I see so much in common with this project and the numerous AI-based UX design tools out there. Whether it's music or UI, now that the "generation" portion of the work costs zero, all that remains is taste.

And so much of taste comes from exploring and killing off possibilities that turn out to be dead-ends. I love the idea that models like these will help us find the dead ends faster, or even produce a gem here and there.

P.S. if you want another uncanny version of Fur Elise, listen to Beethoven's own 1822 revision: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s24TtiGgb6k. His 1810 version that we all know was simpler and more balanced. But for what it's worth, Beethoven didn't publish either of them.

A power outage feels like a baseline scenario—orders of magnitude more common than the disasters in this demo. If the system can’t degrade gracefully when traffic lights go dark, what exactly is all that simulation buying us?

Books are static. They do not watch you, adapt to you in real time, or optimize themselves to keep you reading at any cost. Social media does. It measures behavior, runs constant experiments, and tunes feeds to maximize engagement, often by amplifying outrage, fear, or tribalism.

Meta did more than just take part in this system. It perfected it, scaled it worldwide, and resisted meaningful change until public pressure or regulation forced its hand.

That is why it is worrying to see Meta present itself as a trusted builder of the next major technology wave. When a company repeatedly puts growth ahead of social harm, skepticism is not bias. It is common sense. Giving that company even more powerful and less transparent tools should cause us alarm.

Neither do local merchants when they collect a sales tax.

Neither does the homeowner when they rent their guest room on Airbnb.

Neither does Lady Gaga when she sells a ticket through Ticketmaster.

This isn't controversial. It's price transparency for the consumer and it helps them make better choices.

What's unusual is the White House attacking a private sector retailer for a reasonable choice that's clearly theirs to make. Seeing the "+145% tariff" on your checkout page would puncture a hole in the narrative we've heard for years from Donald Trump that "China pays the tax."

No, you and I pay the tax. And both the U.S. and China will suffer.

Facts are stubborn things.

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43638926

Points: 2

# Comments: 2

One possible explanation is that it happens all the time.

There aren't many comparable breaches to this one. The closest in modern times may be Hillary Clinton's email server being used for government business. In that case, the FBI investigated and declined to bring charges, under the expectation that a jury would be unlikely to render a guilty verdict.

Okay, fine. But the FBI investigated and laid out the facts.

My fear is that the current administration sees this as a PR problem. No, this was an operational failure. We should feel lucky that merely an American journalist was added by mistake.

We should expect the FBI to investigate this, too. But I worry the facts are too inconvenient for even that level of accountability.

In my first week on the job, I was told, explicitly, that if I shared Classified or Controlled Unclassified information over unapproved channels, I would be reprimanded—likely fired, or less likely, prosecuted.

It was also made clear that safeguarding the nation's secrets from the carelessness of others was my responsibility, too.

It is mind-boggling that 18 people were on this thread, and none of them ever suggested that this discussion would be better served in a SCIF. To say nothing of SecDef starting the thread on Signal in the first place.

How many other such threads are active at the highest levels of government right now?

Does Chinese intelligence know?

I'm not suggesting punishment, or even prosecution, for the people involved. But the idea that this breach can occur with no accountability, consequences, or operational changes is unacceptable.

It's wrong.

Startup employees, especially early ones, take on most of the risk that founders do. They take pay cuts. They work insane hours. They sacrifice.

And they have the same liquidity needs, too.

It's wrong to make them wait a decade for a fraction of the liquidity that founders got in the Series B.

It's wrong to force them to absorb the risk of the Series B, C, D, E, F, and IPO. All while the founders were set for life years ago.

If founders are going to take money off the table, they should extend the same liquidity offer, pro-rata, to their employees. Period.

Full disclosure: I work at eShares (and love it).

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10096062

Points: 9

# Comments: 2

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9108836

Points: 16

# Comments: 0

FD: I work at eShares.

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8240554

Points: 2

# Comments: 1

Not only are these beautiful and useful fonts, but each one has a story that's as unique as the typography itself. I can't wait to use one of these in a project soon.

"And Mr. Bromwich’s rates in this matter dramatically exceed what he has quoted in the past. For instance, in a proposal to monitor the New Orleans Police Department five months ago, he suggested a $495 hourly rate, without an administrative fee, which the Department of Justice termed 'relatively expensive.'"