silently. If you're writing performance critical code in any language, you give the compiler no choice in the matter, and do the optimization yourself.

I do generally agree that in the case of qsort, it's an API design flaw
by mothballed | 2026-01-14 23:56:20+00:00
I would agree that social security recipients tend to be the biggest welfare queens. They paid a bunch of people that are now dead. And think because they "paid into" one group of dead people, that now living other people now owe them. An exercise in the logic of the insane, but yet the veneer that holds up the fiction.

It's a broke and bankrupt system, a wise person might jump the ship well before that happens.
by dylan604 | 2026-01-14 23:56:31+00:00
Yanks never got cool vans. Vans also became synonymous with Chester the Molester. Yanks also had Chevy Astro as an option. I grew up with the family owning a full sized custom van with 2 rows of captain chairs and the third row bench folding out into a bed.

From all of the bitching in the driveway, vans were not pleasant to work on the engine. Some of them had to remove a cover from inside the van to gain access, and that cover tended to not be well insulated and was the source of a lot of heat. Not much of a firewall as a car with the engine fully separated from the passenger compartment.

There were a lot of things people did not like about vans available in the land of Yanks. The Limey vans are not the same, so do not equate your experience as being the same.
by dvt | 2026-01-14 23:56:41+00:00
> Since the original point was about solving all prompt injection vulnerabilities...

All prompt injection vulnerabilities are solved by being careful with what you put in your prompt. You're basically saying "I know `eval` is very powerful, but sometimes people use it maliciously. I want to solve all `eval()` vulnerabilities" -- and to that, I say: be careful what you `eval()`. If you copy & paste random stuff in `eval()`, then you'll probably have a bad time, but I don't really see how that's `eval()`'s problem.

If you read the original post, it's about uploading a malicious file (from what's supposed to be a confidential directory) that has hidden prompt injection. To me, this is comparable to downloading a virus or being phished. (It's also likely illegal.)
by mh2266 | 2026-01-14 23:56:51+00:00
> Exactly, designing a 'third place' that isn't alcohol focused seems to be a tough nut to crack.

how so? I go to a climbing gym and it is a pretty social (and, of course, healthy) activity... crossfit is not my thing but apparently it is similar for more traditional workouts. to the extent you can consider a cycling or running club a "space" those are similar. dog parks for dog owners, playgrounds for parents, etc...
by helterskelter | 2026-01-14 23:56:51+00:00
I used to swear by them but I ordered like half a dozen pairs of their standard double fronted work dungs and they fell apart in the washer after 2-3 cycles. This was 2022-2023. It was weird, seams weren't stitched properly, the fabric was lighter, etc. I saw comments on their site which shared my experience.

I think this around the time they shifted production outside the USA (memory is hazy). If you see a "helmets to hardhats" decal on the inside of your pants on the pocket lining, they're US production.

I've switched to Bailey's "Wild Ass" brand of denim work pants for my physical laboring needs, but you have to wear them with logging suspenders.
by yjftsjthsd-h | 2026-01-14 23:56:55+00:00
IIRC the point is that each NBD device is backed by a different S3 endpoint, probably in different zones/regions/whatever for resiliency.

Edit: Oops, "zpool create global-pool mirror /dev/nbd0 /dev/nbd1" is a better example for that. If it's not that, I'm not sure what that first example is doing.
by habinero | 2026-01-14 23:57:49+00:00
My dude, that's not "victim blaming" lol. Nobody's forcing you, personally, to do anything. I don't care if you, personally, publish your work or not.

What I'm saying is that _feeling_ of insecurity doesn't come from haters, because haters gonna hate, it's a sign that _your_ work might not be as good as you think it is, and you don't feel that you can stand behind it.
by 972811 | 2026-01-14 23:58:07+00:00
your links don't disprove OP's main point at all. being forced to share data to the government is different than actively collecting data to sell to other third parties. these companies have tons of incentive to collect user data, but very little to sell it. i think that nuance is important to understand. if you think i'm wrong, try going to facebook or google and asking to buy some user data. you cannot.
by kennyadam | 2026-01-14 23:58:38+00:00
I’ve been using Claude Code, Gemini 3 Pro, and Nano Banana Pro to plan, code, and create custom UI elements for dozens of time-saving applications. For years, I have been searching high and low for existing solutions, but all I found were either overpriced cloud offerings that were bloated with endless features I didn’t need and just complicated the UI, or abandoned GitHub repos consisting of an initial commit and a roadmap that has been waiting eight years for its first update and what code was present was half baked and out of date.
The reality is that my requirements are so specific to my workflow that until these latest models came along, building exactly what I needed in a matter of hours for a cost of $20 a month was inconceivable. Now I provide a description of what functionality I need, some sketches of the UI I made on my ipad with an apple pencil and after a bit of back and forth to get everything dialled in and I’ve created a bit of software that will save me dozens if not hundreds of hours of previously tedious manual work.
by potato3732842 | 2026-01-14 23:59:35+00:00
>Heartbreaking but true. The most popular pickups today are not the most useful pickups. There are no more basic utilitarian pickups any longer, at least in the US.

Any OEM will happily sell you a white vinyl floor half ton with your preferred cab/bed/engine/drivetrain configuration.

The GMC 4cyl 1500s were stupid cheap for awhile, because they shat out a bunch for CAFE and weren't selling so they were going for like 25-30k going into the new model year. I wanna say this was 2024 into 25, maybe 23 into 24, idk.

Ford Maverick seems to fit the bill for compact stuff though I suspect it may make the goalposts zip to "single cab option" and "body on frame"
by keithnz | 2026-01-15 00:00:03+00:00
I’m no expert in string theory but with all the bagging on string theory I tried to get to the guts of what's going on without as much "opinion". I did watch this great video which interviewed a bunch of scientists working on various aspects of string theory, and overwhelmingly it seems there's still a lot of interesting questions to be answered (even if string theory doesn't describe this universe), unfortunately I can't seem to find it at the moment.

I think the main thing is, even if string theory turns out not to describe reality, it shows that quantum mechanics and general relativity can be reconciled within a single, mathematically consistent framework. The tension between the two is gone and it's actually needed for physical correctness. Simply knowing that such a reconciliation is possible is already a meaningful result.

String theory emerged from attempts to quantize gravity. I think the most interesting thing is that when a relativistic string is quantized, a massless spin-2 particle inevitably appears in the spectrum. This particle behaves exactly like a graviton, meaning that gravity is not introduced by hand but instead arises naturally from the theory.

Competing approaches may possibly be all compatible, much like different interpretations of Quantum Physics.

The main difficulty with experimental tests is that the relevant energy scales and distances are far beyond what we can currently probe in the laboratory. This is not a weakness unique to string theory, but a general problem for any theory of quantum gravity. The Planck scale is simply too extreme to access directly with present technology.

As for experiments that depend on both quantum mechanics and general relativity, in principle these would involve situations where quantum coherence and strong gravitational effects are both important. Examples include black hole evaporation, aspects of early-universe cosmology, and possible quantum effects in curved spacetime. These are extraordinarily difficult to study experimentally, but they are what motivates the search for a theory of quantum gravity in the first place.
by ndsipa_pomu | 2026-01-15 00:00:37+00:00
> "implies they've never hired..." seems to be reading an awful lot into it.

I believe that that was the first coloured person in the whole Dilbert strips, though I haven't checked that. I was a fan of Dilbert many years ago, but I suspect that if I re-read them that I'd be thinking of Scott Adams' later politics and looking for early signs. There's probably a lot of suspect cartoons that featured the Elbonians.
by ggm | 2026-01-15 00:00:52+00:00
Removing layers of abstraction over procedure calls makes total sense. So if I was in a stack of 5 virtual calls, and it's elided to 3, thats brilliant. Thats not dissimilar to stuff we talked about in shared lib vs static lib runtimes and kernel, IIRC OSF/1 did a preload thing which reduced the cost of shared link calls significantly, at a barrier of reboot to make changes. This is "fix the software stack in userspace" and it's to me the same as the virtio improvements for access running virtualised OS on linux or BSD.

What I miss, is some sense of how to aggregate things the way ceph does. I wish that ZFS had a better abstraction to say "all these discrete runtime things you have, this chunk of them can now contribute to an ECC protected datastore"
by filldorns | 2026-01-15 00:00:52+00:00
My sweetie,
Here you'll find some data about the context:

War Tensions: It humiliated Japan by completely banning Asian immigrants, which fueled anti-American sentiment and helped pave the way for WWII.

Blocking Refugees: The quotas were so strict that, during the 1930s, the U.S. denied entry to thousands of Jews trying to escape the Holocaust.

Inspiration for Hitler: The law was based on eugenics (racial superiority). Hitler himself praised the act in his book, using it as a model for future Nazi racial laws.

Family Separation: Because quotas for Southern and Eastern Europe were so low, immigrants already in the U.S. were often unable to bring their wives and children, tearing families apart for decades.

The Birth of "Illegal Immigration": By making legal entry nearly impossible for many, it created the modern concept of the "undocumented immigrant" and led to the creation of the Border Patrol to manage those bypassed by the system.

My sweetie,

I'm from another country and I'm following this story from the outside. Believe me, the whole world thinks what the president of the United States is doing is wrong. >>>>Good Luck<<<<

Too vague, or did you just not like that I mentioned your orange idol?
Trump is the worst president I've seen in recent years. You should feel ashamed if you support someone who has inhumane attitudes.
by floxy | 2026-01-15 00:01:00+00:00
Is the C++ language enshittified? Can you use the "numbers must go up" argument to explain it? Of course you can say the committee has to add new features to justify its existence. But that just seems like a superficial explanation. Maybe overall the newer editions of the language seem like a good idea. But complexity explodes until everyone is just using their own unique subset of the language. Anyway I'd like to read a take on enshittification and C++, since the C++ is a long-lived "project" and the standards committee and process is more open than FitBit, with an more interesting mix of stakeholders.
by casey2 | 2026-01-15 00:02:41+00:00
I personally don't believe you have ANY evidence. More plausibly you are acting as a "useful idiot" for traditional media.

Now that Australia has banned social media, are you going to admit you were wrong? Or just double down and ban phones? If something is "unbelievable" then you better have good evidence for believing it, not just narratives.
by echoangle | 2026-01-15 00:03:32+00:00
> Often, it would also contradict how I was internally feeling. I’d wake up feeling rested, see my stats are low, and play a game of chess out of algorithmic rebellion, only to feel my mind up against a barrier and handedly lose.

It would be better to only look at the stats after playing if you want to verify it, this could easily be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
by brewdad | 2026-01-15 00:03:38+00:00
Beer has done the same thing. A few years ago I could get any of a number of beers at Costco for $1 per can/bottle in a 24 pack. Now the cheapest name brand offerings are $1.33 per can and even the Kirkland brand is over $1. If I buy it at a standard grocery store, those same beers are over $2 each.
by observationist | 2026-01-15 00:03:40+00:00
This is overhyped by a lot. A lot of SV grift is attributable to exploited immigrants, too, it's not like it's a city of moral champions.

H1B and other employment based immigration programs are some of the worst influences on the market, because people get screwed, wages suppressed for non immigrant workers, and the donor class for the uniparty are the ones paying for the status quo, and a big reason nothing ever gets fixed.

I'm not a big fan of defacto indentured servitude or a lot of the crap people end up saddled with under the schemes immigration middlemen and agencies come up with to skim off wages, take government funding, and other grifts.

I'm a big fan of success stories too, but those are almost always in spite of the immigration policies.
by parl_match | 2026-01-15 00:03:40+00:00
The only reason i have a pickup is because i put dirtbikes in it. They also fit in a van, but good luck finding a reasonably priced one with AWD (very high demand, especially due to camper conversions).

Vans are way better in almost every regard.

Actually, I'm buying a house with a garage and I may get a bike trailer, and a tow hitch for my BMW. That would be an even simpler solution
by landl0rd | 2026-01-15 00:04:07+00:00
I believe he's referring to the fact that social security, despite being billed as essentially a "retirement account" type program where e.g. silent gen paid in and got out roughly the same amount, it functions more like a ponzi scheme.

This is a consequence of the fact that, when the program was instituted, Roosevelt wanted to immediately start paying out to some people. So, boomers (very large generation) paid for their parents (relatively much smaller generation, meaning small per-person bill).

Now millennials and zoomers (relatively smaller generations) are expected to pay for boomers (much larger per-person bill). Between that, the incredible spending of medicare, and the federal propping-up of the housing market, a huge proportion of the economy has been dedicated to wealth transfer to the olds, an unproductive class who will be gone soon anyhow.
by Retr0id | 2026-01-15 00:04:31+00:00
By the way, pyca/cryptography is a really excellent cryptography library, and I have confidence that they're making the right decisions here. The python-level APIs are well thought-out and well documented. I've made a few minor contributions myself and it was a pleasant experience.

And my personal "new OpenSSL APIs suck" anecdote: https://github.com/openssl/openssl/issues/19612 (not my gh issue but I ran into the exact same thing myself)

> I set out to remove deprecated calls to SHA256_xxx to replace them with the EVP_Digestxxx equivalent in my code. However it seems the EVP code is slow. So I did a quick test (test case B vs C below), and it is indeed about 5x slower.
by Nevermark | 2026-01-15 00:04:35+00:00
> Every Country Should Set 16 as the Minimum Age for [Manipulation] Media Accounts

FTFY.

That is the real problem, no? The combination of surveillance, analysis of the surveilled data, very active feed manipulation based on that surveillance, and indirect business models that both finance and direct the specific manipulation.

Kids should be social. They should connect.

I think we do a grave disservice to our ability to reason about online safety by letting "social" be applied to what is largely interaction with adversarial/amoral value extracting algorithms, model-in-the-middle intermediating human connections, as if the result was any kind of natural social behavior.
by renewiltord | 2026-01-15 00:05:13+00:00
Does everyone know how often their peers fall sick? I’ve had maybe two illnesses in the last five years and I don’t do all this. In fact, I was masks off as soon as we were allowed to, traveled often via plane and train. I also was at many EDM shows as soon as they opened up.

I used to wear masks whenever I fell sick but it’s been a while. After the pandemic, though, everyone started using these as political symbols and I want to opt out of that personally. A thing I’d been doing for decades is suddenly some kind of statement. I’ve no problem looking out for others but if there’s enough schoolmarming over this, I might just not.

I think people are neurotic about this stuff but probably the reality is that others fall sick often and need to take these precautions and I don’t and therefore see no need to.

At the population level, if it’s worth it, then that’s fine but I think it’s not a given that these things are worth it.
by ziml77 | 2026-01-15 00:05:35+00:00
Not everyone is handling PII. Where I work, anything like that is only available to a very limited set of people who absolutely need to be able to see it. Also some systems allow access control at the column and even row level, so even if it's intermingled with other data you want the LLM to read, you might be able to mask it that way.

Also, people shouldn't be running any LLM on data of a business without a proper contract in place like you have with any vendor who has access to your data. And if there's specific PII requirements, those should be covered too.
by mintplant | 2026-01-15 00:06:07+00:00
> Now an outcome has been chosen for you, without your input. The situation is probably irreconcilable.

I think you've reversed cause and effect. SparkFun publicly cut off Adafruit in response to Adafruit's private contact with SparkFun. Only then did Adafruit put out a public post addressing SparkFun's vague public allegations.
by al_borland | 2026-01-15 00:06:12+00:00
I think she confused some things here. When people talk about being alone, they are often still doing stuff that involves outside input. Watching TV, scrolling social media, reading, listening to music, the list goes on.

The benefits mentioned in the video come from being alone with our thoughts, without any external input. This is the piece she missed.

With smart phones able to quickly and easily fill every gap of time, people are rarely alone with their thoughts anymore, there is almost always an outside influence to occupy the mind. The culture largely encourages this, with people encouraging us left and right to put on a podcast while doing dishes or having the TV on just for some background noise.

Cal Newport’s book Digital Minimalism dives deep into this topic. Talking about the value of time to be alone with our thoughts like this, while pulling many examples from history of people who consciously practiced this to center them and improve the quality of their thoughts and decision making.
by fc417fc802 | 2026-01-15 00:06:15+00:00
You could see that as a lack of detail of the problem as posed. Alternatively it's a breakdown when applying it as an analogy.

Time critical scenarios are one possibility.

In a safety critical scenario intermittent sensor failure might be possible but keep in mind that consistent failure is too.

A jury scenario is presumably one of consistent failure. There's no reason to expect that an intentional liar would change his answer upon being asked again.