The machine's purpose was to report status of the control rods that mitigate nuclear reactions. Basically, "are the rods inserted, and if so, how many / how far?". I want to emphasize that this was reporting only, NOT control.

The original software was written back in the 80's, when the plant was originally commissioned, for AmigaOS. Of course, it's hard to buy Amigas anymore, and the original one died long ago (nobody remembers when).

So in the mid '90s, the utility purchased an AmigaOS emulator that ran on Windows NT 4.0, which was current at the time. The emulator (IIRC) was developed by a firm in the UK. The firm went out of business sometime in the late '90s. The control rod monitoring software ran under this emulator on top of NT4.

Windows NT 4.0 was the last OS to allow the emulation software direct access to the physical hardware that produced the status signal. Later versions of Windows abstracted the hardware access away, and the monitoring software broke. Because the emulation company had gone belly up, there was no way to fix the incompatibility.

So the utility had a choice: get new hardware/software certified (by NRC?), or keep doing what they were doing with the software (and hardware) that they had. They chose the latter.

So this is how, in 2007, during a tour of the facility, I stumbled across a Pentium 1 system running an AmigaOS emulator on Windows NT 4.0 that was responsible for displaying the status of the control rods of a nuclear power plant.

Spare hardware for this setup was purchased off of eBay and stocked on an adjacent shelf.

Thanks for flagging the personal attack.

"it just seems transparent that you have a right wing worldview" - based on a single opinion about whether an alternative explanation for a hand gesture could be plausible? That you feel you know me well enough to draw this conclusion from a single sentence in a reply to a comment and announce it, as if you're branding me with shame, is part of the problem with politics here on HN, and in my opinion is strong evidence against Drew's claim in his post. A more constructive comment would engage with the substance of the reply, not the reactionary labeling of its author.

"but don't wanna say it openly coz they are openly racist and fascistic now." You've got the result right, but not the motivation. You're on to something: people who might hold these views don't want to say it openly ON HN because this is the reaction they will receive. Not debate, not even constructive pushback: just tired accusations of being in league with racists and fascists.

Your comment exemplifies the current problem with political discussions on this site: any non-mainstream (and that's this weird combination of civil-libertarian and progressive; see one of my other replies for more) viewpoint automatically earns the poster some derogatory label. Who would want to engage in discussion when this is the inevitable result? Ad hominem comments like yours stifle discussion instead of promoting it, leaving only those who agree with your views in the thread.

This right here is what gets us echo chambers.

sheafification's reply was specifically to me and specifically personal. (Every sentence was directed at me - not something that I wrote.) There was no "general observation" that I can see in his reply. For the record, here is his reply in its entirety:

> Congratulations, you have political opinions. Despite your claims elsewhere, you’re not “politically neutral.” Nor do you believe, in practice, that political opinions do not belong on HN.

Where is the "general observation that has come up many times over the years"? What part of this response read as "correct" to you, and why?

From my reading, it was an ad hominem generalization based on a flawed understanding of my previous post designed to dismiss my opinions based on some perceived contradiction. What about this is "correct"?

Again, I do not wish to debate whether Musk is a nazi (literal or figurative). I don't own or use any of his products, and he is free to espouse whatever views he wants, as we all are. You are absolutely entitled to develop and hold your own opinions regarding Musk and I don't want to attempt to convince you to change them.

Where I both disagree and agree with you is your statement that "the subject is debated again and again each time it appears". This may be true in general, but my point is that here on HN, it has become a truism that Elon performed a nazi salute. My point is that you're right that other outlets present the alternative view that I mentioned above, but I'm not sure ANY substantive debate regarding this specific action ever happened here, and even if it did once, the fact that it has now been stated as fact that "Elon gave a nazi salute" at least twice so far in this thread without anyone bringing attention to the fact that others might disagree with that interpretation does not lend credence to Drew's assessment that HN has been overrun with right-wing bias.

On the other hand, automatic disdain for the hegemony is a pretty progressive lean.

This is why summarily labeling folks as "nazis", "racists", "genocide supporters", etc. doesn't advance the conversation; it shuts it down, and my feeling is that's why we're seeing the types of political threads we see on HN (that are dominated by like-minded individuals ranting against whatever cause they happen to espouse).

IMO, this siloing is not a sign of a healthy community. My preference would be to get back to more technical discussions and try to avoid discussion of politics insofar as that's possible.

But I don't speak for anyone else and can only control how I engage in discussion here. I choose to disengage in political threads. That other (non-HN-mainstream) voices do as well is probably one of the reasons why the self-reinforcing echo chambers exist in the first place.

That's my objection to political discussions on HN.

I don't care about Elon. I don't own or use any of his products, and I don't idolize men. I don't wish to engage in a discussion about whether Elon is a (literal or figurative) Nazi.

I care that Drew DeVault's assessment that HN has been taken over by right-wing posters does not match what I've seen here, and therefore maybe we as a community should re-evaluate the benefit of engaging in political discussion on this (technical) forum.

- migrants in the UK and EU;

- slave labor in the Far East;

- documented genocide in Africa;

- military conscription in Russia;

- press freedom in Central Asia;

- crime and drugs in Latin America

This is not to say that the US shouldn't be criticized. Let's have that discussion. But why on HN? And why do these other topics never result in substantive engagement? My earlier statement that the US is a punching bag meant that relative to all other injustices in the world, the US appears to be facing the most criticism on HN.

On one hand, maybe it's because the expectations for the US are so much higher than other countries. On another, maybe it's because it's fashionable to criticize the hegemon. I don't know. But my experience here is that almost all "government does something bad" posts are about the US. This is, to me, evidence of a bias.

My point is that proposed discussions about US policy that point to something that some HN user has decided is worthy of praise never seem to get traction here, while discussions that are objectively critical of the US seem to proliferate (with no substantive discussion in opposition in the comments section).

That's the real issue. Humans do not engage in productive discussion if everyone holds the same opinions. Find me a set of conservative opinions that has resulted in substantive engagement here and I'll be happy to update my priors. Until then, what I see in the political threads here is an echo chamber, with the (conservative) opposition either downvoted or reluctant to post. I can't tell you why others don't post, but I can tell you why I don't (and I'm not even a conservative):

1) I don't think HN should be a forum for political discussions in the first place; and

2) I'd probably just get downvoted anyway since the progressive bias here is so strong.

You wrote "Elon "Sieg Heil"ed twice on national TV." as if it were undisputed fact. This "fact" been repeated here to the extent that "only Nazis could have interpreted it differently" is the default.

Well, I interpreted it differently. It was an (admittedly inartful) attempt to extend his "heart" to the crowd. This is further supported by his spoken words at the time of the supposed salute: "My heart goes out to you."

Perhaps I just like to assume innocence as opposed to malevolence, but this explanation makes sense to me. Elon isn't the most effective public speaker, so it's entirely reasonable to me that he was just trying to mime what he was saying.

You're welcome to disagree, but the fact that folks here just uncritically repeat "Elon is a Nazi; he even saluted" without any pushback is another example of the symptoms I describe in my earlier comment.

As a recent example, anti-progressive themes (being supportive of Israel, for example) are nowhere to be found. Pro-Palestinian views abound with little counter-engagement.

In addition, just look at all the anti-US posts/comments. Other countries do not get the same treatment in the same volume. The US is a punching bag here. It's tiresome. HN used to be a respite from political insanity on both sides. Now some days it's no better than reddit.

From my (politically neutral, believe it or not) perspective, this site is extremely hostile to conservatives. It's interesting that progressives feel the same way. Maybe we should put a pause on political discussions altogether.