Hacker News: poultron

New comment by poultron in "M7.6 Earthquake in Panama"

poultron — Fri, 09 Oct 2026 18:50:17 +0000

Sample size of.... 1 response...

New comment by poultron in "Apple M5 chip"

poultron — Wed, 15 Oct 2025 19:20:30 +0000

Obsolescence comes when Apple conveniently "optimizes" a new architecture in the OS for a new chip... that conveniently, ironically, somehow severely de-optimizes things for the old chips... and suddenly that shiny new OS feels slow and sluggish and clunky and "damn I need to upgrade my computer!." They'll whitewash it not as planned obsolescence but optimization for new products. Doesn't have to be that way, shouldn't be that way, but its incredibly profitable.

New comment by poultron in "Left-sided Cancer: Blame your bed and TV? (2010)"

poultron — Tue, 28 Nov 2023 15:47:25 +0000

Dont worry, that guest blog post actually read the research results completely wrong and its the opposite. The coils were supposedly attentuating the radiation waves, which is why your right side has a lower incidence. Furthermore, any scientist will tell you a non-powered set of unenergized coils cannot amplify anything. Amplification requires power. Bedsprings are not powered.

Snopes has a solid write up on how badly that author fucked it up. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/coil-mattresses-cause-canc...

New comment by poultron in "Smart drugs reduce quality of effort, and slow decision-making"

poultron — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 18:55:24 +0000

Agreed - when I dont take Adderall, the closest I feel to it is when I do intermittent carb-free fasting paired with high water intake. If I eat shitty, I have what feels like a severe mental hangover every single day with significant impacts to motivation and productivity.

New comment by poultron in "Smart drugs reduce quality of effort, and slow decision-making"

poultron — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 18:53:57 +0000

This is well said. People who dont have ADHD or a similar cognitive dysfunction look at smart drugs as a boost above average to gain high performance - because they havent experienced ADHD or dismiss it. Unfortunately the reality is that folks with ADHD typically feel very below average regardless of their IQ, missing out on meeting details, falling behind in work, procrastinating severely vs their peers. Adderall makes me think "so this is what everyone else feels like" when I take it, and I can just get things done at the most simple levels.

New comment by poultron in "Smart drugs reduce quality of effort, and slow decision-making"

poultron — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 13:38:59 +0000

Agree - as someone who took Adderall in highschool and college, and has started taking it again as an executive in my career, I always took it to be able to handle multitasking more efficiently with less distraction, and to motivate an action to be performed vs procrastinating. A test in which you HAVE to get a job done and you're being monitored and timed - I wouldn't expect a large improvement in results with 'smart drugs'. I think it would be much more interesting to watch study or work habits while under the influence of these smart drugs, measured in pages reviewed/written or emails sent or slides created or phone calls made, etc. True measures of productivity without knowing someone is looking over your shoulder.

Also notice as I take my "smart drugs" my ability to focus in meetings is increased, and therefore allows me to better recall information in subsequent days... vs when not on meds I'm constantly distracted and my memory is much more foggy, especially specifics or details.

New comment by poultron in "Tesla's next-gen electric motors will get rid of rare earth elements"

poultron — Fri, 03 Mar 2023 14:17:51 +0000

Its not that they have some novel idea - its that they're committing to that idea at a corporate level on a massive scale. It's essentially giving us all our best shot at achieving said results. Tesla thinks they've laid out the bridges necessary to get there, and they're publicly making a claim so they can be held accountable. That is why it's a big deal.

New comment by poultron in "SEMrush S-1"

poultron — Tue, 02 Mar 2021 20:53:37 +0000

Not unusual. Look at Blue Apron. https://www.wsj.com/market-data/quotes/APRN/financials/annua...

New comment by poultron in "The Case Against Delaware (2002)"

poultron — Fri, 07 Sep 2018 20:11:18 +0000

Most of you focused on iteration and entrepreneurship should appreciate Delaware simply for its incorporation status alone. Why does everyone incorporate in Delaware do you ask? Is it some tax break or something purely financial, as most people guess? Nope. It's because Delaware put a stake in the ground a LONG time ago and said that they want to be the experts at dealing with business law. So much so that they have their own special court system brought over from England called the Court of Chancery, which iterates its laws at a much faster pace than typical government to keep up with the current business environment. This court system is comprised of Chancellors and Justices who are known to be the best in the world at business law. And when you take a close look at who elects the Court's officials, its strictly divided into half Republicans and half Democrats, with mixed representation from legal and non-legal backgrounds, same with politics. It's about as unbiased as one can get. and from an experience perspective, the Chancellors and Justices ONLY focus on business law cases. Would you want your business case to be dealt with by a judge who just had a divorce case before yours and a criminal case after yours? I wouldnt either.

And from a development perspective, Delaware made their own Division of Corporations almost like a lean startup with the goal of making it the EASIEST and FASTEST way to incorporate your business, with their business hours being 24/7 with international support. You can literally incorporate your business in 15 minutes or less. Try doing that in your home state. Look into the history of the Division of Corporations and the Court of Chancery if you're interested, it's a fascinating story.

So at the end of the day, when you're incorporating a company and inspecting your fiduciary responsibilities to your future employees, shareholders, investors and customers... you want to make sure you incorporate wherever the Business laws are most up to date, with a fast process, a quick judicial system that plays the game by the books and will be swift and fair with a proven track record of extensive experience. Delaware has made itself the no-brainer solution to all of those problems.

And for that, we should thank them (regardless of how shitty their tolls are, ha).

New comment by poultron in "Lilium – Electric vertical take-⁠off and landing jet"

poultron — Fri, 21 Apr 2017 19:42:58 +0000

Because fundamentally thats still less convenient for the customer. In a perfect world, you want to be picked up from your front door and dropped off at the front door of your destination. And if you can avoid highways and traffic, even better. This provides the infamous 'last mile' solution to transportation, instead of forcing everyone onto mainline routes and artery networks.

New comment by poultron in "Lilium – Electric vertical take-⁠off and landing jet"

poultron — Fri, 21 Apr 2017 19:41:39 +0000

You dont afford it. You hail it like an uber. And its autonomous, so you dont need a pilots license. And because its picking up and dropping off dozens and dozens of 'rides' a day, the cost is shared by the user base. A short flight 2 hours away could be $100. Hell of a lot better than spending your time stuck in traffic. Also begins the process of easing congestion on highways.

New comment by poultron in "Lilium – Electric vertical take-⁠off and landing jet"

poultron — Fri, 21 Apr 2017 19:36:39 +0000

Many people are failing to appreciate the "tesla for the skies" model that is coming. Uber is actively pursuing the acquisition of companies like Lilium. Long term, roads aren't a great solution to increasing populations. The Ubers of the sky which land in your front yard or the top of your building and whisk you anywhere within 200-300 miles is coming... fast. And by making the eletric VTOL aircraft autonomous with waypoints, no one has to be a pilot. You simply hail a plane with your app, hop in, fly to your destination and depart. Many companies are testing full-size models like Lilium... for example, http://www.jobyaviation.com/. No one has carried a human passenger yet, and none with autonomous waypoint flying. But soon... within a year.

New comment by poultron in "Perdue Says Its Hatching Chicks Are Off Antibiotics"

poultron — Thu, 04 Sep 2014 18:38:54 +0000

Typical commercial sexing methodology is by holding the wings of the chicks out and looking a the feathers on the wing-tips. There are two sets of feathers there; if the feathers are of equal length, the chick is male. If one set of feathers extends further, the chick is female.

https://www.extension.org/sites/default/files/styles/large/p...

New comment by poultron in "Perdue Says Its Hatching Chicks Are Off Antibiotics"

poultron — Thu, 04 Sep 2014 18:35:43 +0000

Russia has a complete ban currently on dark meat. And Perdue is publicly quoted as exporting zero meat to Russia anymore, dark or white.

Either way, it's the American Consumer that demands white meat... personally I'm a dark meat chap myself.

New comment by poultron in "Perdue Says Its Hatching Chicks Are Off Antibiotics"

poultron — Thu, 04 Sep 2014 04:50:06 +0000

Hey there, I'm intimately familiar with the poultry industry in all aspects. What you're referencing is for egg-utilizing companies, like unilever, who need eggs in their products (ice creams, etc.). Unilever is requiring their egg producers to adopt new technologies to detect male chicks in the eggs and prevent them from hatching, leading to only the female chicks growing into hens, which lay the desired eggs.

The chicken-producing industry (very different from the egg producing industry) does use males. They're differentiated for some products (Perdue's Oven Stuffer Roasters, for example), but 95% of all producers in the country now run "Straight-run" operations, meaning they dont differentiate between male and female birds (no sexing the chicks and separating them). Originally this was a problem, conforming your machines to process two different sized birds (a double-bell-curve, so to speak), but streamlining the selective breeding over the years has brought the females and males together as far as feed conversions and weight gains go.

Always happy to shed light on the poultry industry and it's many quirks :)