Hacker News: goatlover

New comment by goatlover in "AI is removing the middle class of software engineering?"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 19:57:15 +0000

Pretty big assumptions that we will get a UBI that everyone can live comfortably on, that there will be optional jobs for anyone who wants to work, and even given the first two, that there won't be massive wealth and power accumulation at the top, even more than today.

New comment by goatlover in "HTML over WebSockets: real-time SPAs with barely any JavaScript"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 19:36:39 +0000

Is Meteor.js still in use? I recall early on it was all the rage, but that didn't last too long.

I had thought it delivered updated html over sockets, but maybe it was just the data. Did seem to be a bit more of a heavy JS framework, but it's been years.

New comment by goatlover in "Grok 4.6 scores 61 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 19:27:17 +0000

The wrong side is the authoritarian side that wishes to co-opt democracies around the world.

New comment by goatlover in "Aaron Rodgers secretly funded his town's Flock-style cameras"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 18:39:46 +0000

Yes we can already see this with ICE going after social media critics, and the potential for it with the president's NSPM-7 directive defining domestic terrorists as anything that's not "traditional values", anti-fascist or critical of capitalism.

New comment by goatlover in "Bluesky's active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 18:24:35 +0000

Define "far left". In comparison to MAGA? The Overton window of the US has shifted so far right that universal healthcare and free education are seen as one step removed from communism.

New comment by goatlover in "Wisconsin Tracks Man Across State Line with Flock Cameras to Arrest Him for Weed"

goatlover — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 01:24:46 +0000

Don't police have anything better to do? Making weed illegal and a "gateway" drug while alcohol, tobacco and caffein remained legal was something. I don't understand how going after some average person buying weed makes society better.

New comment by goatlover in "Compression is prediction"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 21:48:21 +0000

But not cases that don't fit the scheme, and the future always has some of those. We are continually surprised by what comes next, and have been notoriously bad at predictions that aren't clear trends (until those trends change).

New comment by goatlover in "Ocean heat records broken as hottest July temperature recorded"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 15:00:05 +0000

It would go up less and the climate would likely stabilize by the end of this century. People treat climate change like it's a binary when it's really a range.

New comment by goatlover in "More than 10 firms pay up to $100k a month for access to Truth Social posts"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 14:02:07 +0000

The Republicans still control Congress at least until the new Congress is seated in January. At which point the House may impeach Trump for one of many crimes. But it's unlikely the Senate will have enough votes to convict, even if Democrats also take it back.

New comment by goatlover in "ICE to Pay LexisNexis Millions for Data to Feed to Palantir"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 01:01:07 +0000

> That also includes identifying what ICE perceives as fraud “before crime and fraud can materialize ..."

Guess we can add precrime to the dystopian playbook.

> PenLink is another company ICE contracts with which 404 Media previously reported on. It sells social media monitoring tools and one called Webloc for tracking the location of mobile phones in entire neighborhoods.

As if Flock cameras weren't enough.

> or Enhanced Leads Identification & Targeting for Enforcement, populates a map interface with potential deportation targets, and provides ICE officials with a “confidence score” on the person’s current address.

Just gets worse and worse as you read on. And who is holding ICE or DHS accountable with all this surveillance tech and funding?

New comment by goatlover in "Letter to Governor Abbott on responsible AI infrastructure in Texas"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:43:51 +0000

I'm guessing the people who successfully block construction will be happy the data centers are built elsewhere. I doubt they care that much about AI progress, given the goals of those building the data centers.

New comment by goatlover in "Letter to Governor Abbott on responsible AI infrastructure in Texas"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:39:51 +0000

Since the GOP is already trying to paint Talarico that way, he might as well add it to his campaign if he hasn't already. He can mix it in with God wanting humans to take care of the Earth religious message. It's crazy how much the right has co-opted religion in American politics.

New comment by goatlover in "Letter to Governor Abbott on responsible AI infrastructure in Texas"

goatlover — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:26:57 +0000

Infrastructure for what? To push AI, crypto and gambling on everyone? How about build this "infrastructure" in the back yards of billionaires? They should have plenty of land.

New comment by goatlover in "Letter to Governor Abbott on responsible AI infrastructure in Texas"

goatlover — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 21:13:35 +0000

Or like property on the Texas Mexico border through which a wall is being built sealing off acres of private land from the owner.

New comment by goatlover in "Letter to Governor Abbott on responsible AI infrastructure in Texas"

goatlover — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 21:11:42 +0000

Why is opposing data center construction bad? People need housing, if there isn't enough affordable housing around, then opposing it can be bad. But also people who live there should have a say in what gets built near them, since they have to live with it.

New comment by goatlover in "Tl;dv: Over 180k meetings left wide open"

goatlover — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 17:05:45 +0000

Welcome to Invisible Pink Unicorns and orbiting tea pots. You're just a fleeting experience of a Boltzmann Brain in the background of high entropy universe.

We don't need to disprove radically skeptical or outlandish beliefs. They're not consistent with everything else we know. There's no good reason to take them seriously.

New comment by goatlover in "Everything you do is being recorded"

goatlover — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 23:58:08 +0000

An autocracy or illiberal democracy is perfectly possible. It's happened to several countries recently. And Russia at this point is a dictatorship.

New comment by goatlover in "Everything you do is being recorded"

goatlover — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 23:54:14 +0000

They care to the degree they become aware of it and it's potential misuses.

New comment by goatlover in "Bulldozers Plow Through Big Bend National Park, Sparking Fury in Texas"

goatlover — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 08:19:57 +0000

It's a small fraction of illegal crossings in a very remote area where it's easy for border patrol or sheriffs to pick them up. A wall will just degrade the park and hurt the local economy.

New comment by goatlover in "Bulldozers Plow Through Big Bend National Park, Sparking Fury in Texas"

goatlover — Sun, 09 Aug 2026 08:13:46 +0000

Whatever happened to states rights? This Texas we're talking about, nobody living there wants this.