Hacker News: ironchief

New comment by ironchief in "My Friend Bob Cringely"

ironchief — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 15:13:26 +0000

His Steve Jobs “Lost Interview” is also the best Steve Jobs interview. Highly recommend taking the time to watch it. https://youtu.be/Bbwj58Xj2yI?is=J5w7WWg3-AegCwbf

New comment by ironchief in "My Friend Bob Cringely"

ironchief — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 15:10:29 +0000

He messaged me a couple years ago and it matches with this post's description: "While the first half of the email was about the idea, invariably, the 2nd half was about how much money it was going to make."

  Point-to-point supersonic organ delivery

  Dear Derek,

  I'm Bob Cringely, an ancient Silicon Valley pundit. I also run a little
  CubeSat air-launch startup. Competition from SpaceX forced us to cut costs
  so we figured how to make an old French business jet fly Mach 1.6 on the
  fuel to fly Mach 0.8. Now we want to apply this tech to organ delivery.
  100 VTOL supersonic drones could serve the whole US operating from helipad
  to helipad at 1000 mph. Not autonomous, they'll have pilots on the ground.
  It's a $2 billion business with 75 percent margins but only we know how.
  Please pass it on.

New comment by ironchief in "South Pole Water Infrastructure"

ironchief — Sat, 08 Jun 2024 17:08:49 +0000

More info on the PM-3A reactor http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2014/ph241/reid2/

New comment by ironchief in "Was Apple’s 1999 Power Mac G4 Classified as a Weapon? (2014)"

ironchief — Tue, 20 Dec 2022 17:23:02 +0000

Fascinating that High Performance Computers had export controls in the 90s as dual use technology but little restraint until recently.

How would we apply this today? Instead of MTOPS use TFLOPS FP16?

Was Apple’s 1999 Power Mac G4 Classified as a Weapon? (2014)

ironchief — Tue, 20 Dec 2022 17:19:54 +0000

Article URL: https://www.techjunkie.com/apples-1999-power-mac-g4-really-classified-weapon/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34068985

Points: 4

# Comments: 2

New comment by ironchief in "Head of election worker management company arrested for theft of personal data"

ironchief — Wed, 05 Oct 2022 20:21:26 +0000

I thought your comment was a joke until I read the link. Wow

"District Attorney investigators found that in contradiction to the contract, information was stored on servers in the People’s Republic of China."

What if A.I. gets 100x better in a matter of months?

ironchief — Sat, 24 Apr 2021 21:06:57 +0000

Article URL: https://interconnected.org/home/2020/08/24/ai_overhang

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26928263

Points: 10

# Comments: 8

New comment by ironchief in "Viewpoints Research Institute concluded its operations at the beginning of 2018"

ironchief — Sat, 24 Apr 2021 20:54:07 +0000

Every org that hired Alan Kay as a fellow was closed

- Apple Advanced Technology Group

- Walt Disney Imagineering Fellows

- HP Advanced Software Research

- VPRI

Justice Thomas argues for making Facebook, Twitter and Google utilities

ironchief — Mon, 05 Apr 2021 16:18:24 +0000

Article URL: https://www.protocol.com/bulletins/thomas-scotus-twitter-trump-ban

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26700921

Points: 4

# Comments: 0

New comment by ironchief in "Raiders of the Lost Ark as a Black-and-White Silent Film (2014)"

ironchief — Sun, 21 Feb 2021 00:44:03 +0000

Do you have the link to the documentary?

Tech Startups Say New Pay Rules for H-1B Visas Are Unaffordable

ironchief — Sun, 01 Nov 2020 21:38:24 +0000

Article URL: https://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-startups-say-new-pay-rules-for-h-1b-visas-are-unaffordable-11604246400

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24962731

Points: 9

# Comments: 10

New comment by ironchief in "Filecoin: Proof of Storage Systems"

ironchief — Wed, 19 Aug 2020 19:39:39 +0000

This hardly meets the definition of brief description, let alone a "Deep Dive".

New comment by ironchief in "Y Combinator has lost its soul: A YC founder's perspective"

ironchief — Wed, 22 Jul 2020 18:15:48 +0000

I recommend reading this blog post and drawing your own conclusion.

My conclusion is PG's "I can lay out what I know to be the right thing to do, and still not do it."

New comment by ironchief in "Chan Zuckerberg Initiative scientists: FB’s practices ‘antithetical’ to mission"

ironchief — Sun, 07 Jun 2020 02:10:59 +0000

Yes.

Why Zig When There Is Already CPP, D, and Rust?

ironchief — Mon, 06 Jan 2020 15:00:28 +0000

Article URL: https://github.com/ziglang/zig/wiki/Why-Zig-When-There-is-Already-CPP%2C-D%2C-and-Rust%3F

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21969578

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

New comment by ironchief in "India is easing sourcing norms for single-brand retailers like Apple"

ironchief — Thu, 29 Aug 2019 12:52:59 +0000

“To boost sales in India, Apple has started to assemble several iPhone models locally and reached a stage where it can begin to export to overseas markets phones produced in India. Assembling phones in India allows Apple — as it does to other phone makers — to enjoy some tax benefits that Narendra Modi’s government provides.“

New comment by ironchief in "India is easing sourcing norms for single-brand retailers like Apple"

ironchief — Wed, 28 Aug 2019 20:29:25 +0000

Apple - We can't make iPhones in the US and tariffs don't work

Also Apple - Tariffs made us move production to Brazil and India.

New comment by ironchief in "[dead]"

ironchief — Mon, 06 May 2019 14:51:33 +0000

"Men are chronically lonely and unable to express their pain. Women hardest hit." - @olivertraldi

New comment by ironchief in "Why is there no US rival to compete with Huawei?"

ironchief — Fri, 26 Apr 2019 17:30:21 +0000

"I wonder if the so-called developed countries should be careful of their own premature deindustrialization. The US industrial base has faltered, but there is still so much left to build. Until we’ve perfected asteroid mining and super-skyscrapers and fusion rockets and Jupiter colonies and matter compilers, we can’t be satisfied with innovation confined mostly to the digital world."

I highly recommend reading Dan Wang's "Definite optimism as human capital" https://danwang.co/definite-optimism-as-human-capital/

New comment by ironchief in "Israeli Scientists 'Print' World's First 3D Heart with Human Tissue"

ironchief — Wed, 17 Apr 2019 17:28:34 +0000

It is not. This is another example of "looks like, but doesn't work like". You often see people print noses, ears, whatever that have cells in them. That doesn't make it functional tissue.

Source: I lead a tissue engineering project to print human organs for transplantation.