Hacker News: pchristensen

The State of Context Engineering

pchristensen — Sun, 25 Oct 2026 20:32:31 +0000

Article URL: https://www.dbreunig.com/2026/10/24/the-state-of-context-engineering.html

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50235780

Points: 263

# Comments: 64

New comment by pchristensen in "The No Kings Takedown Is Why You Shouldn't Rent Your Megaphone from Zuck"

pchristensen — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 15:43:59 +0000

I think the main reaction (at least in tech circles) is that companies like Meta have the power, the legal protection, the political cover, and the indifference to shut down anyone on their platform. So making them the sole provider for your tech and communication is a huge risk.

And this incident (negligent takedown of a community on an important day) demonstrates the point perfectly.

New comment by pchristensen in "Lula supporters protest against Meta to denounce its 'electoral interference'"

pchristensen — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 17:49:08 +0000

That is definitely part of the history, but there is no reality where the USA wouldn't have taken Hawai'i, one way or another, because of it's strategic location and the 19th century attitude toward conquest. Hawai'i couldn't defeat Western powers militarily, especially after disease wiped out so much of the population, and none of the Asian countries had developed enough to compete at that point.

But that inevitability doesn't excuse the specific deceit and treachery around the annexation of Hawai'i.

New comment by pchristensen in "AdFection: Targeted ads turned into a pipeline for zero-click mercenary spyware"

pchristensen — Sun, 18 Oct 2026 04:16:59 +0000

This is a multi-sided conflict. Ignoring reality and history won't help, even if you feel very strongly that one of those sides is right.

  - 1948 - Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon invade Israel
  - 1956 - Israel invades the Sinai
  - 1967 - Israel preemptively strikes Egypt in response to military buildup 
  - 1973 - Egypt and Syria invade Israel
  - 1982 - Israel invades Lebanon
  - 2006 - Hezbollah attacks Israel

New comment by pchristensen in "AdFection: Targeted ads turned into a pipeline for zero-click mercenary spyware"

pchristensen — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 17:30:06 +0000

On the contrary, I was using those charters to establish shared blame, rather than singling out Israel for every act of aggression in the conflict.

New comment by pchristensen in "AdFection: Targeted ads turned into a pipeline for zero-click mercenary spyware"

pchristensen — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 21:27:15 +0000

I’m well aware of the history.

What I meant was, I don’t think Israel is the only guilty party in that decades old conflict, nor the only side with agency to choose how to react in the conflict.

Read the Hamas charter, Iran’s statements about Israel, etc. Israel is not unique in choosing violence.

New comment by pchristensen in "New Apple TV 4K"

pchristensen — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 19:56:50 +0000

If you watch Top Gear, do you think it's fine for your data to go to Raytheon? Alcoa? Goldman Sachs? Saudi Aramco?

Netflix has to know what you're watching in order to show it to you. Sony doesn't have to know what you're watching to render HDMI output. All companies are not created equal in every single transaction.

New comment by pchristensen in "AdFection: Targeted ads turned into a pipeline for zero-click mercenary spyware"

pchristensen — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 19:37:53 +0000

Israel is definitely a threat to its enemies, but even if you think it's all their fault and they deserve it (I do not think that), it's pretty obvious that Israel also faces many threats.

New comment by pchristensen in "AdFection: Targeted ads turned into a pipeline for zero-click mercenary spyware"

pchristensen — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 19:34:52 +0000

That is only one part of Israeli society.

New comment by pchristensen in "America didn't lose its rare earth industry, it sold it"

pchristensen — Wed, 14 Oct 2026 23:38:59 +0000

2nd largest manufacturer by dollar value, not overall activity, employment, share of employment, value relative to other industries, percentage of consumption manufactured domestically, etc etc etc. America's manufacturing is specialized on highly valuable outputs.

New comment by pchristensen in "Submarine cable resilience"

pchristensen — Wed, 14 Oct 2026 18:43:49 +0000

If you care at all about this, you'll love Neal Stephenson's long article Mother Earth, Motherboard: https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/

New comment by pchristensen in "New Apple TV 4K"

pchristensen — Tue, 13 Oct 2026 15:14:24 +0000

Different companies have different track records and incentives with regard to privacy. There may be companies more trustworthy than Apple, but there aren't many companies less worthy than most TV manufacturers.

New comment by pchristensen in "Anti-patterns in software blogging"

pchristensen — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 17:28:14 +0000

Over the years, readers learned what to expect from Joel and Paul, which gave them freedom to continue writing in their own style. I'm curious how the same writing would be received today in a very different environment - much more crowded and driven more by social media than the open web, not to mention the shift of attention towards video. I just don't think writers today have access to the attention that tech bloggers of an earlier era built up.

New comment by pchristensen in "Court agrees with EFF: Utah's VPN law demands a technical impossibility"

pchristensen — Fri, 02 Oct 2026 18:08:54 +0000

Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are indeed Christian.

New comment by pchristensen in "Ask HN: What are you reading?"

pchristensen — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 22:40:23 +0000

I havent read PSS but I loved The Vital Question and Transformer. It was so much better than a book on the Krebs cycle had any business being. I probably liked VQ better though.

New comment by pchristensen in "Ask HN: What are you reading?"

pchristensen — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 22:30:59 +0000

I’m also reading Seeing Like a State!

New comment by pchristensen in "Updated Google Maps shows destruction of the city of Rafah"

pchristensen — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 02:26:08 +0000

Most Middle Eastern Jews were definitely not voluntary migrants in 1948. They were expelled from cities and lands they had lived in for centuries.

New comment by pchristensen in "Updated Google Maps shows destruction of the city of Rafah"

pchristensen — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 02:14:36 +0000

From how I understand the history, in 1948, the attacking Arab armies from neighboring countries told the local Arabs (Palestinians) to leave the war zone to be safe. But when Israel won the war, those Arabs could not return.

New comment by pchristensen in "California farmers are struggling to sell grapes as demand for wine drops"

pchristensen — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 01:56:48 +0000

I’d imagine many of them are immigrants that either fled, were deported, or decided not to return for the picking seasons.

New comment by pchristensen in "UK military jamming other nations' satellites to defend itself, BBC told"

pchristensen — Wed, 23 Sep 2026 21:31:48 +0000

Reminds me of in the Avengers - SHIELD couldn't navigate the helicarrier, and Nick Fury said "Is the sun setting? Then put it on our left!"