skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I guess PG's original tweet assumes that cookie banners are a) bad, b) the fault of the EU, and C) unanticipated and unintended by the EU, thereby demonstrating their incompetence.

I can't really comment on what the lawmakers foresaw or intended, but I'd argue that cookie banners are actually a) good, and b) the fault of companies who can't imagine a better way to treat their users.

The reason I think they're good is that they cause a psychological nuisance to users of software which doesn't go out of their way to do them well or avoid their necessity. Over time I hope this will tend to cause an association in users minds that sites with cookie banners are somehow seedy or unscrupulous, like pop-up ads.
The problem isn't so much that economists don't know what they're doing. There are many questions which economists can answer quite clearly.

The problem is that economics has become the center of the entire operation of society, and is used inappropriately or where it is just irrelevant.

It should be self-evident that this is wrong; people don't care so much about being rich, as being richer than those around them. Far from being rational actors, human desires are easily manipulated. People who do not have anything to offer the market can't just 'cease trading', just as workers generally can't choose not to participate in the labor 'market'. Etc.

We need to operate society for the good of humanity, not for the benefit of 'the market' and 'profits'.
Some further truths can colour the reliability of each.

1) honesty is the constantly out of reach ideal that solves a huge portion of nearly all global problems

2) Everyone becomes worm food faster than they expect, and they care less about their legacy when they are dead than they expected and they are forgotten faster and more permanently than they expected.
The article makes that point. There is no law to put a giant banner that disturbs UX in your users face. Companies choose to do so. There only is a law that prevents companies from tracking you without consent.
It precedes the switch to ARM. My 2019 (last Intel generation) MBP also had this issue. And the previous one from 2015 (though that poor thing only had 8GB of RAM).
The downvotes are because the comment is not contributing to the topic at hand.
It tries to derail the topic by saying the same applies to other unrelated things.
And then it also fails to materialize that unrelated claim by not mentioning which other fields they are referring to or giving any evidence for the claim.
The comment I was referring to was talking about the UK, where we don't have a tipping culture in the same way the US does.

>They're legit

It is hard to know whethr they are working legally.
Hot take: rapid acceleration and braking are symptoms of bad driving, and bad driving should come with barriers to being on the road with us and landing in our insurance pools.

Driving information is fine to collect on public roads, and it should be ubiquitous rather than something collected in secret.

Meanwhile in Texas, red light cameras can’t even be used to give tickets anymore.
I normally dislike lists like this but I like some of these.

"It’s usually better to be nice than right."

"Nobody gets to their death bed and says, I’m sorry for trying so many things."
Fitting that it's "old.reddit.com" :P

72 is the new 60. I love the wisdom that comes with age however I hate the back pain.
can you build a website nowadays with analytics without using cookies? or violating GDPR?
Agreed. #4 tagged with (best tip) really got me. Should that not be number 1 then?
Media and Politics.

If the economist says what the politician already agrees with, then the politician doesn't need to look for another economist.

Also can replace "economist" with "think tank organisation".
i am getting better more cohesive results with claude.
The entity that has legislative power takes responsibility for unintended consequences of its legislation. At least this is how Anglo/Common Wealth cultures think about it. You can see that Germans think about this differently.
But that is what the title states and is explained in the article. There is no law that forces a cookie banner. There is a law that requires consent before tracking, but that is not necessarily about showing a banner - that is just one of the possible ways of complying with the law. There is an electronic privacy law, and it is quite comprehensive. There is no "cookie banner law".
How the hell does something like that even happen lol
But in real life, there is a spillover of cultural norm into science communities, thus controversies in the sciences are born. In my university there used to be these 2 competing professor (and their respective teams) working on Dark Energy vs Modified Gravity, and their rivalry was very known on the campus. Whenever an external speaker invited by either one, you'd expect a presence from the other with very sharp round of questioning. It made physics fun for us.
Advertising is “ground zero” for the cookie explosion because nobody trusts anybody in the advertising biz.

For instance the website selling ads has every reason to inflate view and click count numbers, the ad buyer has reasons to diminish those numbers. In fact if you measure an honest pipeline it is going to look that way because some people drop out at each stage.

One reason you have 87 trackers on a typical web site is that many sites and advertisers figure if they have a large number of trackers they can’t all be wrong.

Site X could show ads to users just fine without third-party cookies but then advertisers would not be so sure about the stats.
I wonder - why didn't the the EU put the burden on user agents a.k.a. web browsers to handle the cookie notices? When I visit a site, before saving any cookies, have my user agent ask me if I want to allow cookies for that site. Could have a default "no cookies" option with a whitelist, or default "yes" with a blacklist. It would have been so much easier, with a far more consistent UX, wouldn't it have? Now we have to put up with 1,000 different flavors of invasive banners, popups, "necessary cookies", etc.
Reconfigurable electronics: More functionality on less chip area
Recovery of 18th-century Spanish ship could begin in April
Most people don't even read or understand that pop-up. My girlfriend for example used Bing and Edge for a few years without realising it. She only learned about different browsers and search engines when she started a trainee program in a performance marketing firm and managing ad campaigns became her job.
There’s a law, but it’s not a “cookie banner law”. The section you quoted says nothing about banners. The banners are a design decision by the operators.
I propose focusing on the worst part: information collection on a massive scale. Even if it is not used right now by a spy. They can use what is collected at this moment against you at any point in the future.
Has anyone played with "D-Modem" [1]

"D-Modem replaces a softmodem’s physical hardware with a SIP stack. Instead of passing audio to and from the software DSP over an analog phone line, audio travels via the RTP (or SRTP) media streams of a SIP VoIP call." [2]

Seems pretty cool.

[1] https://github.com/AonCyberLabs/D-Modem?tab=readme-ov-file
[2] https://www.aon.com/cyber-solutions/aon_cyber_labs/introduci...
I wrote a new JIT compiler for PostgreSQL
He's saying that if borders at the time had been more open to immigration from Europe, the European workers could have displaced black workers who migrated internally (within the US that is).

I should not think he ever supported 'letting Detroit factory owners hire only whites', but rather he's saying that his previous position that immigration (from abroad) has little or no disadvantages to domestic workers did not take into account this example and he has adjusted his position accordingly.

That an economist, even one of great stature such as himself, would have been blind to endemic racism within the power structures of society is, well, the point of his article.
What about: look after your body.
Sadly, we are. I didn't ever think of myself as an optimist until I realised just how pessimistic it is possible to become, as I've learned in the last 5 or so years. Now I realise I was quite an optimistic person, at least by comparison with my present self.
A useful feature of uBlockOrigin is being able to block all media elements larger than a given amount such as 50KB. Wish I could set it to only do this on mobile networks and let wifi stay unlimited.
Implementation of mixture of experts language model in a single file of PyTorch
A from scratch implementation of a sparse mixture of experts language model in a single file of PyTorch. This is inspired by and largely based on Andrej Karpathy's project 'makemore' and borrows a number of re-usable components from that implementation. Just like makemore, makeMoE is also an autoregressive character-level language model but uses the aforementioned sparse mixture of experts architecture. I added Expert Capacity to this implementation to make it more complete
> The govt would not be doing this to get a piece of the pie

Ok so we'd be fine with the money collected from it being just burned then?

Because unless you're going to do that then they profit from it.

> Financial inventives and disincentives like these are used effectively all over the world

Heavy [citation needed] caveat, wild to me that so many people think the solution to problems is giving the government a slice of the pie.
They don't need moral ground just agency to act against the greater evil.
That’s because dark matter is frequently referred to as a theory. It’s not. Dark matter is a set of observations which we try to account for in our theories. New theories which account for some observations of dark matter but ignore others are rightfully considered suspect.
The simple yet powerful math we don't talk about [video]
Redditors always write the most boring, uninspiring, safe, mediocre advice.

No soul, adventure or brutal honesty
"Gospel of the shower" and other slang from 1909
I don’t do much on internet, i don’t have facebook nor other various socials, just HN, or read simple docs, or code. Otherwise I’m AFK. Now since October Ive visited 4 sites that were not simple reading stuff, that I had to interact or do various level of meaningful stuff, and all 4 had issues and were expecting me to call support etc. I hope in the future of software development there are more automated tests and less hiring managers
How many "normies" do you know that stopped visiting websites that track them? I don't know anybody who isn't in my tech bubble who cares, and very few normies who would rather pay money than to give access to their data.
Author here. Thanks for asking. One key objective is not to be yet another linksite, but add utility by providing direct shortcuts to code, docs, api references etc. next to the main link.
Uhm, yes, you are right.
Being old doesn't make you wise or particularly knowledgeable.
Your point is well made, and this is an unfortunate consequence of the regulation (and I enjoyed the analogy). But it isn't necessary to have cookie banners on every website. Github is a moderately complex, user-optimised website, right? https://github.blog/2020-12-17-no-cookie-for-you/
>, Paul Graham came up with the thought, that the EU forces companies to have cookie banners. There is no law for cookie banners. [...] Companies could easily avoid any cookie banner. Just don’t track.

KingOfCoders/amazingcto, of course you are technically correct but Paul Graham wasn't talking about the letter of the law.

Instead, you have to interpret his complaint with the lens of game theory. I.e. The Law of Unintended Consequences that takes into account what companies actually do in response to laws instead of what we hope they will do.

Your blog post focused on good intentions of the law. PG's tweet focused on actual outcome.
Why is this guy pontificating in this topic if he is not a lawyer?
Now combine this approach with concepts of no-code, which takes the task of writing lines of code out of the path from concept to production. An AI could easily create instructions that could be fed to bubble to create an app. Either bubble is already working on this or someone else is and bubble will miss the boat.
> Almost all websites make money through ads,

Doesn't require tracking of individuals.

> or at least keep logs of user activity to help them optimize their website

Doesn't require tracking of individuals.
How does the type of image (Anime, vs Photo realistic, vs Painting vs etc .m) affect the compression results? Is there a noticable difference?
Ask HN: Hiring.md Repository File
Wouldn't it be great if you could see who is hiring directly by searching on github for HIRING.md files?

Do you see any pitfalls to that?
But this is exactly what the article is saying.
nope. i've been trying to figure out what's going on by piecing together western-leaning and russian-leaning sources together like a jigsaw. my assumption is that both sides generally tell truths that suit them while ignoring truths that don't suit them, and both will admit that something has gone wrong once it becomes difficult to hide.

here's an example of a western admission that Russia is currently ahead in electronic warfare:

https://archive.is/fxdjy
There is a law, that does not mandate cookie banners, but that still causes them by creating incentives to show the banner. That's the point of criticism.
Or it's playing cards all the way down.

I see the whole thing collapsing from bad PR and taking the companies down with it.

Good riddance.

And give me my stick shift back.
The illusion of control. In a life that is anything but certain. Tales of the ego.
Agreed, but tackling the poverty/food access issue is a pareto issue IMHO - get the wide masses out of poverty and provide equal access to healthy food supplies will get rid of a large chunk of the issue.
I believe distributing media for archival purposes should be legal and that unpaid enjoyers of the media are more likely to correctly preserve the media than the rights holders.

This has been proven over and over, where the rights holder copy of a movie is low quality with poor sound, has cut content and poor translations and the unpaid archivist copy is closer to the directors intentions.
Given how heterodox the Austrian school is: what would it even mean to have an Austrian economic system and how would it differ (and some Austrian ideas are part of "mainstream" economics anyway)?
Do you know what basic OS runs on your network card? Bios? Wifi router? Internet provider's whole infrastructure with built-in advanced deep packet inspection?

It has been mentioned here in the past - in US there comes a guy (some 3-letter agency, probably NSA), installs new black box at ISP, and goes, nobody has a clue what that thingie does, mandated by law. That was before providers decided to just sell data themselves too (scrubbed probably, but not nearly well enough).

I get you have most of the stuff covered, fine for you, but its nowhere near 100%. And literally any phone out there is like swiss cheese all the way down to wifi chip OS from ie Broadcom.
This is something a lot of people seem to misunderstand about GDPR. At its core it says you should only process people’s personal data within a lawful basis. There are 6, and consent is only one.

(a) Consent: the individual has given clear consent for you to process their personal data for a specific purpose.

(b) Contract: the processing is necessary for a contract you have with the individual, or because they have asked you to take specific steps before entering into a contract.

(c) Legal obligation: the processing is necessary for you to comply with the law (not including contractual obligations).

(d) Vital interests: the processing is necessary to protect someone’s life.

(e) Public task: the processing is necessary for you to perform a task in the public interest or for your official functions, and the task or function has a clear basis in law.

(f) Legitimate interests: the processing is necessary for your legitimate interests or the legitimate interests of a third party, unless there is a good reason to protect the individual’s personal data which overrides those legitimate interests.
The last

mother-of-all-recessions where the accumulated debt and unhealthy investment comes crashing down.

that happened in the U.S. was before Keynesian principles were used. It was the use of Keynesian principles that helped FDR win 3 elections.

Im not an economist so anyone with a moderate amount of training will run circles around me in a discussion about economics. So I’ll just say two more things. Your comment about Austrian economics never having been implemented reminds me of leftists who say communism has never been implemented so we can’t say communism doesn’t work. Secondly, before Keynesian economics recessions and depressions occurred much more frequently in the U.S. The data seems to clearly point to at least some level of success of Keynesian economics.
Is there something like this that is more broad than LLMs?
Great example: Neither hacker news, nor that linked article needed a cookie banner.
העבר אין
העתיד עדיין
ההווה כהרף עין
דאגה מנין

Not worth translating unfortunately, it would lose its charm

EDIT: Sorry all! I'll do my best.

The past is no longer,

the Future is not yet.

The present is like a blink of an eye,

So, where does worry come from?

But it rhymes and has a great whimsical feel which is very much lost in translation
Because it's not about cookies. It's a much broader statement than that about how the company is allowed to handle your data.
I9-14900KS and top AMD chips run laps around Apple chips.

They shouldn't even be compared since they target different audiences.
Yeah, I regularly see (and attend) talks on reproducibility, repeatability, and replicability. It’s a problem in some areas, but not exactly hidden away. It is openly discussed and people are actively seeking solutions.
I was shocked when I learned the current economic models don't even account for energy inputs. Supposedly if you decide all energy inputs suddenly stop, GDP is predicted to drop on the order of 5-10% instead of, say, cease to exist
There are issues for ones that don't use iLok or any bad DRM system at all. Kilohearts plugins, for example. 14.4 is bad, Apple makes it harder and harder to not have your computer updated (including forcing major OS upgrades on users back in January and bypassing password authentication to do it, linked to multiple times here) and their software quality is not so good these days.
Using your analogy, I think what ends up happening is that even companies that don't collect hidden fees will put up a banner just in case.

Not only that, I'm not an EU citizen and I'm not browsing websites based in EU but I'm still bombarded with cookie banners non-stop.
This is 100% what PG means IMO and the most sane take on this. Either write the law correctly so it's not easily bypassed or just don't touch anything because you will only make it worse.
I volunteer at a refugee charity. In my experience people given the right to stay will take whatever work they can get, which is often crappy work at low wages due to lack of transferable skills and/or English (e.g. security guard).
Yes and also everyone else.
when you criticise a person to convey your ideas, it doesn't change their minds.

criticizing the "stuff" is okay, this is how we advance, but not the "person"
> On this issue in the group that complain about the cookie law there are some people who are very wrong on purpose because it's in their interest, and some people who are very wrong because they genuinely don't understand the position they're defending, complaining about being made aware of the fee, instead of the fees themselves or the fact that the companies hide them if not forced by law.

The reality is that I (and others who are complaining, as well as many who have resigned themselves to their fate) are happy to have a website "track me", certainly if the cost of non-tracking are having to click away an annoying popup, and think that people who compare a website wanting to know the number of their visitors to "hidden fees" are kind of being ridiculous.
I think you might not have fully grasped the meaning of the post. Let me rephrase it for clarity: there is no cookie banner law, but a consent law, but it doesn't need to be as ugly, intrusive or user-unfriendly as the current cookie banners. One alternative is to opt out of using cookies on your website entirely (which is what I do, by the way), and then you won't need to ask for consent. Or to use a simple, unremarkable, bar.
I get this kind of feeling often when I ride my motorbike.
Like just the materials alone, a variety of steels, aluminium, copper, ..., different plastics each chosen for their specific purpose, from insulation around cables to rubbery seals so the housing of the headlight.
How many people are actually involved just gathering and refining the raw materials?

And all of these parts play together in harmony, so that I hop on and just start driving with no second thought.

I take the machine for granted, sure its a hobby but its also what I drive to work with.
But it is a marvel of engineering no matter how I look at it.
> are cookie banners really so frustrating

They would be a LOT less frustrating if:

a) they were standardized — they currently add a hefty cognitive load while parsing them, deciding which action to take, etc.

b) they worked properly — I would say, more often than not, they 'forget' the previous setting. I should never see a cookie popup on the same site twice unless I clear my browser settings.
I'm sorry, what data is stolen? If I remember your name after we meet, have I stolen your data?
You are citing directive that does not apply in all cases.

It is amended by Directive 2009/136/EC, which changes especially the cookies part.

> (66) Third parties may wish to store information on the equipment of a user, or gain access to information already stored, for a number of purposes, ranging from the legitimate (such as certain types of cookies) to those involving unwarranted intrusion into the private sphere (such as spyware or viruses). It is therefore of paramount importance that users be provided with clear and comprehensive information when engaging in any activity which could result in such storage or gaining of access. The methods of providing information and offering the right to refuse should be as user-friendly as possible. Exceptions to the obligation to provide information and offer the right to refuse should be limited to those situations where the technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user. Where it is technically possible and effective, in accordance with the relevant provisions of Directive 95/46/EC, the user’s consent to processing may be expressed by using the appropriate settings of a browser or other application. The enforcement of these requirements should be made more effective by way of enhanced powers granted to the relevant national authorities.

If you read the exceptions part, you know that you don't need a banner on strictly necessary case.
> You don’t need a banner for the data that is necessary for the service to work at minimum level.

We were advised by our lawyers (a top SV tech law firm) that we should include a cookie banner in the EU even if we're only using cookies for functions like login. After eventually switching legal counsel (for unrelated reasons), we were told the same thing by our new counsel.

Either EU law covers cookie banners that use cookies for routine functionality, or it's so (deliberately) vague that even top tech law firms would rather everyone add a cookie banner than risk running afoul of the law. Either case validates PG's argument here.
Of course you can. What is it you want to do that you think you can't do?