Hacker News: famahar

New comment by famahar in "The “small web” is bigger than you might think"

famahar — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 07:03:09 +0000

I noticed that Kagi Small Web tends to lean towards more tech focused blogs. So it feels more like you've captured that subset of the small web, especially if your main source is hackernews.

Not sure if you've used this as a source too but there's a lot of tiny personal sites in this directory too. https://melonland.net/surf-club

New comment by famahar in "Willingness to look stupid"

famahar — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 07:05:35 +0000

I feel more motivated to write now because a "badly" written text made by a human to me is always better than a "perfect" text completely made by AI. Everyone has their own way of writing. Embracing that in these times is something to find motivation in.

New comment by famahar in "Nintendo DS code editor and scriptable game engine"

famahar — Sun, 01 Feb 2026 01:20:24 +0000

Which is why I love this. Extreme constraints. Takes a lot of creativity to make something interesting, without feeling overwhelmed with possibility. I'm considering making tiny arthouse game projects with this.

New comment by famahar in "Ask HN: How can we solve the loneliness epidemic?"

famahar — Fri, 16 Jan 2026 06:21:09 +0000

Start a community or join one. I have a friend that started a social community where they host discussion groups, sharing circles, art marking, picnics, field trips, cooking club, etc. The whole focus is on creating connection. I myself run an experimental games meetup where our small niche share what were working on each month. I also have a book club each week with some friends (although we chat more about life than books). I think 2026 is the year of community. Make an intentional effort. Show up in the same space repeatedly.

New comment by famahar in "AI generated music barred from Bandcamp"

famahar — Wed, 14 Jan 2026 04:45:32 +0000

I don't think they're arguing about personal use of AI to make something silly shared between family and friends. It's when those songs you made in an instant start to flood platforms where people took weeks, months or years to release an album they crafted by traditional methods. I don't want to discredit the joy you have in making fun songs with your family. I'm curious what is also gained if you made the songs by making instruments out of strings and pans, and performing / improving your own song from scratch. I'm sure the end result is the same, lots of joy and laughs. But something is definitely lost when the slow process of humble hand made creativity is exchanged for polished instant results. But maybe instant gratification is just the new mode of consumption. Ai promises that with a "good enough" button and my fear is that it will be extended to every facet of life.

New comment by famahar in "The unbearable joy of sitting alone in a café"

famahar — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 17:45:53 +0000

Lots of cafés and restaurant in Tokyo have seating designed for just one person. It's usually a cozy spot in the corner. It's not uncommon at all to go to cafés alone. Many people study, read, or just quietly sit. I feel like bars are a place where people go to socialize. Anyways, I'm happy for him. Some people never feel comfortable being alone. I personally view solitude as a key factor in my creative and personal growth. Even better when it's in nature.

New comment by famahar in "Show HN: Ez FFmpeg – Video editing in plain English"

famahar — Sat, 27 Dec 2025 13:14:13 +0000

Do most devs even look at the source code for packages they install? Or the compiled machine code? I think of this as just a higher level of abstraction. Confirm it works and not worry about the details of how it works

New comment by famahar in "I program on the subway"

famahar — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 11:05:31 +0000

I do the same with language learning. Makes me actually enjoy commuting to work since I find it hard to study at home. I just pop in the headphones, take a seat, and sit for 40 mins twice a day. Sometimes I even intentionally take the non-rapid so I can study a bit more (plus the train is less packed so I'm always guaranteed a seat)

New comment by famahar in "GPT-5.2-Codex"

famahar — Fri, 19 Dec 2025 00:40:22 +0000

It's wild to me how people get used to new ground breaking coding LLM models. Every time a new update comes there are so many people that think it's trash because it made an error or takes some time to think. We all have access to a skilled (enough) pair programmer available 24/7. Like I'm still recovering from the shock of the first coding capable LLM from 2 years ago.

New comment by famahar in "Thin desires are eating life"

famahar — Wed, 17 Dec 2025 04:35:24 +0000

I think there's thin consumption and thick. Reality TV and YouTube/Tik-tok shorts being thin. Slow cinema or a documentary being thick. One is primarily entertainment that is easy to digest and acts more as a way to fill the time and quiet thoughts. The other requires deep engagement and confrontation with new ideas and a build up of contemplation through deep prolonged focus.

The first mode of consumption is understandably popular given the amount of noise in the world that distracts us. So many people are trapped in dopamine holes. It's mental withdrawal to try to attempt a sudden switch to thick consumption. They are so opposite of each other.

New comment by famahar in "GPT Image 1.5"

famahar — Wed, 17 Dec 2025 03:41:42 +0000

I was reading a trend report on art and it seems like collage, squiggly hand drawn text, and lots of intentional imperfections are becoming popular. I'm not sure how hard it is for AI to recreate those, but it is nice to see people trying to do more of what AI struggles with.

New comment by famahar in "The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora"

famahar — Fri, 12 Dec 2025 04:53:10 +0000

I watched an interesting video about how the look of cinema has changed dramatically with the advent of green screen sets, CG, VFX, and a move away from large scale on-location scenes. This feels like we're inching towards a new era of cinema that has lost its charm in being real. Maybe I'm just getting old and this is what everyone seems to like (or can't relate to the charm of older cinema from the 90s).

https://youtu.be/tvwPKBXEOKE?si=EYdu543vJlAjdX5c

Another thought I had. Is there no desire to make a modern film that still intentionally looks like an old Pixar film. Less poly. Simpler lighting. No fancy physics effects. In the same way PS1 graphics are popular now.

New comment by famahar in "Australia begins enforcing world-first teen social media ban"

famahar — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 02:03:14 +0000

Originally it wasn't. It was more similar to hackernews, just more general. Lately it's going all in on wanting to be a social media platform full of dark design patterns to keep people hooked. Hackernews has barely changed from its beginning. I don't feel overwhelmed browsing it. Five minutes of reddit and I fall into a dopamine hole that can be hard to get out of. It's no longer part of my daily routine for that reason.

New comment by famahar in "All it takes is for one to work out"

famahar — Sun, 30 Nov 2025 01:04:36 +0000

The blog post is simple but it was enough of a good prompt to spark an interesting discussion. Sometimes the comments expand the depth of an idea and that's where the meat of curiosity thrives.

New comment by famahar in "Where do the children play?"

famahar — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 01:48:22 +0000

I feel both unfortunate and lucky to have grown up in a subsidized housing development. In school I was always seen as the poor kid from that "sketchy area", but as a child, this place was a haven for unplanned adventures and low friction hanging outside with friends. All the housing units were surrounded by a large greenspace area full parks, hills, and a community centre where they ran morning breakfast programs and afterschool clubs.

I have countless childhood memories growing up there. All I had to do was step outside and some fun adventure was going to happen among the kids in the area. As online gaming started to become more popular, the area got much quieter. Not sure what it's like now that there's an abundance of online distraction. I do see the social value in online spaces like VR chat though.

New comment by famahar in "'No One Lives Forever' turns 25 and you still can't buy it legitimately"

famahar — Sat, 15 Nov 2025 16:10:48 +0000

You can still do this. I regularily go to used game shops looking for old console games just based off the box art. They range from $1 - $5 so it's not much lost if the game ends up bad. I make sure to not search for reviews or more info. It's always a fun surprise.

New comment by famahar in "GPT-5.1: A smarter, more conversational ChatGPT"

famahar — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 03:14:52 +0000

This reminds me of a short sci-fi story I read. World was controlled by AI but there were some people that wanted to rebel against it. In the end, one of them was able to infiltrate the AI and destroy it. But the AI knew this is what the rebel wanted, so it created this whole scenario for him to feel inferior. The AI was in no danger, it was too intelligent to be taken down by one person, but it gave exactly what the person wanted. Control the humans by giving them a false sense of control.

New comment by famahar in "Steam Frame"

famahar — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 00:51:01 +0000

The main thing I dislike about VR is how uncomfortable it is on my head and how hard it is to adjust that comfort. Too much friction to enjoy. If I can just easily slip these on that would be perfect.

I also never got used to the feeling of being completely detached from my own world. I know that's the point of VR, for it to be completely immersive but it felt very jarring not knowing what was going on around me.

New comment by famahar in "Smartphones and being present"

famahar — Wed, 15 Oct 2025 05:54:45 +0000

I have an Xperia X Compact phone that I bought in a used shop in Japan for $50. I think you can buy it online too. It's pretty small, runs kinda slow so I don't use any demanding apps. Mostly just use it for directions, studying flashcards, and messaging people. It's sad they don't make phones this small anymore.

New comment by famahar in "You Can Now Make PS2 Games in JavaScript"

famahar — Wed, 01 Oct 2025 13:11:50 +0000

This is fascinating. I really want to dive into this and make a tiny 3D game. Something "simple" where you walk across a large barren landscape. I've only worked with Unity and a visual editor of a scene, so not sure how difficult it would be.