Hacker News: freetinker

New comment by freetinker in "American importers and consumers bear the cost of 2025 tariffs: analysis"

freetinker — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 04:45:55 +0000

You’re self-questioning and self-reflective. Totally not worried for you or by you. Keep it up.

New comment by freetinker in "There's a ridiculous amount of tech in a disposable vape"

freetinker — Wed, 14 Jan 2026 17:07:53 +0000

To paraphrase Upton Sinclair: “It is difficult to get a man to prioritize something when his salary depends upon his not prioritizing it.”

New comment by freetinker in "Waymo is bringing autonomous, driverless ride-hailing to London in 2026"

freetinker — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 02:17:40 +0000

Waymo solved San Francisco. Non-trivial, imo. Is London more complex?

New comment by freetinker in "Steve Jobs and Cray-1 to be featured on 2026 American Innovations $1 coin"

freetinker — Fri, 17 Oct 2025 02:12:29 +0000

This is an evolved view. Let’s put achievements on currency, not humans. Of course, this is no panacea - “achievement” is ambiguous enough to be open to interpretation, and therefore political capture. But it’s a step forward.

New comment by freetinker in "Ask HN: How can I use my laptop without monitors?"

freetinker — Mon, 06 Oct 2025 00:33:05 +0000

Apple Vision Pro.

New comment by freetinker in "Benefits of choosing email over messaging"

freetinker — Sun, 05 Oct 2025 23:38:41 +0000

Emails are optimized for COA record-keeping, not efficient communication.

New comment by freetinker in "Meta CTO explains why the smart glasses demos failed at Meta Connect"

freetinker — Sat, 20 Sep 2025 09:48:54 +0000

PR budgets exist to _prevent_ exactly this sort of response.

New comment by freetinker in "You’re a slow thinker. Now what?"

freetinker — Sun, 14 Sep 2025 21:32:51 +0000

This is an astute point. I’m a mid-40s mech engineer in the Bay Area. HN is my tribe, by and large. I’ve been bombarded with perspectives that ADHD medication is the answer. (Not officially diagnosed, but I’m confident I meet the criteria and very likely “afflicted.”)

The brain is complex—adapted, or maladapted, for different tasks. My working hypothesis: mine is maladapted to the behaviors currently rewarded in corporate America. And I know I’m not Feynman.

So here I am, stuck in a bi-modal world (or maybe just worldview). This piece hits hard.

New comment by freetinker in "A love letter to the CSV format (2024)"

freetinker — Thu, 11 Sep 2025 05:08:52 +0000

The comma makes it more human-readable. What separator would you suggest?

New comment by freetinker in "What fact do you wish everyone understood?"

freetinker — Mon, 04 Aug 2025 06:41:24 +0000

This is a largely correct, but incomplete take imo. Cultures are neither “good” nor “bad”. Some are better than others at optimizing different outcomes. Of course, culture A might be objectively better or worse for you vs culture B - depending on what you value or prefer optimizing.

New comment by freetinker in "Ask HN: Is university still credible?"

freetinker — Sat, 02 Aug 2025 00:32:28 +0000

This, 100%. Look East (assuming a Western reference point) for copious evidence that supports this POV. Education is a means to an end, and the only way out of abject poverty (personal experience).

Studying the classics and poetry (arguably components of a well-rounded “liberal” education) is a privileged viewpoint. Hell, I wanted to study theoretical physics. But that would be like studying poetry. Engineering just seemed more practical. Now I earn more than a tenured professor of physics at a top university. Q.E.D.

New comment by freetinker in "ICE is getting unprecedented access to Medicaid data"

freetinker — Sat, 19 Jul 2025 01:50:48 +0000

This.

New comment by freetinker in "Voting age to be lowered to 16 by next general election"

freetinker — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 04:17:45 +0000

More gullible fodder to influence via handheld screens.

New comment by freetinker in "Self-taught engineers often outperform (2024)"

freetinker — Fri, 18 Jul 2025 03:47:59 +0000

Could you share a little bit about your journey - how you got started, your motivations? (I’m trying to teach myself programming/development, hence the curiosity.)

New comment by freetinker in "Seven Engineers Suspended After $2.3M Bridge Includes 90-Degree Turn"

freetinker — Fri, 11 Jul 2025 02:15:04 +0000

An elegant solution to this problem would be to enforce a very low speed limit entering the turn.

“Sharp turn ahead, reduce speed to 5 km/h”

New comment by freetinker in "Seven Engineers Suspended After $2.3M Bridge Includes 90-Degree Turn"

freetinker — Fri, 11 Jul 2025 02:03:49 +0000

True problem solvers. They solved a political problem, but created a real one. Certainly not engineering ethos torch-bearers.

However, they did meet spec. I’d fire leadership first.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.” - Upton Sinclair

New comment by freetinker in "Cars Are Caught in an Endless Cycle of Bigger Screens Nobody Likes"

freetinker — Fri, 04 Jul 2025 00:17:10 +0000

Terrible. Interaction loop is too slow. Not ergonomic.

New comment by freetinker in "Stalking the Statistically Improbable Restaurant with Data"

freetinker — Fri, 04 Jul 2025 00:12:20 +0000

People lack nuance. Nuanced views are computationally expensive.

New comment by freetinker in "Tools: Code Is All You Need"

freetinker — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 23:53:55 +0000

Drones are delivering. Ukraine?

New comment by freetinker in "Proton joins suit against Apple for practices that harm developers and consumers"

freetinker — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 00:18:23 +0000

Apple does not owe Android users a superior non-Apple experience. Android a pretty damn huge platform, right? Way bigger than Apple, I hear? Blame Google. Google failed to compete.