Hacker News: quantumwannabe

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Kill The Cookie Banner"

quantumwannabe — Sun, 26 Jul 2026 20:46:21 +0000

Or the "Do Not Track" header: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/...

New comment by quantumwannabe in "How we can reduce traffic congestion"

quantumwannabe — Mon, 13 Jul 2026 12:14:44 +0000

We already tried that experiment. The result was Houston.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "How we can reduce traffic congestion"

quantumwannabe — Mon, 13 Jul 2026 12:09:36 +0000

If you believe that adding lanes doesn't reduce congestion, then you must also believe that adding transit doesn't reduce congestion.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, with Spending Hitting $34B"

quantumwannabe — Thu, 18 Jun 2026 00:21:01 +0000

That’s why I don’t understand why Google’s stock has gone up so much recently. They already have maximum market share of digital ads; they can only lose share to competitors like OpenAI. The only way they can make more money is through paid subscriptions.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "OpenAI agrees with Dept. of War to deploy models in their classified network"

quantumwannabe — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 04:27:27 +0000

More details on the difference between the OpenAI and Anthropic contracts from one of the Under Secretaries of State:

>The axios article doesn’t have much detail and this is DoW’s decision, not mine. But if the contract defines the guardrails with reference to legal constraints (e.g. mass surveillance in contravention of specific authorities) rather than based on the purely subjective conditions included in Anthropic’s TOS, then yes. This, btw, was a compromise offered to—and rejected by—Anthropic.

https://x.com/UnderSecretaryF/status/2027566426970530135

> For the avoidance of doubt, the OpenAI - @DeptofWar contract flows from the touchstone of “all lawful use” that DoW has rightfully insisted upon & xAI agreed to. But as Sam explained, it references certain existing legal authorities and includes certain mutually agreed upon safety mechanisms. This, again, is a compromise that Anthropic was offered, and rejected.

> Even if the substantive issues are the same there is a huge difference between (1) memorializing specific safety concerns by reference to particular legal and policy authorities, which are products of our constitutional and political system, and (2) insisting upon a set of prudential constraints subject to the interpretation of a private company and CEO. As we have been saying, the question is fundamental—who decides these weighty questions? Approach (1), accepted by OAI, references laws and thus appropriately vests those questions in our democratic system. Approach (2) unacceptably vests those questions in a single unaccountable CEO who would usurp sovereign control of our most sensitive systems.

> It is a great day for both America’s national security and AI leadership that two of our leading labs, OAI and xAI have reached the patriotic and correct answer here

https://x.com/UnderSecretaryF/status/2027594072811098230

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Mac mini will be made at a new facility in Houston"

quantumwannabe — Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:22:45 +0000

That's because his American-made competitors charge $50 less than he is charging for his Chinese-made showerhead: https://www.waterchef.com/products/waterchef-sf-7c-premium-s...

How much sleep does a banker need? A US court will decide

quantumwannabe — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 03:57:58 +0000

Article URL: https://www.ft.com/content/60b3dd1c-112a-470c-aa77-1bc697d13cf7

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47083513

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Rethinking High-School Science Fairs"

quantumwannabe — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 14:44:30 +0000

The old science fairs actually did find real geniuses. Many kids who placed highly in the Westinghouse Science Talent Search ended up winning Nobel Prizes later in life.

The modern ones are sadly just another checkbox for college admissions, full of cheaters gaming the metrics.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Microsoft increases Office 365 and Microsoft 365 license prices"

quantumwannabe — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 22:55:05 +0000

They haven't really added anything to Office since 2013, the last pre-subscription version. There were massive changes between Office 98 and 2013, including entirely new programs like OneNote. They just found a way to get their customers to rebuy the same product every year.

Same thing happened with Adobe and CS6; feature development slowed to a crawl after the change to a subscription.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?"

quantumwannabe — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 12:53:00 +0000

Only because you chose to walk through the port instead of through town. Google Maps' walking route is shorter than the route that goes through that road, entirely on sidewalks, and only requires crossing one road wider than one car lane per direction (and said road has a signalized crosswalk). There is also a pedestrian bridge across that road that could be used instead, but Google didn't pick it, likely because it connects with "private" property (the convention center's path).

https://maps.app.goo.gl/asfGrRLkLmtpqnps5

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?"

quantumwannabe — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 12:30:09 +0000

Someone didn't read the article.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Starbucks: Location closures and elimination of roles"

quantumwannabe — Thu, 25 Sep 2025 18:38:05 +0000

It most definitely is not. The vast majority of customers at European Starbucks are locals, not tourists.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Ultrasonic Chef's Knife"

quantumwannabe — Sun, 21 Sep 2025 14:09:20 +0000

Do you know if the knife still acts "sharp" when the physical blade is dull or does it still need regular sharpening like a normal knife?

Restriction on Entry of Certain Nonimmigrant Workers

quantumwannabe — Fri, 19 Sep 2025 23:15:17 +0000

Article URL: https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/09/restriction-on-entry-of-certain-nonimmigrant-workers/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45307922

Points: 77

# Comments: 85

New comment by quantumwannabe in "iPhone Air"

quantumwannabe — Tue, 09 Sep 2025 20:22:56 +0000

This is likely a prototype for their folding phone, which are essentially just two ultra-thin phones stuck together.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Texas Instruments’ new plants where Apple will make iPhone chips"

quantumwannabe — Sun, 24 Aug 2025 03:21:34 +0000

You should tell Taiwan that.

Intel and Trump Reach Historic Agreement to Accelerate American Technology

quantumwannabe — Fri, 22 Aug 2025 21:24:31 +0000

Article URL: https://newsroom.intel.com/corporate/intel-and-trump-administration-reach-historic-agreement

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44989986

Points: 4

# Comments: 0

New comment by quantumwannabe in "GitHub is no longer independent at Microsoft after CEO resignation"

quantumwannabe — Thu, 14 Aug 2025 00:35:30 +0000

The hardware was good but nothing that an iPad doesn’t have nowadays. It was revolutionary for the time with the detachable keyboard and trackpad and Wacom-like pen. The software was what made it an amazing device though.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "GitHub is no longer independent at Microsoft after CEO resignation"

quantumwannabe — Tue, 12 Aug 2025 00:17:06 +0000

In addition to being able to run any regular Windows application, it had the best and most intuitive feeling UX of any tablet in history. Amongst many other features, window management was gesture controlled and Internet Explorer had an alternate UI that moved the tabs to the bottom of the screen to make them easier to reach.

Sadly, Windows 10 removed all the good parts of Windows tablet mode, but its ideas were so good that Apple is still slowly copying bits of its interface for the iPad to this day.

New comment by quantumwannabe in "Google to buy Wiz for $32B"

quantumwannabe — Tue, 18 Mar 2025 14:34:07 +0000

Whatsapp when it was acquired cost $1/year (with a year long free trial) and had a billion users and 55 employees. They were printing money.