Hacker News: vmurthy

New comment by vmurthy in "I built an AI receptionist for a mechanic shop"

vmurthy — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 22:40:12 +0000

A bunch of comments around the theme of "Is it worth it for _this_ use case?" misses the point of "Which of these techniques/lessons from the blog can I use for _my_ use case". I found the blog post a good starting point for some agentic stuff I want to do for my use case. Good on you for experimenting and good luck!

New comment by vmurthy in "I built a demo of what AI chat will look like when it's “free” and ad-supported"

vmurthy — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 22:02:02 +0000

Ah the science of influence : the masterpiece on influence is this book [0]. Came my way by a mention in one of Charlie Munger’s speeches. All the things you mention here and more are there in case you want to broaden your understanding

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28815.Influence

New comment by vmurthy in "Why India's big cities are becoming unliveable"

vmurthy — Mon, 29 Dec 2025 15:51:43 +0000

You’ve gone from corruption (which I agree with) to something about dominant religion thinking of truth and morality as subjective ( which is debatable as you have cited nothing - infact seems like it’s your opinion and nothing else) to low trust ( which I agree with). What’s the logical link to cities being unlivable? The article says that mayors and councillors lack powers which is the major problem.

New comment by vmurthy in "OpenAI needs to raise at least $207B by 2030"

vmurthy — Thu, 27 Nov 2025 00:08:36 +0000

> have you seen Amazon's "Rufus"? It's hilariously useless.

I'd argue -- for now. Maybe it's an incentive/urgency thing. At the moment, Amazon isn't seeing ChatGPT do the buying of goods bypassing Amazon's own search. I expect Rufus to drastically improve especially given that Amazon has an AWS offering of LLM(s) [0].

[0]https://aws.amazon.com/ai/generative-ai/

New comment by vmurthy in "Why Everyone Is Leaving New Zealand [video]"

vmurthy — Thu, 23 Oct 2025 06:03:18 +0000

I asked ChatGPT to summarize the video and avoid the ad etc.

"The real reason: opportunity.

NZ’s economy offers few paths beyond agriculture and real estate.

Larger, more diversified Australian cities (Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane) offer broader careers and education options

In Summary

New Zealand’s paradox: a high-quality society built atop a narrow economy. Its openness with Australia, while culturally beneficial, drains the very people it needs to sustain growth. Until it diversifies beyond real estate and agriculture and offers more opportunity to young professionals, the exodus is likely to continue"

New comment by vmurthy in "Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose"

vmurthy — Mon, 15 Sep 2025 05:14:57 +0000

The 20 year old me would have been so excited about something like this. The 39-year old (ok 40 next month) is more reserved. It is not that I don't think this will be adapted but more like : What needs to happen (government, civic groups whatever economic forces) for companies to adapt this? It's going to be a slow burn for sure if this needs to work at a global scale but the impetus should begin with incentives, sadly.

New comment by vmurthy in "iPhone dumbphone"

vmurthy — Tue, 09 Sep 2025 02:52:49 +0000

One aspect of no phone is how to deal with payments. Specifically UPI payments in India. These are QR code based payments and it is getting more difficult to pay by cash at many locations.

Right next to that is OTPs from financial institutions.

New comment by vmurthy in "What brain surgery taught me about the fragile gift of consciousness"

vmurthy — Mon, 01 Sep 2025 04:31:37 +0000

What a beautiful, thought provoking article! When I saw the title , I thought it was a book summary of “My stroke of insight” [0]. This book is by a neuro-anatomist who had a rare stroke resulting in the left hemisphere of her brain being incapacitated. That led her to experiences similar to that of the article’s author. Do check out the book and pair it with the article

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/142292.My_Stroke_of_Insi...

New comment by vmurthy in "Double Bishops: The Silent Killers of Chess"

vmurthy — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 06:11:43 +0000

FWIW , the blog post doesn't really show any famous games where double bishops helped someone win or anything like that. It's a small fragment of games where players with double bishops improved their position etc.

New comment by vmurthy in "Show HN: OverType – A Markdown WYSIWYG editor that's just a textarea"

vmurthy — Mon, 18 Aug 2025 02:24:19 +0000

Went down the rabbit hole which is the overtype.dev website (nice work btw!) and found and even nicer rabbit hole - https://hyperclay.com/ Single HTML apps :). Enjoy!

New comment by vmurthy in "Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is 'Addictive Use,' Not Screen Time Alone"

vmurthy — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:46:15 +0000

I would also pair this article with "Stolen Focus" ( a book I am currently reading -- fascinating read ) [0] . I am only 10% in and the book is captivating. Read the book to understand the "whys" of this article .

[0]https://www.amazon.com.au/Stolen-Focus-Attention-Think-Deepl...

New comment by vmurthy in "Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is 'Addictive Use,' Not Screen Time Alone"

vmurthy — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:40:45 +0000

https://archive.is/jHp7u

New comment by vmurthy in "Klarna's AI replaced 700 workers. Now the CEO wants humans back after $40B fall"

vmurthy — Tue, 20 May 2025 01:05:08 +0000

Human agents + AI empowered . Gives a new definition for Agentic AI , no ? :-P

New comment by vmurthy in "Baby is healed with first personalized gene-editing treatment"

vmurthy — Fri, 16 May 2025 02:32:32 +0000

Cue the book "The Code Breaker" [0]. I read it a long time ago and such an incredible book and journey by Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuel Charpentier. Do check it out

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Code_Breaker

New comment by vmurthy in "Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service"

vmurthy — Mon, 12 May 2025 00:15:42 +0000

I've been thinking that they probably are smart enough to know this but see utility in spewing such lies. Because optics implies higher valuation. It's follow the money as usual :(

New comment by vmurthy in "Buffett to step down following six-decade run atop Berkshire"

vmurthy — Sat, 03 May 2025 23:06:16 +0000

If you’re talking about Mary Buffett, it is his ex daughter-in-law. How to read financial reports like Warren Buffett is the book (I think)

New comment by vmurthy in "Careless People"

vmurthy — Sun, 27 Apr 2025 01:14:39 +0000

Ugh. I’ve blocked it from my memory. Deplorable. At some point, it’s just power play. Not even lust.

New comment by vmurthy in "Careless People"

vmurthy — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 08:57:46 +0000

From the book, it appears that Sheryl used Meta as a platform for promoting her own image and book rather than do the things that prevented a lot of bad. It’s beyond sad

New comment by vmurthy in "Careless People"

vmurthy — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 10:34:59 +0000

I read the book. It’s a very interesting read. A few things stood out ( no spoilers )

- Casual indifference at exec level to atrocities happening because of FB/ Meta.

- Money/power does make you insensitive

- Tech bro view of the world permeates most decisions that Meta takes.

- Casual sexual harassment for women ( follows from the tech bro worldview I guess )

- US centric world view influencing how execs treat world leaders.

All in all worth a read or two!

New comment by vmurthy in "Show HN: Rank And File – a platform for employee activism"

vmurthy — Mon, 31 Mar 2025 03:43:53 +0000

@ideashower, In principle, I agree . But the overlords won't care or will quash it down. This way, the employee collective wields some power in a legal way and the overlords have to work harder to quash it down