Hacker News: whiddershins

New comment by whiddershins in "Green card seekers must leave U.S. to apply, Trump administration says"

whiddershins — Sun, 24 May 2026 06:49:18 +0000

I am under the impression this does not apply to for example o-1 visas. Possibly not for h1-b. Is everyone clear about what they are commenting on here? Is the news coverage clear?

New comment by whiddershins in "Shipping a laptop to a refugee camp in Uganda"

whiddershins — Sat, 23 May 2026 04:28:11 +0000

You are right, the downvotes people gave this comment are wrong, the replies to you are wrong. Feeding evil in the hopes you will also feed a little good is not only bad morally, but bad practically, bad in a utilitarian calculus, and just dumb.

New comment by whiddershins in "Uber Faces Growing Pressure over Sexual Assault Record"

whiddershins — Wed, 21 Jan 2026 14:58:33 +0000

vulnerable how?

New comment by whiddershins in "Scott Adams has died"

whiddershins — Tue, 13 Jan 2026 20:17:02 +0000

I appreciated Scott Adams, and am sad he has passed away. I learned a lot from him and his perspective helped me through difficult times.

The comments here are very unfortunate. When someone dies, it is appropriate to speak of what you appreciated about them.

That's it. That's all you need to say. And you aren't required to say anything at all.

Apologizing for liking him because of x or y or explaining that you liked him despite z is in poor taste and, frankly, cowardly.

I appreciated Scott Adams, and am sad he has passed away.

New comment by whiddershins in "JetBlue flight averts mid-air collision with US Air Force jet"

whiddershins — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 09:08:38 +0000

congresss did not declare war for any of the post wwii wars.

New comment by whiddershins in "Homeschooling hits record numbers"

whiddershins — Sat, 22 Nov 2025 05:00:14 +0000

How many conservatives do you socialize with regularly?

New comment by whiddershins in "The Death of the Middle-Class Musician"

whiddershins — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 06:10:41 +0000

all this was obvious the moment napster became popular. and for more than a decade anyone who explained what was happening was ridiculed, especially in tech circles.

spotify in particular cemented a payment structure that disadvantages any “serious” music versus endless repeat pop songs, while also being completely corrupted by conflict of interest from record labels with an ownership stake. now they manufacture their own muzak and steer your playlist to it, draining the last bits of revenue possibility away from these “middle class musicians.”

youtube streamed music for free for years, paying no artists, and it was one of its core growth engines. completely asymmetrical outcome.

the whole thing denigrated musicians, and music itself. hordes of early online young tech professionals making great money at their office jobs poo pooing the concerns of an entire industry which previously enabled some of the most sophisticated artistic endeavors our culture ever attempted.

just dumb. a complete victory of lowbrow values.

baffling someone is writing this article in 2025. at every fork in the road, the path was taken that would give less revenue to the musicians. and ~no one in tech felt it was a problem.

talking about it like there is a revelation or an emerging phenomenon here mystifies, while rubbing salt in the wound.

New comment by whiddershins in "Claude 4"

whiddershins — Fri, 23 May 2025 03:39:48 +0000

The trend towards opaque is inexorable.

https://noisegroove.substack.com/p/somersaulting-down-the-sl...

New comment by whiddershins in "InventWood is about to mass-produce wood that's stronger than steel"

whiddershins — Mon, 19 May 2025 15:29:36 +0000

I'd be curious about the total carbon emissions, all in, to produce this because it seems like an excellent carbon sink. And especially when compared to steel.

New comment by whiddershins in "A Research Preview of Codex"

whiddershins — Sat, 17 May 2025 14:04:47 +0000

I would like to take this moment to point out that in NY it is ~illegal for me to hire an unpaid intern and train them by for example saying: - this is codex, here is a bunch of tickets - enter each ticket into codex, then review each change and understand what it did. if you think what it did is good, open a PR - twice a day we will meet and i will review all the codex PRs with you and explain what is and isn't working

etc.

This would not save me time. It would be paying it forward. And I cannot do this.

New comment by whiddershins in "Show HN: Node.js video tutorials where you can edit and run the code"

whiddershins — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 05:11:34 +0000

So can I just sign up and get started using it on my blog, or how does this work?

New comment by whiddershins in "AI Horseless Carriages"

whiddershins — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 05:05:19 +0000

LLMs in data pipelines enable all sorts of “before impossible” stuff. For example, this creates an event calendar for you based on emails you have received:

https://www.indexself.com/events/molly-pepper

(that’s mine, and is due a bugfix/update this week. message me if you want to try it with your own emails)

I have a couple more LLM-powered apps in the works, like next few weeks, that aren’t chat or code. I wouldn’t call them transformative, but they meet your other criteria, I think.

New comment by whiddershins in "How to win an argument with a toddler"

whiddershins — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 15:57:01 +0000

"i can't understand my son, he doesn't listen to a thing I say!"

-- Stephen Covey, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

New comment by whiddershins in "New urinal designs prevent 265,000 gallons of urine splashing onto the floor"

whiddershins — Sun, 13 Apr 2025 01:39:13 +0000

argh, just have the back wall recede away from you as it gets lower. tilt it the other way. you could even use a curve.

New comment by whiddershins in "But what if I want a faster horse?"

whiddershins — Fri, 11 Apr 2025 14:38:59 +0000

this is such a fantastic comment because it makes a charitable attempt to explain how data driven decisions go off the rails.

and it matters because this seems to be an omnipresent phenomenon.

everything everywhere seems driven by this unless someone with decision making power is executing a specific and conscious strategy that pushes back against it.

New comment by whiddershins in "Recent AI model progress feels mostly like bullshit"

whiddershins — Mon, 07 Apr 2025 02:44:31 +0000

"known to" !== "known for"

New comment by whiddershins in "AI 2027"

whiddershins — Fri, 04 Apr 2025 13:29:49 +0000

> A rise in AI-generated propaganda failed to materialize.

hah!

New comment by whiddershins in "Overengineered Anchor Links"

whiddershins — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 15:50:04 +0000

i've been wanting to implement a design like this for blogs for 5 or 10 years. Great work on the inline detail on mobile. genuinely better than whatever i would have made.

did you consider pushing the word(s) directly following the activation button to below the detail pane, rather than doing it based on line break?

New comment by whiddershins in "What, exactly, is an 'AI Agent'? Here's a litmus test"

whiddershins — Wed, 02 Apr 2025 20:46:25 +0000

"AI Agent", as of April 2025, is a largely meaningless term that serves as a descriptive abstraction for people who aren't so familiar with coding. Debating its definition is pointless.

AI Agent is whatever you want it to be if it helps you design or explain something.

New comment by whiddershins in "Stoop Coffee: A simple idea transformed my neighborhood"

whiddershins — Wed, 26 Mar 2025 03:59:03 +0000

Great idea, but (as indicated in the article) there are no stoops pictured. A stoop is a series of steps that go to a second level, which makes for way better hang dynamics. Living on a block with stoops is superior to one without because people are far more likely to hang around outside when they can get some height and survey the whole block.

https://www.brownstoner.com/brooklyn-life/brooklyn-stoop-sit...