Hacker News: giantg2

New comment by giantg2 in "Flipper One – we need your help"

giantg2 — Fri, 22 May 2026 10:51:05 +0000

Almost feels like they should just build a dongle of sensors that can plug into existing Linux systems, such as a Steam Deck, laptop, or desktop. It's almost as if people are walking around with screens and batteries in there pockets already. It's too bad they can't just make it plug into an Android phone

New comment by giantg2 in "Samsung chip workers will get an average $340k bonus as AI profits soar"

giantg2 — Fri, 22 May 2026 10:37:07 +0000

If you're in manufacturing and have a union in the US, there's a good chance your job just gets shipped overseas unless it's some sort of protected job that can't legally be done overseas (some defense stuff).

New comment by giantg2 in "Kv4p HT – A homebrew 1W radio (VHF or UHF) that plugs into an Android phone"

giantg2 — Tue, 19 May 2026 18:09:09 +0000

I think there's other phenomena that people might be interested in such as E-skip and tropospheric ducting. Although you cant really rely on those.

New comment by giantg2 in "War game exposed U.S. vulnerability to low-tech warfare"

giantg2 — Tue, 19 May 2026 14:34:00 +0000

We're still vulnerable to low tech warfare. We keep developing expensive systems that can't be manufactured quickly. One of the main reasons for success in WW2 was the fact that we could produce decent weapons in great volume. Japan had limited resources (draw a parallel to our rare earth situation). Germany had many advanced weapons, but couldn't produce enough (draw a parallel to our missiles).

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 21:34:35 +0000

This seems to show the same gradation but with less magnitude. Was there some other point you were making?

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 21:29:03 +0000

The easy thing to do is set a limit for how much and how long you can borrow against, tax the loans as income, or outlaw loans against investment instruments entirely.

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 21:24:34 +0000

Payroll taxes were capped because the related benefits were capped. We could uncap either or both ends of that. Although removing the cap should have been unnecessary if the government acted responsibly, and the removal of the cap would not force them to act responsibly in the future.

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:43:39 +0000

"The majority of the city does not give a shit."

Based on the voting, it seems they do give a shit but in the opposite direction.

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:38:18 +0000

This is close enough (posted here by another).

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48185123

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:36:52 +0000

It seems your article is saying the same sort of thing I already stated - "The share of taxes paid by the richest 1 percent (24 percent)", right?

You are talking about effective taxes rates, which are different. To discuss that, I would have liked to see a bit more detail in the article, like what the income sources were and the deductions and losses to offset gains. I think changes around capital gains and loans against equities could use some adjustments. The other taxes like payroll are basically moot as Bezos's payroll income is only about $90k per year anyways.

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:26:22 +0000

Do you have the data for that? I was wondering about tax paid (as dollars not effective rate- I know effective tends to me lower for HNW individuals due to accountants and other financial professionals they can afford).

New comment by giantg2 in "The FBI Wants to Buy Nationwide Access to License Plate Readers"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:22:33 +0000

Or withholding money (grants).

New comment by giantg2 in "New York to tax luxury second homes in NYC"

giantg2 — Mon, 18 May 2026 20:17:05 +0000

"seeing the ultra rich paying far less taxes then they are."

Is this actually true? I thought looking at the aggregates that the top 10% pay something like 1/3rd of all income/cap gain taxes.

New comment by giantg2 in "PART Telescopes – Bringing radio astronomy within reach of rural schools"

giantg2 — Sun, 17 May 2026 14:22:16 +0000

I'm in the long process (slow due to competing priorities) of building an 18" visual telescope because the views can be really cool and beautiful. Plus it blows my mind that I might be able to hand grind something to see light from deep space that could be thousands of years old.

So, my question is, are there any cool things I can do with a radio telescope that have that same sort of intrinsic cool/wow factor?

New comment by giantg2 in "Avoiding and reducing microplastic false positives from dry glove contact"

giantg2 — Thu, 14 May 2026 13:38:35 +0000

This shouldn't really be a problem. Just use aseptic techniques to avoid glove contact (direct, indirect, and airborne) with the test material.

New comment by giantg2 in "USDA Projects Smallest US Wheat Harvest Since 1972 Due to Plains Drought"

giantg2 — Thu, 14 May 2026 13:35:23 +0000

It will only get worse for the next generation as the aquafers are continuing to be depleted.

New comment by giantg2 in "Twin brothers wipe 96 government databases minutes after being fired"

giantg2 — Wed, 13 May 2026 20:18:34 +0000

The whole point of stuff like SOC2 and audit to verify that policy is actually implemented. Seems like nobody actually checked.

New comment by giantg2 in "Twin brothers wipe 96 government databases minutes after being fired"

giantg2 — Wed, 13 May 2026 20:17:34 +0000

It still blows my mind. Shouldn't the government audit their contracting companies for egregious issues like this? Seems extremely reckless not to.

New comment by giantg2 in "Twin brothers wipe 96 government databases minutes after being fired"

giantg2 — Wed, 13 May 2026 19:16:38 +0000

Shouldn't this force companies that need to pass a SOC2 out of the district? Doesn't SOC2 require background investigation of personnel with access to sensitive systems?

New comment by giantg2 in "Twin brothers wipe 96 government databases minutes after being fired"

giantg2 — Wed, 13 May 2026 19:09:26 +0000

How did they get access to 5k passwords? Are they being sent/stored in cleartext? This is the most baffling part of the article for me.

The second part I'm unclear about is how you could pass SOC2 when you aren't terminating account access simultaneously with the employment termination.