<rss version="2.0" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"><channel><title>Hacker News: themacguffinman</title><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=themacguffinman</link><description>Hacker News RSS</description><docs>https://hnrss.org/</docs><generator>hnrss v2.1.1</generator><lastBuildDate>Tue, 21 Apr 2026 09:04:24 +0000</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://hnrss.org/user?id=themacguffinman" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"></atom:link><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Many African families spend fortunes burying their dead"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The difference is that it's pretty acceptable for you to reject family requests for money, it doesn't make you a pariah and being a pariah doesn't carry the same consequences when non-family institutions govern society.<p>The article spends a lot of time belaboring this point: you don't have to do what your family asks you to do in developed countries. On the other hand, becoming outcast from your family in a kinship-dominated society means you have nowhere else to turn to which is enormous pressure.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:16:27 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47712014</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47712014</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47712014</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Apple randomly closes bug reports unless you "verify" the bug remains unfixed"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>How about they keep the bug report open until they attempt and confirm the bug is no longer reproducible?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 25 Mar 2026 20:22:49 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47522649</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47522649</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47522649</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "I'm OK being left behind, thanks"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I doubt software development will stay as "low skilled prompting", or that it is even low skilled prompting right now. Productive LLM usage goes beyond typing in better prompts and involves things like improving guardrails (eg type definitions and tests), context (docs and "skills" and MCP servers), and management strategy (instructing specialized agents together). It seems natural that there will be high skill AI coding to differentiate engineers, at least until superintelligent AGI emerges and kills us all.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 20 Mar 2026 16:46:17 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47457176</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47457176</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47457176</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "I'm OK being left behind, thanks"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Isn't that what is implied by the toughest job market yet for junior level candidates? Author is very confident that the answer to his question is "no".</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 20 Mar 2026 16:07:50 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47456619</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47456619</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47456619</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Google details new 24-hour process to sideload unverified Android apps"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>How is it unsustainable when iOS has enforced even stricter rules for its nearly 20 year lifespan?</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 19 Mar 2026 21:25:29 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47446408</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47446408</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47446408</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Tell HN: I'm 60 years old. Claude Code has re-ignited a passion"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I think the key metric to good software has really changed, the bar has noticeably dropped.<p>I see unreliable software like openclaw explode in popularity while a Director of Alignment at Meta publicly shares how it shredded her inbox while continuing to use openclaw [1], because that's still good enough innit? I see much buggier releases from macOS & Windows. The biggest military in the world is insisting on getting rid of any existing safeguards and limitations on its AI use and is reportedly using Claude to pick bombing targets [2] in a bombing campaign that we know has made mistakes hitting hospitals [3] and a school [4]. AI-generated slop now floods social networks with high popularity and engagement.<p>It's a known effect that economies of scale lowers average quality but creates massive abundance. There never really was a fundamental quality bar to software or creative work, it just has to be barely better than not existing, and that bar is lower than you might imagine.<p>[1] <a href="https://x.com/summeryue0/status/2025774069124399363" rel="nofollow">https://x.com/summeryue0/status/2025774069124399363</a><p>[2] <a href="https://archive.ph/bDTxE" rel="nofollow">https://archive.ph/bDTxE</a><p>[3] <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/who-says-has-it-has-verified-13-health-attacks-iran-2026-03-05/" rel="nofollow">https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/who-says-has-it-ha...</a><p>[4] <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/world/iran/iran-school-strike-us-military-targeted-area-rcna261888" rel="nofollow">https://www.nbcnews.com/world/iran/iran-school-strike-us-mil...</a></p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Mar 2026 13:19:44 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47287390</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47287390</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47287390</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p><a href="https://www.bestbuy.com/product/asus-rog-strix-27-dual-mode-5k-165hz-2k-330hz-1ms-gaming-monitor-with-freesync-premium-pro-and-hdr-black/JJGHGPRXXF/sku/6648335" rel="nofollow">https://www.bestbuy.com/product/asus-rog-strix-27-dual-mode-...</a><p>I haven't found a glossy competitor, or even one with the same HDR spec, but this is the closest I could find so far.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Tue, 03 Mar 2026 16:46:10 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47235103</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47235103</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47235103</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Timeline: Anthropic, OpenAI, and U.S. Government"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The events are out of order, the bottom three events are:<p>- Feb 27, 2026, 02:13 PM: OpenAI raises $110B on $730B pre-money valuation<p>- Feb 27, 2026, 12:00 AM: Anthropic: Statement on the comments from Secretary of War Pete Hegseth<p>- Feb 27, 2026, 10:14 PM: Dept. of War: Anthropic is a supply chain risk</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 28 Feb 2026 14:25:40 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47195752</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47195752</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47195752</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Statement from Dario Amodei on our discussions with the Department of War"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The keyword is "cancel", not threaten seizure with the DPA and destruction with a baseless supply chain risk designation.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 27 Feb 2026 07:24:13 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47177597</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47177597</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47177597</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Statement from Dario Amodei on our discussions with the Department of War"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Not this, because this is completely unprecedented? In fact, the Pentagon already signed an Anthropic contract with safe terms 6 months ago, that initial negotiation was when Anthropic would have made a decision to part ways. It was totally absurd for the govt to turn around and threaten to change the deal, just a ridiculous and unprecedented level of incompetence.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 27 Feb 2026 04:04:22 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47176362</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47176362</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47176362</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "A simple web we own"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>I think this mostly misses the biggest reason why writers would choose big tech platforms or other big platforms: discovery and aggregation. If you want to speak to be heard and not just for its own sake, then you want to go where the people are hanging out and where they could actually find your content.<p>This is like talking about how book authors don't need Amazon when you have a printer and glue at home.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Mon, 23 Feb 2026 17:44:03 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47125747</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47125747</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47125747</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "You Are Here"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The recent frontpage post I see is <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926245">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926245</a> (not on frontpage anymore, probably downranked by flamewar detector since it has tons of comments)</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 23:01:30 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929185</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929185</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929185</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Ask HN: Need feedback on the idea I'm working on"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Sorry, I do not.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 22:54:47 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929115</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929115</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46929115</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "We mourn our craft"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>A lot of people are using Claude Code which many consider to be a noticeably better for coding than the other models.<p>I think also they tend to be generating non-C++ code where there are more guardrails and less footguns for LLMs to run into. Eg they're generating Javascript or Python or Rust where type systems and garbage collection eliminates entire classes of mistakes that LLMs can run into. I know you said you don't use it for Python because you know the language but even experienced Python devs still see value in LLM-generating Python code.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 22:42:04 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928975</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928975</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928975</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "We mourn our craft"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Humans are also non-deterministic code generators though. It can be possible that an LLM is more deterministic or consistent at building reliable code than a human.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 22:31:48 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928883</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928883</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928883</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Ask HN: Need feedback on the idea I'm working on"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>My first impression of the idea is that what you're pitching is a lot like Kickstarter or Indiegogo (I'm assuming you're talking about physical sales because you mentioned Shopify). Kickstarter even holds money in escrow as a stronger signal of demand.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 22:11:43 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928660</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928660</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46928660</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Fraud investigation is believing your lying eyes"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>The partisan politics are in the story and part of its substance (and really how could it not be? what he's suggesting has substantial political consequences even setting aside the naked partisan jabs). The presence of technical details doesn't negate that, many polemics have technical details.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 19:43:25 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926987</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926987</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926987</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "U.S. jobs disappear at fastest January pace since great recession"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>No, DNC picking a bad candidate should be responsible for a D electoral loss, it is not responsible for Trump's electoral win. A lot of people seem to think only the DNC has agency in elections, only they should be responsible for outcomes.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 18:31:27 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926239</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926239</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46926239</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Fraud investigation is believing your lying eyes"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>You don't have to care how apolitical it is but the partisan political nature of the post, which it starts and ends with, is why the HN thread is reacting to and discussing partisan politics. What makes it partisan is the shift from admonishing the government to justifying the partisan "irresponsible demagogues" that are currently brutalizing Minnesota by pointing to the blue-state government's slow prosecution of Somali immigrants.<p>When Charlie Hebdo was bombed and shot, I suppose what people should have been writing is a technical post about the poor quality of their work with tips on how to convey the same artistic point in a way that doesn't invite fanatics to bomb and shoot them, concluding that by not reining in their bad work they have ceded the field to people who will not be gentle in their proposals. Then you can comment things like "What do I care how apolitical it is? The art is what we should care about. That's what the post is about".<p>Edit: maybe a better analogy would be 9/11 with the US and Al Qaeda, where the US would be less innocent in your political sensibility than Charlie Hebdo and the dynamic I hypothesized was more real.</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 14:52:11 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924340</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924340</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924340</guid></item><item><title><![CDATA[New comment by themacguffinman in "Fraud investigation is believing your lying eyes"]]></title><description><![CDATA[
<p>Sorry I meant that humorously in the vein of Ryan George's comedy YouTube series "Pitch Meeting" where one of his catch phrases is "I'm gonna need you to get all the way off my back on that"</p>
]]></description><pubDate>Sat, 07 Feb 2026 13:27:01 +0000</pubDate><link>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46923683</link><dc:creator>themacguffinman</dc:creator><comments>https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46923683</comments><guid isPermaLink="false">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46923683</guid></item></channel></rss>