<rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>Hacker News: astar1</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=astar1</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Sat, 18 Apr 2026 10:58:20 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=astar1" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "India: Income Tax Bill allows officials to forcibly access social media, email"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>hmm, this Economist article from earlier this month shows just how bad things are in India:
<a href="https://archive.is/bttaV" rel="nofollow">https://archive.is/bttaV</a><p>The last thing india needs is more bureaucracy and regulations and restrictions on personal freedoms (not to mention a free press which they've plummeted since the current PM's party took control).</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 21 Jul 2025 21:56:28 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640872</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640872</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640872</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Africa's gigantic $80B dam could transform entire continent"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>>To put it in perspective, it will have a generating capacity far greater than that of the Three Gorges dams in China and Itaipu in Brazil. With a projected capacity to produce 40.000 megawatts of power, the Grand Inga Dam is more than just an ambitious megaproject.<p>Am I missing something here?<p>Three Gorges damn has capacity of 80, the new Tibet dam that China already started building has a capacity 300 megawatts
<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/21/china-starts-building-world-biggest-hydropower-dam-yarlung-tsangpo-river-tibet" rel="nofollow">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/21/china-starts-b...</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 21 Jul 2025 21:11:04 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640457</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640457</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640457</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "DeepSeek R2 launch stalled as CEO balks at progress"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>almost as well as o3? kind of like gemini 2.5? I dug deeper and surprise surprise: <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/03/deepseek-may-have-used-googles-gemini-to-train-its-latest-model/" rel="nofollow">https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/03/deepseek-may-have-used-goo...</a><p>I am not at all surprised, the CCP views AI race as absolutely critical for their own survival...</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 28 Jun 2025 10:34:28 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403672</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403672</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403672</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "DeepSeek R2 launch stalled as CEO balks at progress"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This, my guess is OpenAI wised up after r1 and put safeguards in place for o3 that it didn't have for o1, hence the delay.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 28 Jun 2025 09:04:39 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403265</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403265</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44403265</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "X's new "encrypted" XChat feature doesn't seem to be any more secure"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>lol!</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 04 Jun 2025 09:30:39 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44178814</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44178814</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44178814</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Evidence of controversial Planet 9 uncovered in sky surveys taken 23 years apart"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>it's a Mass Relay</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 05 May 2025 04:17:30 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43891906</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43891906</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43891906</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>oh i forgot to add, the internet penetration rate is around 50% in India, so 50% of the population can't even access youtube on demand.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 02 May 2025 00:52:52 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43865077</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43865077</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43865077</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>> they do not suffer any setbacks<p>hmm:
<a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/10/13/india-arrests-raids-target-critics-government" rel="nofollow">https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/10/13/india-arrests-raids-targ...</a><p>> Second point the Indian leader arrested was involved in huge scams in liquor and policy.<p>unproven, and the timing could not have been more suspicious:<p>"Amnesty International, an international human rights group said that the arrest of Kejriwal and the "freezing of Indian National Congress’ bank accounts", a few weeks before India's general elections showed "the authorities’ blatant failure to uphold the country’s international human rights obligations".[45][46]"<p>> Despite extradition treaty Canada has become a safe harbor of terrorists and refused to extradite terrorists even after repeated requests by India.<p>How about despite an extradition treaty, India has never submitted a claim against these so called terrorists and like normal democracies use the courts to argue their case for extradition. In Canada the courts are generally far more independent than those in India. Note - speech calling for a separate state by itself is not terrorism in any country that values free speech (heck half of Quebec regularly does this), only calling or acting for violence means crossing that line, i haven't seen any evidence for the latter (but I'm open to be proven wrong - from independent credible sources unlike those you listed).<p>> Reversing the trend ? Are you kidding me.<p>Yes, according to the article I originally cited and others, India has become less democratic. Caste violence and religious tension (i.e. chants of "love jihad") seems to have gotten worse - true to India's founders video in the 1950's I shared of democracy in India.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2025 21:09:24 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863392</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863392</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863392</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>it's still no where near the same. Adani, india's richest man, has close connections to Modi and is under indictment by the US for bribery: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indictment_against_Gautam_Adani_et_al" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indictment_against_Gautam_Adan...</a> .<p>He also bought one of india's last major independent traditional media outlets (NDTV) years ago. The comparison I can think of is if MSNBC, CNN, and Fox News were all run like Fox news in terms of alignment with Trump. In a country where 25% the population is illiterate this is especially concerning as a significant portion of the electorate can only access their news from traditional media (TV, radio).</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 01 May 2025 20:52:52 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863228</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863228</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43863228</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Indian court orders blocking of Proton Mail"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It's becoming an illiberal democracy like Turkey. Which is still a lot different than the US imo.<p>e.g.:<p>-After a decade of Modi rule, India now ranked 161 out of 180 in the world press freedom index: <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/22/media/india-elections-press-freedom-decline-intl-hnk/index.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/22/media/india-elections-press-f...</a><p>-Political opponents have been arrested on trumped up charges before elections: 
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest_of_Arvind_Kejriwal" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest_of_Arvind_Kejriwal</a><p>-Extrajudicial killings on Canadian soil and possible attempt on US soil before they were caught (despite extradition agreements between India and these countries): <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/india-government-agent-assassination-plot-sikh-nationalist-canada-rcna176048" rel="nofollow">https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/india-government-agent-as...</a><p>I saw an interesting interview from 50's by one of India's founders on the topic of democracy in India: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/shorts/WyWUlIbcRH8" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/shorts/WyWUlIbcRH8</a> . It seems India still has a long way to go, and the current government is reversing the trend.<p>I really hope the west thinks long and hard about foreign investment in/free trade with India without preconditions (although these are doubtful from the US under the current administration, maybe the EU can step up). The west had this idea that opening up trade with China would make the country more democratic and free, but it had the opposite impact (the extra resources only made things worse in these areas at home and aborad, especially after Xi's takeover in 2014).</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 30 Apr 2025 03:53:05 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43841101</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43841101</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43841101</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Temu pulls its U.S. Google Shopping ads"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>too little too late for Forever 21 and it's 350 locations which once employed 43,000 people at it's peak: <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/17/forever-21-files-for-second-bankruptcy-blames-shein-and-temu.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/17/forever-21-files-for-second-...</a><p>The temu/shein loophole should been closed ages ago.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 15 Apr 2025 00:12:46 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43687694</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43687694</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43687694</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Athena spacecraft declared dead after toppling over on moon"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>These 2 failures could have been easily avoidable both times.<p>I really wish there was a push in the US government to create and stockpile plutonium-238 and ensure it's readily available, subsidized, and offered for all US probes/rovers/other scientific instruments in space (whether it be for NASA's use who currently has to ration because of how little they have left, or for private use after approval).<p>Like, why aren't all of space scientific instruments RTG powered like voyager 1 which is still providing useful scientific data 47+ years later. Think about all of the lost scientific insights over the past few decades because either NASA (because of a low stockpile) or private companies like intuitive (from their 2 failures) end up choosing solar panels for their source of power with no other alternative.<p>Besides the fact that solar panels can fail if they aren't pointed a certain way, they usually offer far less power, and are subject to radiation, micro meteor, or dust damage. All of these are the main reason why these instruments tend to have a far shorter lifespan than voyager 1.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 08 Mar 2025 07:59:01 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43298422</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43298422</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43298422</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "DeepSeek Open Infra: Open-Sourcing 5 AI Repos in 5 Days"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This is so damn true. I wish people would stop taking companies in China at face value about any of their claims  if the CCP has a vested interest in for geopolitical and economic reasons. Bytedance is another example.<p>It's telling that "South Korea has accused Chinese AI startup DeepSeek of sharing user data with the owner of TikTok in China." - source: ><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gex0x87g4o" rel="nofollow">https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gex0x87g4o</a><p>Bytedance, which has had a CCP government official on their board for years: ><a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/bytedance-says-china-unit-holds-local-licences-response-media-report-2021-08-16/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reuters.com/technology/bytedance-says-china-unit...</a><p>Deepseek's claims that they used old unsanctioned gpus are probably totally fabricated as well (side point-giving signapore f35s was probably a mistake): ><a href="https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/deepseek-gpu-smuggling-probe-shows-nvidias-singapore-gpu-sales-are-28-percent-of-its-revenue-but-only-1-percent-are-delivered-to-the-country-report" rel="nofollow">https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/deepseek-gpu-smug...</a>.<p>I mean it's not like an entity that bypasses sanctions would ever be open about it, as doing so would immediately result in more sanctions and the closing of loopholes. What does the CCP have to gain? What does it have to gain by stealing hundreds of billons of western IP in the past? 4 things: Power, prestige, riches, and the means to keep their power. This has been going in since at least 2004 (see Nortel case: <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/7275588/inside-the-chinese-military-attack-on-nortel/" rel="nofollow">https://globalnews.ca/news/7275588/inside-the-chinese-milita...</a>)<p>The US winning the AI race was a clear threat to those 4 things.Hurting investor sentiment by a) distilling a model which cost billions to develop, and b)spreading propaganda and muddying the waters about costs, gpus, etc, helps them to narrow the gap. Making it open source was not done out of the goodness of their hearts, but out of self interest - another attempt to deflect from their actions (further muddying the waters) and divide the public against taking any further punitive action against the state (given the connection re: SK claims-tiktok algorithms were probably on overdrive spreading their bs) .</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 22 Feb 2025 04:06:43 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43136004</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43136004</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43136004</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Show HN: Transform your codebase into a single Markdown doc for feeding into AI"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>><i>Java</i><p>found the problem</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 15 Feb 2025 05:04:32 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43056032</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43056032</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43056032</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by astar1 in "Ratan Tata dies aged 86 years; India loses an icon"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I respect this man for calling out the Ambani family (you may have remembered them from the extremely lavish wedding of one their sons earlier this year) for owning one of the most expensive homes ever (a luxury condo just for the family) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antilia_(building)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antilia_(building)</a> which overlooks one of the worlds biggest slums :
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dharavi" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dharavi</a><p>"Tata Group former chairman Ratan Tata said Antilia is an example of rich Indians' lack of empathy for the poor.[47] Tata said, "The person who lives in there should be concerned about what he sees around him and asking how he can make a difference. If he cannot, then it's sad because this country needs people to allocate some of their enormous wealth to finding ways of mitigating the hardship that people have.[47] It makes me wonder why someone would do that. That's what revolutions are made of."[48]"<p>The Ambani family is so influential in india (a symptom of a very big problem in India re: extreme levels of poverty and income inequality and political corruption) that zuckerberg even bought the son a 30 million dollar wedding gift (private jet):
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/shorts/iPlzRBpo0Gg" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/shorts/iPlzRBpo0Gg</a><p>And their wealth is brought on from very questionable means  e.g. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukesh_Ambani#Stock_manipulation_and_penalty" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mukesh_Ambani#Stock_manipulati...</a>
(not to be confused with Adani family, another indian billionaire family shrouded with corruption allegations)<p>Anyways, Ratan Tata life story seems to be a genuine rags to riches story without the lavish flaunting of wealth or outright corruption to obtain the wealth in the context of an extremely poor (for at least half of indians)/corrupt country.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 10 Oct 2024 03:49:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41795330</link><dc:creator>astar1</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41795330</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41795330</guid></item></channel></rss>