<rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>Hacker News: ludston</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=ludston</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Wed, 09 Sep 2026 03:17:26 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=ludston" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Music Theory for Programmers"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It's a bit more circular than that. The music you were raised with sounds good to you, which means you want to understand how to make music like that hence the dominance of 12 tones and major and minor scales in Western music.<p>But also, nobody bothers to talk about this because for beginners without sufficient focus on mastery by copying other people, they're generally not going to be able to do anything notable with music anyway, so this kind of meta-theory is an unnecessary distraction. (And by the time you are actually decent with music literally years have passed and you've probably stumbled upon this idea by then)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 06 Sep 2026 13:37:55 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586434</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586434</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586434</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Music Theory for Programmers"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>> we tolerate them being slightly out of tune<p>And in many cases we don't need to tolerate this because most instruments barring guitar and piano allow musicians to tune chords to just temperament, and players will do this automatically and completely subconsciously.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sun, 06 Sep 2026 13:25:07 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586335</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586335</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49586335</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Cheap GPS jammers are filling the world with navigation dead zones"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Probably just turn off the jammer for 2 seconds</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 01 Sep 2026 08:36:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49519490</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49519490</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49519490</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Why aren't smart people happier? (2022)"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Given that the purpose of a measure is to make predictions: IQ can be used to improve predictions of academic outcomes, whereas the multiple intelligences models are worse at this.<p>Whether or not there are multiple intelligences or not is an implementation detail unless knowledge of this has measurably lead to some better prediction.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 20 Aug 2026 22:33:35 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49381185</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49381185</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49381185</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "HackEurope 2026: A short rant on AI and hackathons"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It's telling how out of touch the evaluators of these things are that the grand winner designed a tool that's been in use by fire services for decades. (Software that predicts fires based on lightening strikes). But you slap LLM on it, and assert that somehow you can replace the arborists and helicopter pilots with drones (as if the human piloting the thing is the expensive part of a multi million dollar vehicle hauling tonnes of water around anyway) and that tricks non-professionals into thinking you're disrupting a field.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 17 Aug 2026 08:35:24 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49327920</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49327920</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49327920</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "A Discord Alternative – Echoed"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Congratulations, I'm sure it was a monumental effort to build this. Good luck with marketing and all that.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 23:39:49 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49077134</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49077134</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49077134</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>> Not as a stand in for general stupidity.<p>It's being used as a stand in for a very specific example of stupidity, and it is "clever" because it evokes strong imagery in an unexpected way. Which is why it is funny. But still offensive. It's best to avoid black and white thinking about things like this, as hard as it is for the ego to admit that it takes pleasure from cruelty.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 23:24:39 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49076959</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49076959</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49076959</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I assume you're being sarcastic, but moron, retard, stupid, dumb, idiot, mad, imbecile, mongoloid, spastic, lame, lunatic, maniac and psycho were all used as medical terms before they became stigmatic. Filter out sexual and scatological insults and there is very little left.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 11:58:35 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49068327</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49068327</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49068327</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Most of our insults against intelligence come from medical terminology originally. Every word eventually starts being used offensively, and then a new one gets coined and the cycle continues.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 03:51:20 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065025</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065025</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49065025</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It is, and autism is just the swap-in vulnerable minority of the day that is socially acceptable to be the butt of the joke.<p>If you don't understand what I mean, swap out "autistic" for "retarded" and the joke still functions, but a lot more people will be offended by it.<p>I still laughed though.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 03:09:43 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064787</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064787</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064787</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "French firefighters face 'pyrocumulonimbus' for first time"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Governments have been working on this for more then 20 years now. 40 maybe. As long as I've been alive at least. It's just that all of the actions to try and deal with this have been continuously undermined by fossil fuel industries and right-wing politics.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2026 02:02:21 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064407</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064407</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49064407</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "If coding has been solved, why does software keep getting worse?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The fact that Arch is bleeding edge has been an explicit part of the Arch philosophy for as long as I've been using it (for 20 years now). It breaks a lot less frequently than it used to.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 25 Jul 2026 03:55:35 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49044379</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49044379</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49044379</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "GigaToken: ~1000x faster Language model tokenization"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It depends on whether or not latency is the constraint of throughput in your circumstances.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 23 Jul 2026 08:18:04 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49018381</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49018381</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49018381</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Why do you suck at juggling now?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>And that demonstrates the difference between a developer that is ready for promotion vs one that isn't. You need to be able to make the correct choices for your employer (even if they are not the best choices, or most interesting choices), and being able to recognize these is a skill.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 23 Jul 2026 01:53:44 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015850</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015850</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015850</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Why do you suck at juggling now?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>It's fine to prefer the comfort of familiar problems and obstacles, but you shouldn't pretend to yourself that you haven't chosen to embrace them over fear of the unknown.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 23 Jul 2026 01:50:54 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015837</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015837</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49015837</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Why do you suck at juggling now?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Instead of talking about skills, or personal efficiency, talk about technologies that you're going to introduce to your product, or some specific difficult problem that you're intending to solve.<p>Another next career step is to take ownership of things without needing to be asked or told, to create and execute plans, to raise and address problems pro-actively etc. And if your workspace doesn't give you opportunities to do it, and you want career progression, then go somewhere else.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 22 Jul 2026 14:08:16 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49007097</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49007097</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49007097</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "Do we just want slaves?"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This is bait right? Obviously the answer to this question is there is some population that are happy for there to be suffering so long as it benefits them, and then there is another population that is vehemently against this, and then there is one that is apathetic and tries to just get on with their lives.<p>Like with every major ethical crises ever.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 21 Jul 2026 05:47:56 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48988509</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48988509</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48988509</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "China’s open-weights AI strategy is winning"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I need a !remind me 15 years.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 20 Jul 2026 21:57:15 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48985388</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48985388</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48985388</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "A road to Lisp: Why Lisp"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>That argument seems crazy to me. 18th is <i>so</i> good. There are literally thousands of programming languages that it is competing with.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 10 Jul 2026 02:17:55 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854989</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854989</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854989</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by ludston in "A road to Lisp: Why Lisp"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>This is just not true. The Lisp family contains all conceivable variants of languages, from statically typed Coalton, to dynamically typed Scheme. From functional, immutable by default Clojure to the imperative-style of Common Lisp.<p>There are prologs, constraint solvers, ffis, JavaScript alternatives, garbage collected and not garbage collected languages that call themselves lisps.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 10 Jul 2026 02:07:48 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854920</link><dc:creator>ludston</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854920</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854920</guid></item></channel></rss>