skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Consider the Volkswagen scandal where code was written that fudged the results when in an emissions testing environment.

The only person to see major punishment for that was the software dev that wrote the code, but that decision to write that code involved far more people up the chain. THEY should be held accountable in some way or else nothing prevents them from using some other poor dev as a scapegoat.
Executives have always used decision-making tools. That’s not the point. The point is that the executive can’t point to the computer and say “I just did what it said!” The executive is the responsible party. She or he makes the choice to follow the advice of the decision-making tool or not.
That would be a disaster of epic proportions. Every thread, no matter how innocuous the topic, would devolve into perpetual feuds about which kinds of people were upvoting and downvoting which other kinds. These sorts of shitstorms were pretty common on HN, in the long-long-ago, and even then all we were revealing were comment scores, not voting attribution.
The danger is that in a system without any meaningful rule of law, people will turn to violence as a means of achieving justice. This is an incredibly dangerous road we're going down.
> I am now WAY less terrified that the bureaucracy will be weaponized against people whose only crime was to disagree with the party in power.

As a bisexual queer lefty computer programmer I wish I shared that confidence, as does ever queer or trans person I know.
If my attention is so cheap I would definitely like to pay $5/ year to not have to see ads.
Maybe. The first test will be on February, 5, when there are scheduled protests in all state capitols. There's also https://generalstrikeus.com.
Sure, a cold war has started and China is the enemy. But why make enemies out of your closest allies?

The US tried tariffs during Japan's rise as an automobile powerhouse. Look where that's left the American auto industry.

Sanctions have their place as a carrot and stick mechanism. But Trump offers no carrots. Only stick.
Meanwhile BYD sales are up 83%.

https://electrek.co/2025/02/03/byd-sales-overseas-surge-new-...
And kids would actually pull quite a lot of the weight back then too. "Clean your room" more like you are coming to the farm with me today boy and splitting the firewood for mother later.
I struggle to remember the last time that anyone who wasn't made of straw said to trust the mainstream media.
Free as in freedom, or free as in beer?
Where do I email?
The implication here is that unlike a computer, a person or a corporation can be held accountable. I'm not sure that's true.

Consider all of the shenanigans at OpenAI: https://www.safetyabandoned.org/

Dozens of employees have left due to lack of faith in the leadership, and they are in the process of converting from nonprofit to for-profit, all but abandoning their mission to ensure that artificial intelligence benefits all humanity.

Will anything stop them? Can they actually be held accountable?

I think social media, paradoxically, might make it harder to hold people and corporations accountable. There are so many accusations flying around all the time, it can be harder to notice when a situation is truly serious.
Hi, I’m a game developer.

> in modern gaming you just make every texture max size even though it only covers a tiny surface

This completely false. Not even hyperbole, just plain false. We have budgets, we have tools. You need higher res textures for things that are smaller because you can get close to them. Is there waste? Sure, but no more so than in any other field. My local newspaper takes 15 seconds to load on gigabit WiFi, and hangs on scroll. Reddit can’t handle more than one tab open. Slack uses more ram than the game im developing sometimes. Even HN still falls flat on its face with a “moderately” popular link, and can’t handle it if you perform too many operations.

> A huge portion of NVidia and AMD GPU drivers is literally hacks to make games actually run well.

This is because nvidia and AMD offer this as service but without access to your codebase. The days of them being required to function are long behind us.

> Titanfall 1 shipped with like 30gb of uncompressed audio. They did this to "reduce CPU load". In 2014.

As I’ve said many times, you might disagree but it was intentional. The Xbox one was an 8x1. 75GHz CPU, and some of that was reserved for system use

All software is shit, and held together by duct tape. All industries have products that we can point at and call a disgrace - it’s not games that are the problem.
I just had to fix this for my kid over the weekend. https://steamcommunity.com/app/2767030/discussions/0/5962604... was very helpful:

You can also skip the UAC prompt without editing the registry, by adding the following to the game's launch options in Steam:

cmd /min /C "set __COMPAT_LAYER=RUNASINVOKER && start "" %command%"
This one is working:

https://web.archive.org/web/20250202235355/https://www.wired...
I used it for a couple of years but I find Thunderbird to be better.
Disappointing that red hat is basically validating open weights as open source, and excusing it by saying this:

> The majority of improvements and enhancements to AI models now taking place in the community do not involve access to or manipulation of the original training data. Rather, they are the result of modifications to model weights or a process of fine tuning which can also serve to adjust model performance.

Well yes, because they have no access to anything more. With training source code and data they might do something different. If you don’t have all the things used to produce the final result, it’s not open source.
This feels very "I'm 12 and this is deep".

If a bridge collapses, are you blaming the cement?
AI-assisted targeting in the Gaza Strip
I mean, these "kids" are rockstars. Why are they being juvenilized by the Wired writer?
How is "I condition myself to fail" the conclusion from the description of what happened?

If there is little or no interest from the audience, then there is no action available other than changing the project and trying again.
so if someone makes a change to the system… there’s a person somewhere holding themselves accountable for the faults of the system, no?
After getting away with his first hack you would think he would be content with only $16 million? greed kills
I'm curious if you read the fact check?

The most charitable interpretation is 243 Chargers.

According to the AP[0] it's 214

[0] https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-electric-vehicle-charg...
There is certainly a transfer of power going on, but whether that's unlawful will be for the courts to decide.
As decided by elected officials.
100%, can we not normalize this kind of thing in multiplayer games played by humans?

My friends and I have quit a number of multiplayer computer games when they've become infested with cheaters and developers couldn't or wouldn't keep up with the arms race of banning them. This is really not that different from someone writing and using an aimbot in a public lobby for a shooter.

If you're going to be writing and testing cheats or AI or bots do it in single player games or private multiplayer lobbies so normal players aren't affected.
Charlottesville, VA!!!

The area between UVA's campus and downtown is walkable and continues to develop. Charlottesville has mild winters and beautiful falls. UVA has a gorgeous campus and lots of programming.

The town punches above its weight with respect to the food scene and is surrounded by wineries. The Shenandoah mountains are close by. There is an airport in the town that makes it less remote.
No-Panic Rust: A Nice Technique for Systems Programming
I always thought the same when seeing that XKCD comic, but turns out it was the opposite. PS3 hack (2010) came 3 years after the XKCD comic(2007), they even used it as one of slides during 27C3 presentation. https://media.ccc.de/v/27c3-4087-en-console_hacking_2010#t=2...
This hits the nail on the head. The issue is that humans are accountable, but systems are not. And smart humans learned how to hide behind systems to avoid accountability. That's the whole strategy of using corporations, a social structure that removes individuals from responsibility. A corporation can do pretty much anything, including criminal acts, and the humans benefiting from it are shield from the negative results except for financial losses. What we're seeing is just the whole strategy moving into the level of computer systems (and Google has already used this accountability skirting strategy for more than two decades).
I just press my nail into it, to avoid scratching but to still cause the counter-itching effect.
In this context, prevention. So people see what happens if they screw up in a negligent way and make sure to not do it themselves.
You said we - possibly there is a flaw in my grammer. How should I be referring to this "we"? Isn't the "I" to "We" transform applied to "you" still "you"? I thought "you" could be plural for groups.

I don't think going from "we" to "they" would be appropriate although in hindsight it might have been a better choice.
Nah, heh, nobody needed any additional reasons.
So no more predicting the weather with sensors?
The Death of the Pitch
The X post in that last link is in response to a suspended account. Screenshot for those wondering is here:

https://x.com/jessesingal/status/1886479301081522599

(The names it includes are already in the Wired article)
What exactly is terrible about it other than that you disagree?
Construction companies don’t shrug and blame the concrete. Or at least nowhere near as often as companies that employ software in their customer interactions.
Fascinating, I hadn't heard of WARC - thanks for the pointer and I'll consider it.
Musk doesn't do that. He bought a company and claims all the credit for it, he's just a rich brat using daddy's blood money.
It's a reasonable question. Looking back, I can see how it seems that way. On the contrary, I believe people should do what they want. I've always supported my sister, my nephew, my friends and their kids, and their kids' friends. I've voted 'yes' to transgender policy for as long as it's been an issue.

It's only after struggling to motivate my lifelong liberal friends to vote that I started to re-think my opinion and research more. And, now my opinion is more mixed. I've read a few of the landmark papers on suicide rates for instance. And, there are big problems with the methodologies. However, you can't question or you will get labelled a bigot.

Maybe I'm too utilitarian, but I've been working toward liberal / progressive goals for the last 30 years. And, I just saw most get set back 30 years largely because of this wedge issue.

And, I don't not support them now. But, I feel like the approach that's being taken is unrealistic and way too heavy-handed and top down. It's not a strategy that will succeed, but it's taking a lot down with it.

I hope transgender activists will take a more pragmatic approach in the future. I hope they understand that lots of people over 40 can't relate to what they're talking about. This is different from other social justice activism in which most people could at least kind of relate to. Activists should also work on better outreach and good-will activities so that the average person recognizes them as nice, kind, and helpful people. You're not going to win support by shouting at people online. And, be happy with incremental wins. Changing culture takes time.
Ironically, one of the founders of DOGE(nee USDS), Mikey Dickerson, was caught colluding with billionaire Reid Hoffman to spread misinformation ahead of a 2017 election in Alabama in favor of Democrats.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon...
He's going to nationalize a foreign social media company? Can we do United Healthcare next?
> Large apartment buildings of course do have trash chutes leading to a dumpster of some sort

The bags therein get put out on the street in a big pile, however. Or they did before the new bin situation.
>The US probably hasn't been this economically dominant since after WWII.

now look at the deficits.
The trend towards the glorification of failure is annoying. Failure sucks for many reasons: wasted time and other resources, disappointment, worsening mental health, and so on.
Surely the company that is making profit out of said build systems and providing attestations holds some accountability. Someone wrote the code. Someone paid for the code to be written to a particular standard, under particular budget and resourcing constraints. Someone was responsible for ensuring the code was adequately audited. Someone claimed it was fit for purpose, and likely insured it as such, because they are ultimately responsible.
Either you're too bad (at best average; same thing I guess?) or the company management is shit. Either way you should not be in that company. So what's the problem?
Yes, but adults who have ADHD, but neither know it nor suspect they may have it, will look for alternative explanations to make sense of their consistent failures at things other people seem to handle fine. A common one they arrive at is character flaws. They'll see themselves as lazy or childish, and as they try and fail to correct it, they'll internalize guilt and shame.

"Surely everyone else gets distracted this much" is exactly the kind of belief that creates and reinforces feelings of guilt.
Regarding using WebAssembly as a plugin API, like for zed:

how do plugin developers debug their code?
Is there a way for them to do breakpoint debugging for example? What happens if their code crash, do they get a stacktrace?
Location: USA
Remote: FLEXIBLE
Willing to relocate: YES
Technologies: FIGMA, ADOBE XD, SKETCH, MIRO, ADOBE CREATIVE SUITE
Résumé/CV: https://www.linkedin.com/in/srushti-sarwate/

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AHbRzWo8WG5g_BXeFKKd1cMgUF7...
Email:srusun@gmail.com

Hi, I am Srushti - a servicedesigner, with experience in UX design.
Imagine if some member of the bin Laden family was high on something and had rumors of their cousin's shenanigans and were spilling them out on some IRC channel or BBS or whatever, and that guy happened upon them and tried to alert the police, only to be dismissed as a lunatic and end up in prison for unrelated reasons while the disaster happened. That would be a true Kafkian nightmare.
Key word here is "cannot be elected more than twice". So as long as there is no official election, he is not technically violating the constitution by remaining in power. I'm playing devil's advocate here.
My point is that our debt only grows unsustainably in response to severe crises (the great financial crisis, COVID). Our deficit is otherwise sustainable during "normal" times as our economy grows alongside it. We of course should want our debt to GDP ratio to be declining during periods of peace and prosperity (and it is evidence of political malfeasance that we haven't seen that happen since the late 90s). But our current spending is not a crisis in it's own right.
One has to take in the broader picture. The DOGE events are one piece of the puzzle. It was only last week that far-right thugs were pardoned unconditionally by the President.

Some people hold conservative views, some liberal and others a mix. People have "tribes", but that's not what this is about.

What is happening is not good if you view rule of law and liberal democracy as being good things.
You misunderstand the term.

Negative externalities implies the net externalities are negative for some 3rd party, not just that there’s any negatives.

Economists don’t want to discourage net positive activities like exercise because they have some downsides. ‘People get hurt at the gym and occasionally miss work!’ isn’t a compelling argument. Frankly it’s meaningless to look at downsides in isolation, all that tells you is what scale it’s operating at.

Suppose smoking retained the unpleasant odor, but the health effects where reversed so smokers and people breathing second hand smoke lived significantly longer and healthier lives. Would economists suggest taxing it more to limit how many people smoked or limit where they could smoke? Of course not even though it had some downsides in terms of odor the benefits would hypothetically outweigh them.
Yeah, I never understood why they couldn't make it Dec-Feb-Jan with January at the end of the year so that Janus could still be the god of transitions, but I guess I'm no theologian so there is probably a reason.
The article leaves out optimizing is_leap_year. Here is an interesting version that is correct (in the Proleptic Gregorian calendar) for 0 <= year <= 102499 and takes only 3 instructions:

((year * 1073750999) & 3221352463) <= 126976

How this works is surprisingly complex, I am thinking of writing a whole blog post about it...
Fwiw I agree with you.

I feel that in general people obsess over assigning blame to the detriment of actually correcting the situation.

Take the example of punishing crimes. If we don’t punish theft, we’ll get more theft right? But what do you do when you have harsh penalties for crime, but crime keeps happening? Do you accept crime as immutable, or actually begin to address root causes to try to reduce crime systemically?

Punishment is only one tool in a toolbox for correcting bad behavior. I am dismayed that people are fearful enough of the loss of this single tool as to want to architect our entire society around making sure it is available.

With AI we have a chance to chart a different course. If a machine makes a mistake, the priority can and should be fixing the error in that machine so the same mistake can never happen again. In this way, fixing an AI can be more reliable than trying to punish human beings ever could.
I love when this paper pops up, because now I get to recommend a relevant episode of a really great, really nerdy podcast:

https://futureofcoding.org/episodes/061.html
My own experience mainly, only Gemma seems to have been any good for Slavic languages so far, and only the 27B when unquantized is reliable enough to be in any way usable.

Ravenwolf posts tests on his German benchmarks every so often in locallama and most models seem to do well enough, but I've heard some claims from people about Mistral's being their favorite models in German anyhow. And I think Mistral-Large scores higher than Llama-405B in French on lmsys and that's at least something one would expect from a French company.
No, if there are multiple people who in principle are not directly coordinated to make that happen. They can always point the finger at others and say they're not responsible for that bad outcome.
I was about to say the same thing, the whole thing is just confusing to me. There doesn't appear to be any game.
The US Supreme Court is the original constitutional court. It invented the idea that courts can rule on the constitutionality of laws and governmental actions (in Marbury v. Madison, 1803).

Some more recent constitutions have established a separate court that only rules on constitutional issues, but the US doesn't have that.
It just means a virtual onsite type interview process. Real time interviews for both skill and cultural fit.
Seems like a mostly reasonable list of things to not let AI do without better safety evals.

> AI that tries to infer people’s emotions at work or school

I wonder how broadly this will be construed. For example if an agent uses CoT and they needs emotional state as part of that, can it be used in a work or school setting at all?
The scary thing for me is when they've got an 18 year old drone operator making shoot/no-shoot decision on the basis of some AI metadata analysis tool (phone A was near phone B, we shot phone B last week...).

You end up with "Computer says shoot" and so many cooks involved in the software chain that no one can feasibly be held accountable except maybe the chief of staff or the president.
Peter Theil is running America
We should keep tapping the sign as long as people are still using "computer says no; nothing can be done" as a serious argument.
Unfortunately TLS happens inside the the application, not in the kernel, so using eBPF to hook syscalls to write won't help with TLS decryption.
Nobody wants to play multiplayer (only) games with cheaters. It is that simple.

Esports money...? Micro transactions is the money. Publisher driven esports is advertising.
I applaud these guys and the work they're doing. Any bureaucracy, public or private, with access to a guaranteed income stream will grow like a tumor. The entire federal govt needs to be audited and gutted. The time for committees, reports and similar half measures is over.
Any plays on who is gonna win the Super Bowl? If I were you I’d find a betting market and put ALL my money on your claim.

Edit: Daww, no sense of humor?
It's definitely inferable contact info
Location: New York
Remote: Yes
Willing to relocate: No
Technologies: Rust, Python, Javascript, Typescript, React, HTML, CSS, Shaders/webGL, C++, Linux, Docker, Tauri, OpenFrameworks
Résumé/CV: https://skyler.io/resume.pdf
Email: skyler[at]skyler.io

I’m a developer with a passion for building and problem-solving that extends far beyond the code I write. I bring a hands-on, creative approach to everything I do – whether it’s designing and building custom tiny homes out of buses and vans, or developing innovative solutions to everyday challenges. I have experience in welding, woodworking, electronics, and mechanical design, and I thrive on finding unique ways to merge technology and sustainability. From turning discarded materials into functional objects to powering my workshop entirely off the grid, I’m always looking for ways to reduce waste and make a positive environmental impact.

Outside of development, I enjoy diving into projects that allow me to combine my technical skills with my creative side – whether that’s composing music, crafting custom upholstery, or designing quirky contraptions for an annual race of pedal-powered sculptures. My background as a technician running cables and setting up networks also means I’m highly adaptable and comfortable in hands-on, fast-moving environments. Ultimately, I’m a maker at heart, and I love bringing fresh, practical solutions to any challenge I encounter.
In AI crap, I think this crops up as, giant company asks vendor, "Indemnify us against XYZ, but we also want to own everything." My dude, that's what owning the thing entails: taking liability for it.

The punchline will be that people will agree to whatever smoke and mirrors leads to sales.
"General limitations under Win32s (131896)", surviving technical note.

https://ftp.zx.net.nz/pub/archive/ftp.microsoft.com/MISC/KB/...
The electoral college was created to prevent a majority from doing such things, but having the electoral college override the will of the people creates all sorts of problems (and possible tit-for-tat in future elections).
There must be a whole bootleg health system by now in the shadows , that is single payer and non-hostile/helping. Wait till the debtdoctor passes then go to the real one in some back alley .
Agreed! But you shouldn't be yelling at them about their age
Given the computer vision approach, I'm surprised they didn't try different themes other than the Fire Emblem: Three Houses theme. There are many other themes for Tetris 99 with likely better visual clarity for the tetriminos.
it's hard for me to understand how "pretty old" could excuse something as simple as not incrementing some 64 bit counters correctly.
That's a very valid argument. Both SpaceX and Tesla are quite capital efficient. Maybe another angle to consider is what's being optimized for? What outcomes would be considered successful for these federal agencies? That's probably going to tell us more about whether the austerity measures that seem likely result in more efficient use of resources to create successful outcomes.

One thing that seems worth think through more is whether the stated outcomes of those agencies is what's actually be optimized for, or whether those are suborned for personal gain by a few parties.