Hacker News: browsingonly

New comment by browsingonly in "The Bromine Chokepoint"

browsingonly — Sun, 19 Apr 2026 23:00:02 +0000

Until the cost of local production (union labor, environmental regulations, etc.) meets the increasing costs of imports during said shortfall. Then we'll just make it here. The shortfall goes away but the price would admittedly be higher.

New comment by browsingonly in "Employers use your personal data to figure out the lowest salary you'll accept"

browsingonly — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 20:11:30 +0000

The Big Three have many non-credit-report products, and no they will not share them with the reports' subjects (you and I).

New comment by browsingonly in "Meta Horizon Worlds on Meta Quest is being discontinued"

browsingonly — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 20:55:39 +0000

That was the point of Horizon Worlds. They were trying a (very expensive) social play for VR.

The problem is that the intersection/suitability of VR and social media is rather low, while as a counterexample the intersection of mobile and social media is very large. I have no desire to chat with old classmates when I "suit up" with VR goggles, I'm there to game.

New comment by browsingonly in "E2E encrypted messaging on Instagram will no longer be supported after 8 May"

browsingonly — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 22:10:12 +0000

I work on products that feature live monitoring capabilities. There's no connection to the monitoring side's microphone (or camera) — why would there be? I'm not sure why there would be for their products.

Whatever the cause, it sure sounds like it was a strange and unnerving experience.

New comment by browsingonly in "Suburban school district uses license plate readers to verify student residency"

browsingonly — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 17:20:05 +0000

Repossessing cars isn't societally harmful, quite the opposite in fact.

New comment by browsingonly in "DARPA's new X-76"

browsingonly — Mon, 09 Mar 2026 21:25:22 +0000

https://www.iarpa.gov/research-programs

New comment by browsingonly in "Americans are destroying Flock surveillance cameras"

browsingonly — Tue, 24 Feb 2026 00:51:46 +0000

Some are installed by private entities. Home Depot installs Flock cameras in their parking lots.

I assume their primary use case is combating organized retail theft rings, as companies like Target spend a great deal on this problem (to include famously having their own accredited crime lab).

New comment by browsingonly in "San Francisco's pro-billionaire march draws dozens"

browsingonly — Mon, 09 Feb 2026 17:23:24 +0000

Billionaires For Bush did it first, and better.

New comment by browsingonly in "New York’s budget bill would require “blocking technology” on all 3D printers"

browsingonly — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 06:24:16 +0000

Here, among other vendors:

https://southbendreplicas.com/

New comment by browsingonly in "New York’s budget bill would require “blocking technology” on all 3D printers"

browsingonly — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 06:15:10 +0000

That's not true. They have millions of digitized 4473s. They are banned by law from creating a searchable registry of gun owners but they digitize paperwork on a daily basis.

https://medium.com/statute-circuit/the-atfs-quiet-digital-tr...

New comment by browsingonly in "San Francisco Graffiti"

browsingonly — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 23:41:56 +0000

I lived it when I lived in West Oakland. Tagging, violence, hell a neighbor was shot in the face in front of her family over a gang beef. I'm still exposed to it now working with people reentering society after being incarcerated.

You haven't been paying attention for the last 30 years, perhaps because you only circulate with people just like you in insulated echo chambers. I can tell you from having lived it: tags are not funsies and diversity and inclusion. They are male-cat-pissmarks-on-the-wall from gang members establishing, defending, and expanding turf, and they are unwelcome for very good reason.

New comment by browsingonly in "San Francisco Graffiti"

browsingonly — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 20:50:12 +0000

Not all harm is physical.

New comment by browsingonly in "San Francisco Graffiti"

browsingonly — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 20:49:10 +0000

I don't know anyone in tech who enjoyed watching gangs mark their territory with tags in their neighborhood.

New comment by browsingonly in "San Francisco Graffiti"

browsingonly — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 20:46:00 +0000

Maybe just more mature.

New comment by browsingonly in "Doubting U.S. resolve, Europe looks to bolster its own nuclear arsenal"

browsingonly — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 20:30:35 +0000

I think Estonia would be mad to think France will risk Paris to save Tallinn from being occupied.

New comment by browsingonly in "Drones that recharge directly on transmission lines"

browsingonly — Sat, 10 Jan 2026 21:46:30 +0000

Use the transmission lines to link up with an RF node to hand off. Friendly territory might just be some place without good Russian internal security coverage (perhaps deeper in Russia rather than towards the front lines if the node uses satcom).

A friend of mine worked on a covert comms system for the Rangers to use in the Battle For Berlin that thankfully never occurred. The idea was to clamp onto plumbing, fences, and similar infrastructure where possible. Nodes with radios handed off to other comms systems. It worked reasonably well in tests but I don't know that it went anywhere, point is that the theory is sound.