Hacker News: kokanee

New comment by kokanee in "Anti-AI fonts are useless and harmful"

kokanee — Thu, 20 Aug 2026 18:00:11 +0000

I'm a bit frustrated by what seems to be a widespread strong negative reaction to anti-AI fonts. The accessibility problem is real, but I feel like that's a reason to push the investigation deeper for solutions to that problem, not a reason to abandon the effort entirely. The largest intellectual property infringement in the history of the universe is actively unfolding, and it's resulting in an existentially threatening transfer of wealth and power. That's a problem worth exploring every solution for, and solving it may entail some serious sacrifices.

New comment by kokanee in "Incident with Github.com [resolved]"

kokanee — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 17:29:08 +0000

Yeah let's not forget that in those brief few days when Sam Altman was fired, Satya Nadella swooped in and hired him. Despite the failure of that move, Microsoft has invested $13 billion directly into OpenAI, and has spent $100 billion on the partnership. No sympathy from me watching their software crumble as a result.

New comment by kokanee in "Changes at Google DeepMind: Demis Hassabis from CEO to Chair, Jeff Dean departs"

kokanee — Wed, 05 Aug 2026 17:36:06 +0000

Does everyone want AI?

New comment by kokanee in "Proving a human wrote something"

kokanee — Fri, 24 Jul 2026 18:43:37 +0000

Yeah I think the "how can you prove text was handwritten" question is a subset of the larger "how can you prove that a computer is being driven by a human" problem that all of the work around captcha, attestations, biometrics, and government-id auth has been aimed at. The fundamental issue, it seems to me, is that any signal that a human can provide to a computer (keystroke, camera frame, mouse click, etc) is inherently only parsable by code because a sensor has translated the analog signal into a digital one. That same requirement also ensures that the input can be digitally spoofed or automated. There's a similar problem on the output side: how can an analog user trust a digital certificate? What's stopping me from copying the certificate HTML or taking a screenshot and using it to trick people into thinking my AI content is handwritten?

I don't have any suggestions. I worry that the only strong solutions require a lot of power to be given to a centralized authority.

New comment by kokanee in "How to stop Claude from saying load-bearing"

kokanee — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 20:00:26 +0000

I want to know when I'm consuming AI content because the source of information matters. I want to know what was at stake for the author, what motives they had and didn't have, what biases I should be aware of, and, for example, whether I'm reading content farmed slop that exists solely to attract ad impressions.

New comment by kokanee in "How to stop Claude from saying load-bearing"

kokanee — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 19:09:50 +0000

Hot take -- I'm glad that LLMs still tend to have recognizable communication patterns, because they're often the only clue I have to filter AI content.

New comment by kokanee in "Your 'app' could have been a webpage (so I fixed it for you)"

kokanee — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 17:42:41 +0000

Am I the only person who buys things on mobile websites? I feel like most apps are just websites rendered in webviews with a bunch of background tracking added, and websites create a bit of a firewall between my OS/filesystem and the application.

New comment by kokanee in "Your 'app' could have been a webpage (so I fixed it for you)"

kokanee — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 15:27:49 +0000

Back when I used to freelance, somebody once paid me a scant fee to build a pretty cool online tool for music teachers, basically an interactive piano. I checked in on the website a few years afterwards and found that they had wrapped it into an app and been selling it for $5/install ever since I made it for them. Probably my fault for not licensing the software I wrote for them (I was basically a kid at the time) but it still bothers me.

New comment by kokanee in "I Changed My Name"

kokanee — Thu, 09 Jul 2026 21:36:49 +0000

How do they handle this in Brazil? Is there a standard for which portion of a name shows up on credit cards and ID cards and such?

New comment by kokanee in "Show HN: 18 Words"

kokanee — Thu, 09 Jul 2026 14:59:29 +0000

Just a vote since I'm seeing a lot of anti-timer sentiment: I like the timer because it creates a conclusive way for the game to end, and causes me to spend a lot less time on the game, I imagine. But I also think it makes sense to have a non-timer mode. It would also be cool to have like 3 shuffles that you are allowed to use. As an exit to the non-timer mode, I think it would be fine to have an "I give up " button.

New comment by kokanee in ".self: A new top-level domain designed to support self-hosting"

kokanee — Mon, 06 Jul 2026 17:03:25 +0000

I see -- the statement "Link your existing social accounts to prove you're not a bot" is intended to mean that after you have verified your identity by scanning your passport, you can prove you're not a bot on your BlueSky account. The phrasing is misleading, and the home page seems to omit the most important part: you have to scan your passport.

New comment by kokanee in ".self: A new top-level domain designed to support self-hosting"

kokanee — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 22:03:20 +0000

I'm curious about how this works, but it doesn't look like I can find out without creating an account. I see that it says "Link your existing social accounts to prove you're not a bot." How does having social media accounts prove I'm not a bot?

New comment by kokanee in "Data centers trigger voter backlash"

kokanee — Fri, 26 Jun 2026 22:27:50 +0000

So many of these conversations come back to the problem of privatized gains and socialized losses.

Most things that create value have externalities. I kill the moss on my roof, then it rains and the chemicals go into the stream, then you try to go fishing and get skunked. I exerted my freedom as a private property owner and got the benefits; you paid for the drawbacks. We're all pulling from the same pile of resources, and the Earth doesn't care where your picket fence is.

Data centers incur expensive externalities and you're asking the general public to bear those costs -- or "pay those taxes," if that resonates more. I suppose NIMBYism is part of it, but we're not talking about ugly condos here, we're talking about towns running out of electricity: https://fortune.com/2026/05/12/lake-tahoe-data-center-49000-....

New comment by kokanee in "Finding the best dog treat with statistics"

kokanee — Tue, 23 Jun 2026 18:33:08 +0000

Yes, and also the presence of a window fan on that side is a big deal because the selection is based on scent. In my experience dogs appear to "like" a scent based on how strong it is, not necessarily how it is "flavored" (for examples, dogs can behave as if they love the smell of poop or skunk spray, but it's actually the powerful sensory information that they're reacting to, not a culinary desire). It seems possible to me that the dog is choosing whichever scent is more powerful.

New comment by kokanee in "Is Meta destroying its engineering organization?"

kokanee — Wed, 17 Jun 2026 00:25:37 +0000

I've definitely seen some articles on the topic of AI psychosis among executives. I think there's something about being in a position of power that makes the sycophancy really psychologically dangerous.

New comment by kokanee in "I Won't Buy You a Coffee"

kokanee — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 19:00:00 +0000

I'm surely not the only American reading this and being flabbergasted at the wildly low consumer prices mentioned. I had to double-check the post date to see if this was from 1990 or something.

New comment by kokanee in "Robinhood now lets your AI agents trade stocks"

kokanee — Fri, 29 May 2026 18:13:41 +0000

As much as I hate the idea of enabling the desperate masses to gamble like this, LLMs are very aligned tools for sentiment analysis, which can be the foundation of a trading strategy. I think it's extremely irresponsible to use them for execution, though.

New comment by kokanee in "I am retiring from tech to live offline"

kokanee — Fri, 29 May 2026 17:35:49 +0000

I would take this advice a bit further even -- I don't think savings alone is the key, because inflation and de-dollarization are exponentially eroding purchasing power. The key is ownership of income-producing assets. In late-stage capitalism, the vast majority of people who work in exchange for wages will be members of the debt class; workers who manage to escape debt will still be living on a knife's edge where you can be laid off at any moment regardless of how well your company is doing. The only people living with stability will be those whose lives are paid for by the assets they own, rather than by the hours they sell.

New comment by kokanee in "Private equity bought America's essential services"

kokanee — Wed, 27 May 2026 22:40:58 +0000

We need to figure out how to effectively organize boycotts, and find a way to actually incentivize participation.

I'm spitballing here, but what if we created a browser extension that gives users the option to block various monopolistic/oligarchic tech platforms. If the browser navigates to a blocked platform, we show a "consider these alternatives" page instead. Competitors to the monopolies could offer incentives (raffles, discounts, etc) in exchange for promotion on the recommended alternatives list, creating an incentive to participate in a boycott.

Example: a user opts into an Amazon boycott, but later clicks an affiliate link that leads them to a book listing on amazon.com. The browser extension intercepts this and displays a list of other places to shop for that book. Barnes and Noble offers a 10% discount for people who boycott Amazon, so they're the top recommended alternative, and the user gets the book for a discount.

New comment by kokanee in "Standard Chartered CEO walks back comment about 'lower-value human capital'"

kokanee — Wed, 20 May 2026 18:52:25 +0000

This is the kind of thinking that has resulted in an economy where losses are socialized and gains are privatized. There is strategic business value in managing your company in a way that doesn't contribute to the collapse of the middle class.