Hacker News: technotarek

New comment by technotarek in "Filing the corners off my MacBooks"

technotarek — Sat, 11 Apr 2026 13:01:35 +0000

Like Mr Jobs said, “You’re holding it wrong.”

New comment by technotarek in "Air Lab – A portable and open air quality measuring device"

technotarek — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 11:19:29 +0000

Not a fan of my own medical example there. If I knew my kid was going to be blind, there are lots of actions I would take: Educating myself, potentially preparing the home environment etc.

New comment by technotarek in "Show HN: Air Lab – A portable and open air quality measuring device"

technotarek — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 11:05:18 +0000

A sincere question : In a home environment, what information do devices like this provide that you regularly act upon and how? Can you give some examples? I’m trying to understand the use case given I already have a thermostat with humidity readings and look at the weather for air quality. Is it more than after cooking, the PPMs are high, open the window or turn on the vent fan (which I do out of habit anyways)?

I self imposed a rule when I went through the process of having a child — to avoid (negative) information that I couldn’t or wouldn’t really act upon (e.g. learning about genetic markers/hints that couldn’t be prevented and wouldn’t make me think about extreme measures, such as blindness). For me it’s an issue of anxiety management.

New comment by technotarek in "Crowd Sourcing Broken QR Codes"

technotarek — Sun, 11 May 2025 11:33:19 +0000

But whatever came of the lost cat??!!

New comment by technotarek in "Cozy video games can quell stress and anxiety"

technotarek — Sat, 19 Apr 2025 01:34:05 +0000

Wow, what an interesting piece of journalism, in regards to the presentation. It reminded me of when I saw the NYT’s Snow Fall piece for the first time. At the time, it was an amazing display of cutting edge UI skills that exhibited both skill and restraint. Great storytelling to boot.

New comment by technotarek in "Detroit’s revival takes shape after decades of decay"

technotarek — Mon, 03 Feb 2025 14:47:08 +0000

As a native (suburban) Detroiter (who departed 20 years ago), I don’t want to throw shade but articles like these rarely give a good sense of the size or scope of decades of decay. There are still miles (and miles) of apocalyptic looking neighborhoods. As a teenager, we had our pick of hundreds of abandoned warehouses to party (“rave”).

I'd love to see it flourish, and maybe if the area could get past its car addiction, I’d even want to call it home again one day.

*Removed inaccurate statement about the city’s size.

New comment by technotarek in "Who killed the rave?"

technotarek — Wed, 08 Jan 2025 18:16:11 +0000

RE prices were zero in my rave days : https://technotarek.com/shows/richie-hawtin

New comment by technotarek in "Hoarder: Self-hostable bookmark-everything app"

technotarek — Tue, 24 Dec 2024 14:33:27 +0000

FYI the demo’s login credentials are case sensitive for the email field (when they probably shouldn’t be?).

New comment by technotarek in "Itch.io Taken Down by Funko"

technotarek — Mon, 09 Dec 2024 13:01:28 +0000

I’ve got about twenty domains listed with them. No problems after 2-3 years, but I do wonder whether it’s a good idea to use the same vendor for DNS and domain registration.

New comment by technotarek in "Apple Bobbing"

technotarek — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 01:38:34 +0000

I love this photo:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_bobbing#/media/File%3A...

Apple Bobbing

technotarek — Wed, 30 Oct 2024 01:35:34 +0000

Article URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_bobbing

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41991141

Points: 3

# Comments: 1

New comment by technotarek in "All political ads running on Google in the US"

technotarek — Fri, 25 Oct 2024 20:46:41 +0000

If anyone is interested in connecting with someone working in this space, please hit me up. We’ve been building tools for political media buyers for the last several years. We draw data from the Google Transparency DB, Meta’s equivalent and other disparate sources to allow campaigns to analyze the spending in greater detail. It has been really interesting from an engineering perspective, but also just to learn more about how this industry operates.

New comment by technotarek in "Leonard Cohen: The Man Who Saw the Angels Fall"

technotarek — Thu, 19 Sep 2024 19:55:34 +0000

Here’s a cover of his I like, kind of turned on its head.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8eYJwydTxYA

New comment by technotarek in "How a scientist is pushing to supersize research into ultra-processed foods"

technotarek — Sat, 14 Sep 2024 17:35:24 +0000

Tangential…Anyone from the HN community using Yuka app. (Scan barcodes to get info about dangerous additives and other health info about food and healthcare products.) I discovered it in France where it’s rather popular and continue to use it state side. Has changed a lot of my buying/consuming decisions. No affiliation.

New comment by technotarek in "Balsamic vinegar is likely fake"

technotarek — Mon, 06 May 2024 17:03:02 +0000

Whenever I see statements like this that correlate price and product quality (eg wine, spirits), I’m always wondering why a “fake” wouldn’t just elevate its price to the level of the non-fake. I have a feeling most customers won’t know the difference. I guess I’m just skeptical of using price as a proxy where everything from a fancy-looking label to a nice marketing campaign will inflate the price.

New comment by technotarek in "U.S. to require automatic emergency braking on new vehicles in 5 years"

technotarek — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 12:48:06 +0000

Breaking news

New comment by technotarek in "Yahoo is buying Artifact, the AI news app from the Instagram co-founders"

technotarek — Tue, 02 Apr 2024 15:34:18 +0000

Just installed and gave it a try. Good initial vibe. One of the first things I wanted to do was share a particular story/summary with someone else (ideally by text or email). Since you’re pushing the sharing idea at the bottom of the front page, maybe you want to consider that option as well? Not much beats getting a potential new user by feeding them the real meat of your product.

New comment by technotarek in "Berlin's techno scene added to Unesco intangible cultural heritage list"

technotarek — Fri, 15 Mar 2024 13:33:55 +0000

We need an acknowledgment of the past, the origins, which may no longer be present. Detroit starting in the ‘80s and into the 90s would be the prime example. I wrote a short essay about the latter :

https://technotarek.com/shows/richie-hawtin

New comment by technotarek in "The web won't be nirvana (1995)"

technotarek — Sun, 18 Feb 2024 16:17:08 +0000

I was being specific when I chose an LLM product like ChatGPT, not LLMs generically. I do so because it is a product like ChatGPT that boils away the noise to the end user, for better or worse. That is, to grossly simplify my point, it provides a single answer / response, instead of a long list of potential garbage for which I must dig, ponder, assess etc.

New comment by technotarek in "The web won't be nirvana (1995)"

technotarek — Sun, 18 Feb 2024 12:34:32 +0000

Sure, but that’s huge. And probably the reason some (or at least me) are becoming so disillusioned with the web. It’s why I find it hard to believe/trust what I read from news to health advice to product reviews. The noise numbs us to the point where it all starts to feel worthless. This may be one reason ChatGPT et al feel so novel. They get rid of the noise. Of course, they are all built on the back of that noise.