Hacker News: eschulz

New comment by eschulz in "Isaac Asimov: The Last Question (1956)"

eschulz — Fri, 17 Apr 2026 13:06:32 +0000

I love this story. When I first read it online in college many years ago I was surprised, and disappointed, when I suddenly realized it was a short story. It's a great one to recommend to people.

New comment by eschulz in "Iran War Cost Tracker"

eschulz — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 19:30:44 +0000

Right, consider the personnel costs that are displayed here. They were already getting paid this past weekend either way (admittedly the military may have had to hire some last minute contractors to help with the operation).

New comment by eschulz in "Mark Zuckerberg Lied to Congress. We Can't Trust His Testimony"

eschulz — Wed, 18 Feb 2026 15:17:36 +0000

Well, there is an explanation here - he simply was misleading regarding his intentions.

New comment by eschulz in "A brief history of barbed wire fence telephone networks (2024)"

eschulz — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 16:22:31 +0000

As a native of Northern Illinois, I was pleased to see Joseph Glidden mentioned.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Glidden

Edit: after reading about Claude Shannon, I too think it would have been nice if he was mentioned.

New comment by eschulz in "Fined $48k for using a jammer to keep commuters from using phones while driving"

eschulz — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 15:21:23 +0000

Absolutely. If I'm driving and using my cellphone (in a legal or illegal manner), and the network is suddenly screwed up, I'll probably be more distracted since I'm trying to solve the "problem" with my phone in addition to driving.

New comment by eschulz in "Dole Kemp 96 Web Site"

eschulz — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 15:46:14 +0000

Here's the page you were looking for: https://www.dolekemp96.org/about/cookies/cookies.html

New comment by eschulz in "Dole Kemp 96 Web Site"

eschulz — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 15:44:09 +0000

no problems right now

New comment by eschulz in "The hidden engineering of runways"

eschulz — Tue, 27 Jan 2026 16:46:23 +0000

Same, and I also just marvel at the airplanes. This video made me think of the several grass runways that are in my area. They're literally just maintained by some guy mowing them, and yet people land on them in tiny planes as well as two-engine aircraft.

New comment by eschulz in "Canada Announces Divorce from America"

eschulz — Wed, 21 Jan 2026 13:56:49 +0000

I'm not from Canada, but my take is that given Canada's economic reliance on the US, any "divorce" would cost them more than anything they could find anywhere else. However, I also don't think the PM there can simply separate his country from the US by simply giving a speech, although he can work to foster closer ties with others while still trying to make it work with the US.

New comment by eschulz in "America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws"

eschulz — Fri, 16 Jan 2026 16:22:56 +0000

I'm probably the only person here who has been in a Walmart in the last year or two, but recently I found that my local Walmart offers a warm counter with freshly prepared small bites, and you can get a respectable chicken sandwich for $2. It's a decent small meal, and the same item would probably be $6-$12 at a fast foot joint. I guess each individual Walmart is big enough to offer these bites to their shoppers.

New comment by eschulz in "AI will kill all the lawyers"

eschulz — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 18:43:18 +0000

You're right. Gold and golf are at the center of the legal world.

New comment by eschulz in "Oldest attestation of Austronesian language: Đông Yên Châu inscription"

eschulz — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 18:47:13 +0000

I consider the languages of Western European colonial powers to have achieved a sort of heightened mobility when they more or less mastered extensive sea travel.

Something that I've always found interesting is how the two large Polynesian areas of Hawaii and New Zealand and currently dominated by the English language, but this domination came to New Zealand from the British Empire as it traveled east, while it arrived in Hawaii from the United States traveling west.

The English language capturing the world is unlike anything else.

New comment by eschulz in "Map of Near and Middle East Oil 1965"

eschulz — Mon, 29 Sep 2025 14:09:36 +0000

The the font for the title of the map meant to allude to the style of Arabic writing? It looks crazy.

New comment by eschulz in "YouTube says it'll bring back creators banned for Covid and election content"

eschulz — Tue, 23 Sep 2025 21:06:25 +0000

who doesn't get free speech?

New comment by eschulz in "Guy running a Google rival from his laundry room"

eschulz — Wed, 10 Sep 2025 18:15:07 +0000

Before this happened to me, my first search returned an impressive SERP.

New comment by eschulz in "1910: The year the modern world lost its mind"

eschulz — Sun, 10 Aug 2025 21:49:30 +0000

Being invented doesn't mean that they became commonly used. Many ancient inventions took thousands of years to rollout and be adopted by the vast majority of humans.

New comment by eschulz in "1910: The year the modern world lost its mind"

eschulz — Sun, 10 Aug 2025 21:13:59 +0000

I'm reminded of how time pieces such as sundials changed societies, and how some ancients almost lost their minds due to this new development.

“The Gods confound the man who first found out How to distinguish the hours---confound him, too Who in this place set up a sundial To cut and hack my days so wretchedly Into small pieces ! . . . I can't (even sit down to eat) unless the sun gives leave. The town's so full of these confounded dials . . .” ― Plautus

New comment by eschulz in "States and cities decimated SROs, Americans' lowest-cost housing option"

eschulz — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 20:07:18 +0000

You're right. The town has speculated it to be the case and doesn't want housing for situations like this. Real estate investors also speculate it, and they'd prefer to cater to those with more disposable income.

Single-room units would bring down the cost of housing for everyone, but those with influence and money have decided that we don't want it in our community.

New comment by eschulz in "States and cities decimated SROs, Americans' lowest-cost housing option"

eschulz — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 19:47:15 +0000

In my town there used to be a lot of single-room units (there are of course none now), and my understanding is that the primary residents were migrant men working pretty much all day. They'd just crash in the rooms, all their meals and social events would be out in town or at their work place.

I feel as though there would be a different tenant in the modern era. Some would be migrant young men trying to save every dime, but many would be those suffering mental illness, and they'd fill the unit with tons of stuff. Can you imagine how much more stuff Americans have these days than they did back in say 1900? I genuinely think that the volume of stuff/garbage would be a legitimate fire or structural hazard. No landlord would want that. Back in the old days landlords had a lot more ability to force out any tenants they didn't want.

New comment by eschulz in "Hiroshima (1946)"

eschulz — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 22:21:04 +0000

This piece made a big impact on me when I read it like five years ago, and if I recall correctly there was a young doctor there who was one of the few interviewed who stated that the bomb's use was possibly a war crime. He did like 48 hours in the hospital as thousands upon thousands of burned and dying walked from afar to the completely overrun clinic.