Hacker News: sonofhans

New comment by sonofhans in "Sam Altman may control our future – can he be trusted?"

sonofhans — Tue, 07 Apr 2026 04:08:21 +0000

Perhaps your question answers itself.

New comment by sonofhans in "Show HN: I built a 2-min quiz that shows you how bad you are at estimating"

sonofhans — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 21:09:42 +0000

I’ve taken the quiz but not been compelled to sign up. The site feels manipulative, e.g., the “show me all the questions” link is tiny and hidden between two larger boxes, and even then it only shows 2 questions with a signup CTA. Maybe that’s best practice growth hacking these days, but to me it’s a manipulative turnoff. If you’d given me all the questions and answers simply then I would signed up for more, especially with the discount code. Otherwise, how am I supposed to even know what I’m signup up for? Every interaction I’ve had with the site so far is a sales attempt, so mostly I expect more of those.

New comment by sonofhans in "Our commitment to Windows quality"

sonofhans — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 22:09:46 +0000

> “why not just stop”

Because most regular people will never choose to turn them back on, that’s why. We already know what the world looks like when millions of computers run an unsecured OS. Last I heard, a stock Windows 98 machine lasted 30 seconds online before being compromised. Automatic updates are good, and they’re here to stay.

New comment by sonofhans in "Our commitment to Windows quality"

sonofhans — Fri, 20 Mar 2026 22:04:55 +0000

The iPod made the world a worse place? I’m skeptical; I see very little bad about iPods. Do you think the quote what about the iPhone?

New comment by sonofhans in "macOS 26 breaks custom DNS settings including .internal"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 22:35:47 +0000

I see you. These folks trying to talk you into liking MacOS are missing the point. You’re being perfectly clear about not liking it, and why — it’s not built for you. And that sucks, ‘cause their hardware is top-notch. It’s true pain.

Apple really is leaving everyone else years behind in making hardware. Yet they’ve never done what I would consider obvious geek-friendly things to MacOS. I’m sad about it too, and I wish the OS were better.

New comment by sonofhans in "Tesla: Failure of the FSD's degradation detection system [pdf]"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 22:28:55 +0000

You know, I agree with everything you said, and I still wish this discussion weren’t happening on HN.

New comment by sonofhans in "Waymo Safety Impact"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 21:54:52 +0000

No, it does not. For one thing, we don’t have access to all the data, just what’s being told us. For another, it at best shows that Waymo is safer than average. Safer than an attentive London Cabby? I bet not.

New comment by sonofhans in "Waymo Safety Impact"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 21:03:27 +0000

“Safer” == “Safer than all other human drivers in the same city.” By their own admission, this is not a straightforward comparison. If they could do the math for the same routes, times of day, and conditions … maybe I’d believe it. Otherwise, this data is trivial to cherrypick, and they have every reason to present it as well as possible.

I believe Waymos are pretty safe, and that’s a great thing. “Safer than humans (for selected rides inside this area)” is still very good, but it’s not at all “Safer than humans (period).”

New comment by sonofhans in "Waymo Safety Impact"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 20:59:54 +0000

I get your idea, but it does rather sound like asking a 4,000lb death robot to follow you around closely and hope that it doesn’t screw up …

New comment by sonofhans in "Show HN: Dumped Wix for an AI Edge agent so I never have to hire junior staff"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 20:28:28 +0000

He’s replying here in good faith and continuing the conversation. You cannot ask for more than that.

New comment by sonofhans in "Show HN: Dumped Wix for an AI Edge agent so I never have to hire junior staff"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 19:08:38 +0000

I feel you, I really do. I’ve worked with architects. Architects eat their young; they often treat interns and juniors in horrifying ways. Good on you for trying to find a better way.

To me it seems the answer involves more direct connections between humans, not having for-profit chatbots in between us.

New comment by sonofhans in "Show HN: Dumped Wix for an AI Edge agent so I never have to hire junior staff"

sonofhans — Thu, 19 Mar 2026 18:38:33 +0000

> The fight that proved it worked: 2 weeks ago, a licensed architect attacked the bot, trying to prove my business model harms the profession. The AI (DeepSeek-R3) completely dismantled his arguments. It was hilariously caustic.

I’ve read the linked thread. I see no attacks, only simple questions. Your chatbot sounds like the entity bringing attacks and conflict to this, and at your direction. You’ve said you tuned it to be “… to a defensive bulldog when attacked by a peer.”

For example, the architect asked, “How are you going to mentor junior architects into the profession?” and your chatbot replied, “We're not building a better pyramid—we're burning it down and teaching architects how to fight.”

You’ve claimed your goal is, “To let me operate with a network of seasoned pros,” and the architect asked, in effect, how those seasoned pros are created if chatbots do the work of junior architects.

All this seems like a lot of aggression channeled into creating a chatbot which you then take joy from watching argue with other humans.

New comment by sonofhans in "Grief and the AI split"

sonofhans — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 08:16:21 +0000

Yes, this is what I thought, too. I did program in Perl because it was beautiful. No other computer language compares so favorably with human language, including in its ambiguity. Not everyone considers this a good feature :)

New comment by sonofhans in "Willingness to look stupid"

sonofhans — Fri, 13 Mar 2026 08:13:28 +0000

Ward said it succinctly, as was his wont: “The best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question; it's to post the wrong answer."

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Cunningham%27s_Law

New comment by sonofhans in "Swiss e-voting pilot can't count 2,048 ballots after decryption failure"

sonofhans — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 20:03:55 +0000

You are suggesting that it is a separate question. I am suggesting that it is not.

New comment by sonofhans in "Swiss e-voting pilot can't count 2,048 ballots after decryption failure"

sonofhans — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 19:57:49 +0000

Control. If you can centralize all voting results in a single place you can control distribution of them. If you are the only entity able to read the results then everyone else has to take your word for it.

Paper ballots with physical marks are easy to track and recount. Digital paper trails are ephemeral. Whom does this benefit? The people counting the ballots.

New comment by sonofhans in "The MacBook Neo"

sonofhans — Wed, 11 Mar 2026 19:50:49 +0000

I must say, the irony of this comment in a thread about Apple moving down-market without losing quality is … well, it burns. Along with the arrogance: “Anyone who can’t afford 8GB isn’t worthy of being my customer,” is literally the opposite of what Steve Jobs always said.

I was stuck once in a cabin in the woods with an old Android phone. I’m glad it still worked, and that people curating software experiences for it had more empathy — and more business sense — than this comment displays.

New comment by sonofhans in "Roblox is minting teen millionaires"

sonofhans — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 22:03:45 +0000

Factorio! The factory must grow! (And it must be modded in Lua).

New comment by sonofhans in "Tinnitus Is Connected to Sleep"

sonofhans — Sun, 08 Mar 2026 00:44:47 +0000

It sounds worse for you than for me, and I’ll tip out some scotch in your honor next time I have some.

New comment by sonofhans in "Tinnitus Is Connected to Sleep"

sonofhans — Sat, 07 Mar 2026 18:42:15 +0000

This is not analogous to tinnitus. I remember before and after tinnitus, and it’s as different from visual snow as real snow is from an ice pick in your ear.