<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: brianleb</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=brianleb</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Wed, 21 Oct 2026 00:30:00 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=brianleb" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Systems that no one will test"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>>>The other one to check is LexisNexus<p>FYI <a href="https://consumer.risk.lexisnexis.com/request" rel="nofollow">https://consumer.risk.lexisnexis.com/request</a>. The Work Number gives you results immediately but LexisNexus says it's going to mail them to you.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 29 Sep 2026 12:01:12 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49891722</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49891722</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49891722</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Early rogue AI agent activity and attempts to hack found on urlquery.net"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I'm not going to say you're victim-blaming, but I will say that there are degrees of difference between "looking both ways before crossing the street" and "hardening my website against unforeseen attacks by rogue AI agents."<p>AI black-hatting your website is not the same sort of foreseeable consequence that crossing the street without looking is.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2026 22:07:56 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49837365</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49837365</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49837365</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "ChatGPT now knows what you do on other websites via ad collector"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Could you define (or link) to what "Weizenbaum feed" means/references? Too obscure for me but I'm interested. Thanks.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 20 Sep 2026 19:28:33 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49779152</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49779152</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49779152</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "The American Religion of Self-Storage Facilities"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>They don't have to ever sell the properties. Property can be assessed by a third party and then function as collateral against a low-interest loan, which is real money.<p>Not that I think McDonald's will ever really find themselves in a pinch, but if they did, they would additionally be able to liquidate selected properties for cash. When you are rich enough, the promise of having money in the future is just as good as actually having money. It doesn't work like that for most of us, but that's the nature of risk assessment in finance.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 17 Sep 2026 21:16:32 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49746662</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49746662</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49746662</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "FDA clears blood test to aid evaluation for Alzheimer's disease"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I am skeptical of 100% anything, so did some looking:<p>>>Mutations in PSEN1 and APP are associated with complete penetrance, meaning that all individuals who have a PSEN1 or APP mutation will develop AD if they live a normal lifespan [1]<p>and<p>>>[Age-of-onset] Usually 40s or early 50s (range 30s-early 60s) [2]<p>Note that this is only for early-onset Alzheimer's, representing ~5% of all Alzheimer's.<p>>>Our study showed that the rate of EOAD in AD is 5.5%, not 1-2% as usually demonstrated. And our results indicated that the rate in developed countries was relative higher than in developing countries [3]<p>[1]<a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3326653/" rel="nofollow">https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3326653/</a><p>[2]<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK1161/table/alzheimer.T.earlyonset_familial_alzheime/" rel="nofollow">https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK1161/table/alzheimer.T...</a><p>[3]<a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4356853/" rel="nofollow">https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4356853/</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 24 Aug 2026 17:09:02 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49422832</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49422832</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49422832</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "We can still stop California's 3D printer surveillance scheme"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I share your hopeful optimism, but here's the reality of the mass-email campaigns targeting congress:<p>[email received 6/18/26 from the office of Steve Scalise, majority leader in the house, who is one of my representatives. I have trimmed for brevity.]<p>>>
Due to advancements in technology, many third-party organizations use their mailing lists to send advocacy letters like this on your behalf. With the increased volume of third-party letters being sent to my office, I want to be sure that I am able to more appropriately address your thoughts and concerns.<p>I will be sure to consider the views you have sent me, but if you have any additional thoughts on this issue, or need other assistance with a federal agency, please contact my office directly through my website scalise.house.gov or by calling (202) 225-3015<p>-----------<p>In case it is not clear to anyone reading, this is kosher political speak for "I am ignoring automated emails. Consider this your notice."<p>Honestly, I am surprised it took this long, although I'm quite certain it has been going on for a lot longer and generally they simply do not provide the courtesy of telling you they are ignoring you.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 27 Jun 2026 00:00:52 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48693598</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48693598</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48693598</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "How many of the 170k English words do you know?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>As others have pointed out, too many clicks per word. I am a sucker for a 'how many words do you know' quiz so I finished anyway. Overall I'm skeptical of the classifications. In broad strokes, the early words are easier and the latter words are more challenging, but the middle is pretty muddied.<p>Some of the words chosen are rather absurd/inappropriate: breviary (which I got wrong but felt like a vaguely religious word) was characterized as intermediate but I think it's much more obscure and less obvious than that; Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia was used as a word (I got that wrong as well) - any type of 'phobia' word is really the sort of thing a fourth grader opens up a page in the dictionary and points out, not a word that is used... ever; metamorphosis and kinetic were labeled expert, which I don't agree with (what elementary schooler doesn't learn about the metamorphosis of a caterpillar into a butterfly? what high schooler doesn't learn about kinetic energy?).<p>Most words were reasonably well defined in a way that most people would understand or recognize. A few words had poor definitions: lethargy ("the state of being lethargic" - obvious); complacent ("smug satisfaction with oneself" - I disagree that complacency is intrinsically smug); magnanimous ("generous toward a rival" - I disagree that a rival must be involved); gauche ("socially awkward" - this is sort of close but the given definition completely misses the idea of being tactless).<p>They call it scientific and give a hand-wavey formula, but they don't explain how words are stratified in the first place. If stratified sampling is a formally recognized method of doing this, it would be nice to have a link to a real reference. I think I know a lot of words, but I am skeptical of the estimate this app provided (north of 75k).</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 19 Jun 2026 21:44:56 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48603620</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48603620</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48603620</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "The AirPods Effect"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This is a very un-nuanced and combative take on a lot of people's lives. It reminds me of it being socially acceptable for the extrovert to say to the introvert, "Why don't you talk more?" while it is not acceptable for the introvert to say to the extrovert, "Why don't you talk less?"</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 19 Jun 2026 13:04:16 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48598108</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48598108</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48598108</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "AI job grief: A psychological crisis hitting tech workers"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>OP did not say anything about skilled workers who make things with their hands. You are describing an artisan or craftsman, or at the very least a tradesman.<p>The quote is talking about manufacturing labor. This is the guy on the assembly line who lowers the press, makes his thousandth widget for a day, and then lifts it up. Rinse and repeat.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 30 May 2026 16:05:39 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48337700</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48337700</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48337700</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "GTA 6 Developers Unionize"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>33.1%: Nintendo's charge<p>29.8%: Retailer's margin<p>15.1%: Publisher's margin<p>14.8%: VAT<p>That's... 92.8%.<p>Developer's royalty: 4.6%<p>"Yikes" -me, just now</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 29 May 2026 19:26:28 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48328072</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48328072</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48328072</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "North American English Dialects"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Ha, grew up in Harahan. When I left the LA for college, people were shocked to find out where I was from based on how I talked. I would hear areas of New England, 'no discernible accent,' and also Canadian. Apparently the Canadian comes out when I say words like out, about, and house. I can't hear it but my friends all swore up and down they could.<p>There are so many unique dialects hyperlocal to New Orleans, it's amazing.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:26:59 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47794658</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47794658</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47794658</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Tech employment now significantly worse than the 2008 or 2020 recessions"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I have to say I appreciate your aplomb in these responses. The whole thread is littered with shocking (and unsurprising?) tech-bro overconfidence that they can manage a situation they literally know nothing about better than someone who's already done it. Cheers to you and have a good weekend.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 06 Mar 2026 21:21:47 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47281244</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47281244</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47281244</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Sizing chaos"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Similar to a sibling comment,<p>>>the advent of chemical non-sugar sweeteners, which in recent decades are turning out to be just as harmful as sugar, only differently.<p>requires citations. People lump sugar substitutes together as one class of drugs, but they very much are not. Some are sugar alcohols, some are glycosides, others are different molecules. Different molecules have different mechanisms of action and paths of metabolism.<p>Much like one might take a "blood pressure" medication, it is a large umbrella consisting of chemically distinct ACE-inhibitors, ARBs, thiazide diuretics, loop diuretics, calcium channel blockers (dihydropyridine and non-dihydropyridine distinctly), and more. These drugs generally do have class effects, but the class effects from an ACE inhibitor (bradykinin cough, angioedema, etc) are quite different from diuretics (hyponatremia, frequent urination, etc). One person's 'blood pressure medicine' is not the same as the next.<p>I agree that the prevalence of sugar substitutes in the western diet demands scrutiny, and I am concerned about their effects, however any current research lumping them all together without strict attention to pharmacological mechanisms supported by translational research is worse than useless - it is misleading.<p>In the sense of what we 'know' about modern medicine, we 'know' almost nothing about sugar substitutes. The body of evidence is vanishingly thin. I want more research into this topic, but right now, it's just not there.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 01:10:01 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068667</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068667</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47068667</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Shai-Hulud malware attack: Tinycolor and over 40 NPM packages compromised"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>>>a few lines of own (LLM generated) code.<p>... and now you've switched the attack vector to a hostile LLM.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 16 Sep 2025 20:01:22 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45267221</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45267221</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45267221</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "FDA has approved Yeztugo, a drug that provides protection against HIV infection"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Agree that it sounds 'close to correct.'<p>I think, though, that the underlying assumption is that the old virus hangs out, forever waiting for the moment to strike.<p>Cells senesce and die and get replaced, and the immune system is always active in the background. If the virus particles are released, the immune system is going after it and cleaning up. As essentially no new virus is being created, this is the body's opportunity to clear the virus at a slower, manageable pace where it doesn't have to contend with a rapid, expanding infection.<p>It feels like one of those ideas that's technically true in all the right ways, but misses one crucial piece that would make the whole thing accurate.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 28 Jul 2025 21:11:55 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44715714</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44715714</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44715714</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Two Americas, one bank branch, and $50k cash"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>>> I had some $115k at the time in it.<p>I'm sorry, but you are an order of magnitude out of touch with the average American consumer. Average savings balance under the age of 64 is below $73k.[1] Median savings is below $9k. Most people will, outside of their retirement savings, never have access to an account that has over $100,000 in it.<p>Never.<p>Not one day in their life.<p>Median household income is $80k/yr.[2] Personal savings rate is under 5%.[3] As is noted in the title of the article, there are two Americas.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/average-savings-by-age/" rel="nofollow">https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/average-savings-...</a>
[2] <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2024/demo/p60-282.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2024/demo/p60-28...</a>
[3] <a href="https://www.bea.gov/data/income-saving/personal-saving-rate" rel="nofollow">https://www.bea.gov/data/income-saving/personal-saving-rate</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 05 Mar 2025 21:16:10 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43272544</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43272544</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43272544</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "2025 Hiring Pause"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Haven't seen anyone mention this yet: there is a difference between "listed employees" vs. "full time employees" (FTEs) vs. "full time employee equivalents" (FTEEs). In this very specific case, physicians/providers often work 0.125-0.875 (i.e. one hour to seven hours of an 8 hour day) for one entity (say, their primary teaching hospital), and the remainder for another entity (the university where they are also an listed as adjunct professor, etc.).<p>You could have 10,000 employees, however 4,000 of them are physicians/providers, 3,000 of whom work less than full time for that entity. So you are looking at 10,000 employees, but some number between 7,000 and 9,999 FTEEs. These are very different, and very relevant, numbers when looking at healthcare organizations.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 02 Mar 2025 23:16:08 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43236325</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43236325</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43236325</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The sibling comments are very relevant, but I wanted to provide a marginally different perspective. You have to take not only what is being said, but _who is saying it_ into perspective.<p>In this case, this is a government official speaking to the press (i.e. in an official capacity). If they were to say "this was sabotage," that is a definite declaration that the government believes - again, officially and on the record - that an outside party has deliberately done material damage to their country. Given the general situation, it is not a huge leap to come to the interpretation that "this was an attack against our country, and possibly an act of war."<p>No government official would want to be within miles (or kilometers) of that sort of statement unless they have pretty much already internally decided from the top-down to escalate the situation. Almost no single government agent has the authority to escalate the situation in that manner. So what we end up with is "appears to be." This overtly says 'all available evidence points to this being the case, however something else cannot be ruled out.' (As a sibling comment suggests, it can also act as a type of propaganda). So it is not an official government declaration that another nation has damaged them, but they have reasons (probably both apparent and not) to believe what they are saying publicly.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 19 Nov 2024 21:19:31 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42188196</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42188196</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42188196</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Museum of Bad Art"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>>>"We don't say negative things about the art or the artist. Our stated goal is to collect, exhibit, and celebrate this art that would be appreciated nowhere else."<p>Perhaps this is a 'whoosh' moment for me, but it seems that by simply housing the art in the Museum of /Bad/ Art, you are certainly saying something quite negative about the art and the artist.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 19 Nov 2024 12:10:29 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42182574</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42182574</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42182574</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by brianleb in "Passport Photos"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>So I actually shave my beard every time I get a haircut (so, let's say every 8 weeks).<p>What does 'recent' mean, since you have already acknowledged that temporal recency is irrelevant? When am I traveling? What's accurate to my current appearance? What if I started a cancer treatment that renders me unable to grow a beard?<p>Your flippant reply ignores reality, and these aren't even edge cases.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 06 Nov 2024 23:13:15 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42071035</link><dc:creator>brianleb</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42071035</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42071035</guid></item></channel></rss>