<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: bloak</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bloak</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Mon, 14 Sep 2026 07:09:47 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=bloak" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Far-right AfD wins historic victory in German state election"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It wasn't a semantic argument; it was a question, or two questions.<p>It's possible, in fact likely, that the Budesamt für Verfassungsschutz has a clear idea of what rechtsextrem (I'm guessing that's the term they use) means but I certainly don't!</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 07 Sep 2026 19:34:35 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49602074</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49602074</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49602074</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "The revolt of the reader"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Technically, I think, that first sentence, by Austen, uses a passive participle but does not use a passive voice for any finite verb. I don't think that advice to avoid "the passive" is intended to apply to that situation.<p>For example, nobody would seriously suggest avoiding the passive participle in a sentence like "Put the broken plate in the bin". ("Put the plate that someone broke into the bin"?)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 06 Sep 2026 09:41:32 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49584803</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49584803</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49584803</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "The shrinking landscape of linguistic diversity in the age of LLMs"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>LLMs are impressively multilingual, though. I just asked ChatGPT a question and told it to reply in Latin. It seems to have done a reasonable job, though it's hard for me to judge: I suspect it knows Latin a lot better than I do.<p>One thing I might try, when I have some spare time, is see to what extent ChatGPT "understands" the difference between British and American English and is capable of using the variety I prefer. I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out that ChatGPT is better at writing "pure" British English than the average British teenager in this day and age. Has anyone, by any chance, already experimented with anything like that? Like I say, I haven't tried the experiment yet, but it seems like a good fit for the sort of thing that LLMs are good at.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 03 Sep 2026 12:59:05 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549397</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549397</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49549397</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "“Weird” is a weird word"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>"I before E except after C, but only when the sound is E" is the version I've heard, so "weird" (and "weir") are not exceptions. (In standard British English the vowel in "weird" is /ɪə/, not /iː/.)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 29 Aug 2026 09:17:12 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488271</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488271</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49488271</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Codex in ChatGPT desktop app for Linux is now in preview"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>"Codex could not find bubblewrap on PATH. Install bubblewrap with your OS package manager. See the sandbox prerequisites: ... Codex will use the bundled bubblewrap in the meantime."<p>I think neither the bundled bubblewrap nor the Ubuntu 24.04 bubblewrap works properly under Docker with the default options ... Yes, I've just tested that by asking Codex to "Test that bubblewrap is working properly" and then "Test again" after apt-get install bubblewrap.<p>EDIT: So the solution is to run "codex --dangerously-bypass-approvals-and-sandbox" in a Docker container?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 13 Aug 2026 15:12:57 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49287249</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49287249</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49287249</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Grok 4.6"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It says "requesting sexual content of a minor". I'm not sure how to parse that. My brain is jumping back and forth between "requesting stuff from a minor" and "stuff that is inside a minor".</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 13 Aug 2026 13:14:43 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49285425</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49285425</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49285425</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Codex in ChatGPT desktop app for Linux is now in preview"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Bubblewrap gets a bit confused inside a Docker container. If anyone knows how to run Codex inside a Docker container on Linux without it constantly complaining about a broken bubblewrap, please tell.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 13 Aug 2026 09:36:02 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49283571</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49283571</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49283571</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "As AI eats the web, the internet’s collective memory is disappearing"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I never thought of the DVR as a particularly significant development. I thought of it as just a replacement for the VCR. That's what it was for me. But perhaps in some areas DVRs were used to a greater extent than VCRs had been?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 2026 12:53:26 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49257519</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49257519</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49257519</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Everything you do is being recorded"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>That rule wouldn't work very well if the person who destroyed the evidence isn't the person suspected of the crime and it is unclear whether the person who destroyed the evidence is a friend or an enemy of the suspect. So I think a sane legal system would want to punish the person who destroyed the evidence rather than jeopardise the fair trial of the suspect.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 2026 07:37:40 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49254623</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49254623</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49254623</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "A 'bananas' order for 5000 obscure book titles fuels suspicion"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Rare, certainly: there are plenty of vanity publications that were chucked into the bin by almost everyone who was unlucky enough to be given a copy. Precious? Well, with the help of an electronic friend I found ISBN 978-3-8365-7349-8. Apparently a copy of that book is worth about £40k. Can anyone beat that?<p>(EDIT: I'm assuming "precious" means the same as valuable here to make the question easier to answer. In fact, of course, people usually say "precious" when they mean a personal or emotional attachment or cultural importance rather than economic value.)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 10 Aug 2026 12:55:45 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49243004</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49243004</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49243004</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Everything you do is being recorded"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Since you seem to know about this, what are the actual rules about "destruction of evidence" in your jurisdiction? What does the accused need to have known for a crime to have been committed?<p>(Common sense tells me that the accusation might make sense both in cases in which the accused knows about a crime and in cases in which the accused knows about a police investigation, even in the absence of a crime, but deleting nude photographs to stop a customs officer from seeing them, for a random example, would that be a crime?)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 10 Aug 2026 11:05:52 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49242123</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49242123</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49242123</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Everything you do is being recorded"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Which country are you in? Here in GB it is expected that dogs will be under control, and in any case their owners are responsible for any damage they do. Cats on the other hand ... people have devices to scare away cats, though I'm not sure how well they work. Interestingly, cat owners have them in some cases ... to keep their own cat away from certain areas?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 10 Aug 2026 10:02:41 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241621</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241621</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49241621</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "The USSR in 100 Photographs"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I don't know much about the USSR but I'll just put this here:<p>1. If the children didn't have enough vitamin D, wouldn't a pill be a much cheaper and easier solution?<p>2. There seem to be other possible reasons for prescribing treatment with ultraviolet light because I seem to recall a case of someone (in England, half a century ago) having that recommended for some kind of skin condition.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 09 Aug 2026 10:47:40 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49230233</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49230233</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49230233</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "GrapheneOS protections against data extraction from locked devices"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>On the other hand, if everything about you is boring, that in itself may begin to seem suspicious. "I borrowed this old phone from my stepson because my own phone got run over by a steamroller at a vintage vehicle show" is the sort of thing an actual spy or criminal would never say.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 26 Jul 2026 11:51:23 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49057164</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49057164</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49057164</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "What's slowing down the AI buildout"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>There are so many different options, it's confusing. But a "proper" 7 kW charger can cost over £2000 to install if your house isn't wired in a convenient way, while installing an ordinary socket outside might cost about a tenth of that and give you 2.3 kW. You might get about 4.5 miles per kWh, so potentially more than 80 miles from an 8-hour overnight charge from an ordinary 230 V socket, which can deliver 10 A for a long time if it's a modern one and properly installed though you need to be a bit careful because it's not normal to take that much current from an ordinary socket and you'd be doing this at night so you should worry a bit about something overheating and catching fire. Worth getting someone competent to take a look at the wiring, I'd say.<p>Basically, as far as I can tell, you can take 10 amps off lots of places in an ordinary modern house, but to get 32 amps for a "proper" EV charger you probably need to go back to where the power supply enters the house and start there afresh with new and rather more expensive equipment and cables.<p>(US readers note that I'm talking about GB where domestic wiring is all 230 V.)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 13 Jul 2026 10:58:51 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48890788</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48890788</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48890788</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Under federal rule, colleges must leave grads better off or lose financial aid"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It was expressed in a strange way but I assume what they meant was that if the former student goes bankrupt within the 7-year period then the student loan is not cancelled.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 12 Jul 2026 08:08:55 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48879315</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48879315</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48879315</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Late Bronze Age Collapse"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I'm being pedantic here, of course, but "nation-states" is perhaps not the right expression to use for that era. Nation states are primarily a thing of the nineteenth century (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation_state" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation_state</a>). The article seems to talk about "imperial states" and "palace states", and I'm not sure I've ever seen the expression "palace state" before.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 10 Jul 2026 16:23:24 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48862071</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48862071</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48862071</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Building relationships with customers through support didn't turn out as hoped"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Why exactly? "Error logging" is mentioned there as an alternative. I would have thought that if you can do telemetry you ought to be able to generate a local log file that is readable enough for the customer to feel confident about sending part of it back to you without breaking the law or their contracts with other parties.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 06 Jul 2026 08:59:01 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48802257</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48802257</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48802257</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "If you're a button, you have one job"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I used to have a device with a physical button which, when you pressed it, would beep and add 30 seconds to the time. However, sometimes it would beep and not add 30 seconds, and sometimes it would add 30 seconds without beeping, so you always had to squint at the dim display to discover whether it had worked or not. I thought this must be a peculiarly bad design ... but since then I have lost count of the number of purely software buttons that somehow seem to replicate this broken behaviour: whether the button changes colour on the screen is somehow only loosely correlated with whether the action requested will take place. Why? How, even, have they implemented this?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 05 Jul 2026 07:26:50 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48792015</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48792015</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48792015</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by bloak in "Canadian boy, 11, dies of rabies after waking to bat on his face"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Not necessarily. Which country were you in and when was this?<p>(I don't much like this Internet confusion where half the time people don't know what country they're reading about. At least this article has "Canadian" as the first word of the title. Here in Britain I think rabies in bats is a recent thing and even today rabies is very rare in bats.)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 02 Jul 2026 15:17:12 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48762938</link><dc:creator>bloak</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48762938</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48762938</guid></item></channel></rss>