Hacker News: ultropolis

New comment by ultropolis in "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (July 2026)"

ultropolis — Mon, 13 Jul 2026 22:53:02 +0000

I had some ideas for improvements to brutalist.report but it got out of hand:

A slop machine, what's that??

*my feeling are very hurt that this link won't hotlink

New comment by ultropolis in "[dead]"

ultropolis — Fri, 03 Apr 2026 16:10:50 +0000

I notice the article says that US had destroyed only about 1/3 of [missiles and stuff], but as to the second third? Also destroyed.

Traditionally we call that "2/3", but what do I know of statistics and reporting?

New comment by ultropolis in "MacBook Neo"

ultropolis — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 17:24:23 +0000

Hip kids were doing bad type since Photoshop 3/illustrator* gave them the ability to do so. Apple boldly ignored their fanbase and did type right.

I don't want kids who think [incompetent] typography is hip designing my laptop, even if they use said laptop. Good type on Apple marketing says "don't worry, we hire boring people to do make your computer work". This looks like incompetence on the part of some designer IMO.

Also: if Apple wants the hip kids to know they are being marketed to, they just show a picture of a hip kid using their computer to do trashy type.

* I didn't mention any page layout programs on purpose.

New comment by ultropolis in "Medical journal says the case reports it has published for 25 years are fiction"

ultropolis — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 17:13:09 +0000

Wouldn't citing actual cases be a HIPAA violation? I can see why they would invent example cases, based on real ones, especially if they are fairly pedestrian cases.

I mean. Except if your pedestrian example does not reflect reality, then that is bad.

New comment by ultropolis in "Glaze by Raycast"

ultropolis — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 15:01:56 +0000

It's so much worse. Your link fails to mention that the "Glaze" in question is a cough bodily fluid. Yes that one. Have I seen politicians use "glaze" recently? Yes. Gross.

On the other hand it is kind of the perfect name for Yet Another AI Website Maker (YAAWM?).

New comment by ultropolis in "MacBook Neo"

ultropolis — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 14:50:19 +0000

I hope that Steve Jobs gets up and slaps whoever thought scaling the "Hello Neo" font to 150% width was ok, fires them, and then gets back in his grave grumbling that he would never have let this happen.

I have a degree in design, I paid good money to have bad type piss me off.

New comment by ultropolis in "AIs can't stop recommending nuclear strikes in war game simulations"

ultropolis — Wed, 25 Feb 2026 21:20:01 +0000

Cant read the article, BUT

1)Seems like if the ais knew it was a game, then theyd go nuklear because why not. If they did NOT know it was a game... well have you ever tried to use an ai to do ANYTHING antsocial? They refuse all day long!

2) seems like a fun thing to set up on your own. Id do it like a tabletop game with a computer DM to decide the outcomes ofveach turn. Maybe a human in the loop to make sure the numbers made sense.

New comment by ultropolis in "Hacker News.love – 22 projects Hacker News didn't love"

ultropolis — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 11:30:54 +0000

Pshar, this comment will be on hackernews.love in three years when hackernews.love has it's 10 billion dollar IPO

New comment by ultropolis in "Is liberal democracy in terminal decline?"

ultropolis — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 15:54:33 +0000

I immediately tested the premise in my newsreader, and saw that modern clickbait gives us headlines like "How many weeks till Blandars Gnob is released?", So I added that it must be a binary question.

New comment by ultropolis in "Is liberal democracy in terminal decline?"

ultropolis — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 15:43:53 +0000

A trick I learned recently that you can apply here is the following:

If a headline asks a yes/no question, the answer is "no".

New comment by ultropolis in "The great sameness: a comic on how AI makes us more alike"

ultropolis — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 14:05:11 +0000

Because you thought that you had collaborated with the LLM, not that it had fed you ideas. Have you and a partner both believed you contributed more than 50% of a project's work? Like that.

New comment by ultropolis in "The great sameness: a comic on how AI makes us more alike"

ultropolis — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 13:46:11 +0000

I will tell you my cover letter secret*, which has gotten me a disproportionate number of interviews**:

Do NOT write a professional cover letter. Crack a joke. Use quirky language. Be overly familiar. A dash of TMI. Do NOT think about what you are going to say, just write a bunch of crazy-pants. Once your intro is too long, cut the fat. Now add professional stuff. You are not writing a cover letter, you are writing a caricature of a cover letter.

You just made the recruiter/HR/person doing interviews smile***. They remember your cover letter. In fact they repeat your objectively-unprofessional-yet-insightful joke to somebody else. You get the call. You are hired.

This will turn off some employers. You didn't want to work for them anyway.

* admittedly I have not sought work via resume in more than 15 years. ymmv

** Once a friend found a cover letter I had written in somebody's corp blog titled "Either the best or worst cover letter of all time" (or words to that effect). In it I had claimed that I could get the first 80% of their work done on schedule, but that the second 80% and third 80% would require unknown additional time. (note: I did not get the call)

*** unless they are using AI to read cover letters, but I repeat: you didn't want to work for them anyway.