Hacker News: etempleton

New comment by etempleton in "John C. Dvorak has died"

etempleton — Thu, 23 Jul 2026 00:23:31 +0000

He wrote a hell of a column. Opinions were notoriously often wrong, but always entertaining to read.

New comment by etempleton in "John C. Dvorak has died"

etempleton — Wed, 22 Jul 2026 23:58:32 +0000

I think their butting heads eventually got on both of their nerves. John would derail the show just to get under Leo’s skin. And Leo became increasingly ridged with the show structure. The show was losing popularity and I think some guests said they didn’t like John because he was cranky and his politics, but the real issue was probably that the studio was no longer as convenient for people to get to.

At the same time they both became increasingly politically polarized. John C Davorak became a full right wing conspiracy theorist. Leo increasingly embraced the left wing ideology of the moment.

New comment by etempleton in "John C. Dvorak has died"

etempleton — Wed, 22 Jul 2026 23:51:05 +0000

Both of them kind of lost the thread. I really enjoyed the show but they became increasingly polarized and unmoving in their opinions.

New comment by etempleton in "US gas prices hit an average of $4 a gallon again"

etempleton — Tue, 21 Jul 2026 03:00:59 +0000

There are almost no new vehicles in the US that still offer a V8. They exist, but make up a very small part of auto sales.

New comment by etempleton in "US gas prices hit an average of $4 a gallon again"

etempleton — Tue, 21 Jul 2026 02:56:47 +0000

Not so much the efficiency of the engine but the weight and size of the vehicle. Almost all new cars in the US are turbo charged 4 cylinders if not hybrids or pure electric, but US consumers do prefer larger vehicles which are less aerodynamically efficient wnd heavier, which is really a direct result of the distance and reliance on the vehicle Americans have.

New comment by etempleton in "US gas prices hit an average of $4 a gallon again"

etempleton — Tue, 21 Jul 2026 02:49:06 +0000

Depends on the model. The example given is the most inefficient model.

New comment by etempleton in "US gas prices hit an average of $4 a gallon again"

etempleton — Tue, 21 Jul 2026 02:46:09 +0000

The example you gave is the Ford F150 Raptor which is an enthusiast model for off roading that is extra inefficient and I wouldn’t call the Jeep Wrangler a “big SUV” but it is an incredibly fuel inefficient one with terrible aerodynamics.

New comment by etempleton in "Who Is America's Homer?"

etempleton — Mon, 20 Jul 2026 03:04:08 +0000

This falls into the great American author conversation and for that I would probably have to say Mark Twain or John Steinbeck. If you want to talk about lasting influence on the large literary world it is probably Edgar Allan Poe.

Tracey Chapman is an all time great, but beyond a few song probably doesn’t rise to the American Homer status. I don’t think I would put a songwriter forward for that but if you did it would have to be Dylan.

New comment by etempleton in "$100 AI Music Video: Claude Fable 5 vs. GPT-5.6 Sol"

etempleton — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 13:35:06 +0000

Completely agree. Impressive as a tech demo, but that is pretty much where it ends. Give a talented kid an iPhone and they could create something significantly better and more interesting.

And this is the bear case on AI. Sure, if the quality of the output is largely meaningless or binary, e.g. it works or it doesn’t, then AI is useful, but as soon as subjective judgement or taste is involved it is useless.

New comment by etempleton in "SpaceX bond worth 10% less than issue price – heading for junk bond status"

etempleton — Wed, 15 Jul 2026 14:34:39 +0000

Some people, many people, recognize him as a serial liar/exaggerator, but think he will make them rich too. Eventually that probably stops being true.

New comment by etempleton in "Wikipedia Is Battling for the Soul of the Internet"

etempleton — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 02:54:10 +0000

Yes, but Larry Sanger of 20 years ago wouldn’t believe who he has become either. I don’t say that with prejudice, just that he has a very different set of guiding principles now than he had at the time and that influences his perspective on the site.

New comment by etempleton in "Majority of id software to be laid off by Microsoft"

etempleton — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 02:14:54 +0000

They are cutting to make short term profitability on paper go up to appease Microsoft leadership. Long term, they are destroying themselves, but that is Xbox leadership in 5 years problem.

New comment by etempleton in "Majority of id software to be laid off by Microsoft"

etempleton — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 02:13:12 +0000

What a terrible long-term decision. You have a team with incredible talent that ships that you could move to something other than Doom if you wanted, but instead you are laying them off.

New comment by etempleton in "Resetting Xbox"

etempleton — Mon, 06 Jul 2026 17:22:11 +0000

Completely agree. Their problem is that corporate wants more money to funnel back into AI and it is really inconvenient that Xbox provides only a couple billion dollars per month whereas Office and Cloud provide many more billions. What a complete joke.

New comment by etempleton in "Sony Deletes 551 Movies PlayStation Owners Paid For"

etempleton — Wed, 01 Jul 2026 15:18:09 +0000

They often have two tiers, a rental tier and a purchase tier. If you purchase the assumption is it will be available forever.

New comment by etempleton in "Apple raises prices of MacBooks, iPads"

etempleton — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 13:58:12 +0000

Yeah, I was one of those people. Did not see this coming. The situation is truly dire out there.

New comment by etempleton in "OpenAI unveils its first custom chip, built by Broadcom"

etempleton — Wed, 24 Jun 2026 20:02:34 +0000

I feel like they would be very specific if it was no.1.

New comment by etempleton in "US holds off blacklisting DeepSeek, more than 100 firms deemed security risks"

etempleton — Wed, 17 Jun 2026 23:33:26 +0000

The ellipses in American English is often used as an awkward pause, or to indicate trailing off, or sometimes to indicate a sarcasm or passive aggressiveness. The last one seems to be a more modern usage. I have seen older generations use it as an almost soft question mark to indicate uncertainty, which always confused me because I assumed thy were being passive aggressive out of nowhere.

New comment by etempleton in "Leaked OpenAI financials show $38.5B loss and compute burn"

etempleton — Wed, 17 Jun 2026 15:52:26 +0000

Assuming that constant R&D is not a requirement to compete. At what point can any of these companies stop improving their models? The answer is when they have a monopoly position. And we’re nowhere near that happening.

New comment by etempleton in "What the Fuck Happened to Nerds"

etempleton — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 10:46:04 +0000

I miss Jobs. He was the one all these tech founders wanted to be. And Job, for all his faults always really cared about the product he made.

I feel like every founder is now some kind of grifter. Bouncing from new idea to new idea on how to make more money even if the whole thing is just smoke and mirrors.