Hacker News: zucked

New comment by zucked in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

zucked — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:01:26 +0000

I suspect you're correct on that front, too. I have family in an area that has been bringing in European teens to work seasonal tourist-facing jobs for probably(?) decades now. I can't speak to how they are treated outside my view, but anecdotally, they seem to really enjoy the opportunity. They get their little euro-crew together and basically have a College experience.

Locals like them, too - they're charming, generally well-behaved, polite, and it doesn't hurt that they don't have to pay them very much. I like to think the cultural exchange between the Europeans and the otherwise isolated locals is fantastic for broadening horizons, also.

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 20:42:25 +0000

Turns out you're correct, but this store also has a fair number of negative reviews, too. Fortunately for them (or unfortunately for us) they end up a rounding error in their favor.

New comment by zucked in "Making Tailscale Faster"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 21:23:23 +0000

Yeah, the app-free nature of tunnels was a huge draw. Cloudflare does effectively MiTM your traffic, so that's a risk you have accept but the tradeoff was worth it for me. Between that an the secondary authentication you can put in front of your services, I felt much better about opening my self-hosted stuff to to relative 'public'.

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 21:15:48 +0000

This article has some inconsistencies with what I experienced. For example, my label absolutely had tracking before being intercepted. In fact, it made it all the way to my city's distribution center.

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/nullship-selling-counterfe...

Here's the trajectory. Note that the final status has updated to no longer say "counterfeit" it's now just "postage assessment".

----- Delayed for postage assessment, Item in transit to destination

August 13, 2026 5:44 AM

Departed USPS Facility

JERSEY CITY NJ DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 11, 2026 2:08 PM

Delayed for postage assessment, held awaiting payment

August 10, 2026 9:21 PM

Arrived at USPS Facility

JERSEY CITY NJ DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 10, 2026 4:53 PM

In Transit to Next Facility

August 10, 2026 6:24 AM

In Transit to Next Facility

August 9, 2026 7:13 PM

Departed USPS Facility

MYTOWN DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 9, 2026 8:18 AM

Arrived at USPS Facility

MYTOWN DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 9, 2026 1:28 AM

Departed USPS Facility

MYTOWN DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 8, 2026 10:30 AM

Delayed for postage assessment, held awaiting payment

August 7, 2026 6:29 PM

In Transit to Next Facility

August 7, 2026 9:14 AM

Arrived at USPS Facility

MYTOWN DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 7, 2026 7:17 AM

In Transit to Next Facility

August 6, 2026 7:04 AM

In Transit to Next Facility

August 5, 2026 5:53 PM

Departed USPS Facility

OPA LOCKA FL DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 5, 2026 4:46 AM

Arrived at USPS Facility

OPA LOCKA FL DISTRIBUTION CENTER

August 4, 2026 2:33 PM

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 21:08:38 +0000

The redaction is frustrating, but I suspect the approach is still at least partially viable, so they aren't interested in giving a playbook for scammers to exploit.

The tool I bought wasn't what you'd think of as a small, inconsequential item. I'd wager it was ~2lbs and was a automotive brake bleeder in a blowmolded case. Probably the size of an old-timey encyclopedia. Cheaply made of course (almost certainly an aliexpress item). The seller I bought from has what appears to be an aliexpress dropshipping supply chain -- they buy the tool for $, ship from a US warehouse in Florida for $$.

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 21:03:02 +0000

There was recently an update report published that gives a little bit more information but is still heavily redacted. I presume some of these vectors are still viable for exploit. https://www.uspsoig.gov/sites/default/files/reports/2026-09/...

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 20:32:23 +0000

This report alludes to (but IIRC stop short) of confirming that there is only validation at the designated ports of entry scans. https://www.uspsoig.gov/sites/default/files/reports/2026-04/...

My suspicion is that these labels are entering the mailstream somehow circumventing the "first" scan.

New comment by zucked in "U.S. postal inspectors shut down website selling counterfeit postage labels"

zucked — Tue, 29 Sep 2026 20:25:21 +0000

I am pretty sure I bought from a seller using this (or something similar) on eBay. It sent me down a rabbit hole of reading about this type of scam that exploded earlier this year: https://www.uspsoig.gov/sites/default/files/reports/2026-04/...

Here's how it went down:

https://www.ebay.com/fdbk/feedback_profile/theperfectpart

Note that they’ve sold so much that even 1k neutral ratings are barely registering - they have “100% positive feedback”

I bought a cheap tool from this seller on ebay. Tracking number was provided showing my town as the destination. About four days later, I get an unprompted ebay message from the seller: “I monitor all my shipments and sometimes there are problems so I’m proactively sending you a new one, here’s a new tracking number.”

The original tracking number showed a message I’d never seen before “Item seized - counterfeit postage”. The new tracking number showed postage that had been bought back in January, but never entered the mailstream. Huh. I suspect that buys them time while they re-ship.

I did eventually get the item after another tracking number was provided.

My suspicion is that the seller uses counterfit USPS postage on 'x' number of packages to juice their margins. If you look at the neutral reviews, you can see a pattern — slow postage, lost package, had to replace, blah blah. Look at the positives — rave reviews at how fast things are arriving. Probably because the seller is “paying” for higher end postage via scamming the USPS.

And only when they get caught by USPS do they need to re-ship an item. They must get away with it enough to make it worthwhile

New comment by zucked in "Making Tailscale Faster"

zucked — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 19:26:10 +0000

Same trajectory, but I've now migrated a lot of my previous tailscale stuff to Cloudflare tunnels -- it opens up the attack vector a _little_ bit (that can be mitigated) and it's app-free (which made it viable for a lot of my non-tech users). Still love tailscale and use it all the time for remote access to very sensitive stuff (ssh).

New comment by zucked in "I turned my security cameras into an automatic bird identification system"

zucked — Mon, 31 Aug 2026 18:15:46 +0000

I've done essentially the same thing before (using my existing Go2RTC and Frigate setup) but the challenge I ran into is that the microphones on my cameras just aren't very good.

New comment by zucked in "Why does Opus 5 feel worse to work with?"

zucked — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 17:40:11 +0000

The second bullet point, down to the comma in the middle of the sentence, is what has been driving me absolutely batty of late. It's a surefire tell that I cannot seem to beat out of my outputs. It CONSTANTLY does it, even when you say not to.

Between that and the insistence on "this, not that" structure makes me want to install the caveman skill and use it even for non-code workflows.

New comment by zucked in "Kinney Drugs pulls back AI phone assistant after hundreds of customer complaints"

zucked — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 17:51:38 +0000

This is probably the most pragmatic take here and the overall responses support it. There's a handful of practitioners who are seeing some implementation success. They probably had significant domain expertise and are several iterations deep. Then there's a bunch of people who are experiencing the "AI iS mAgIc" approach where LLMs are being shoehorned into workflows with very little effort given to make the process actually… work (well)… to satisfy investor-driven mania. This growing-pains stage will pass eventually and we'll hit some equilibrium.

New comment by zucked in "Pebble Index 01 – External memory for your brain"

zucked — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 15:49:42 +0000

Years is literally just the plural of a single year. Ergo, years feels like the appropriate word here. What are you suggesting they phase it as instead?

New comment by zucked in "Turtletoy"

zucked — Mon, 08 Dec 2025 15:40:54 +0000

Was this with the little turle as your cursor? Seeing the "older" kids who could manipulate that program/language to make stopmotion movies might have been the moment that set me on the path of "technology enthusiast" for the rest of my life. The scene of the dimmed computer lab with a whole group gathered around someone's monitor to watch the newest creation is forever etched in my memory.

New comment by zucked in "“Captain Gains” on Capitol Hill"

zucked — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 15:46:01 +0000

I honestly don't know how you put a cone of silence around congresspeople such that insider trading anywhere in their sphere of influence is impossible. My intent would be to make it difficult for the congressperson to directly benefit from passing along insider info and compensate them enough such that it isn't a practical path. Sure, they could still tell friends to buy/sell, but if the friend *does* act on that, it's sure going to raise eyebrows when they try to wire $1M worth of proceeds to the congressperson for "movie & pizza night".

And I know that the next stone to be cast is "yeah, but if they help friends/business associates beat the market, congresspeople can still benefit with board seats and jobs when they're done with congressional terms". That's totally valid, and I have no idea how to combat that.

New comment by zucked in "“Captain Gains” on Capitol Hill"

zucked — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 14:39:24 +0000

Agree -- strict term limits would be a gamechanger in a lot of ways.

New comment by zucked in "“Captain Gains” on Capitol Hill"

zucked — Wed, 03 Dec 2025 14:37:53 +0000

I have a hot take on this that I think could actually make some headway: - We raise the congressional salary. Say, maybe double them across the board.

BUT in exchange, you, your immediate family, and any business, LLC, or other similar vehicle you are a named party to as a consultant, beneficiary, owner, or investor must divest of specific investments and can only hold the equivalent value of an index fund that tracks the general market. Or, you can remove yourself from the investment/ownership vehicle during the term you serve as a congressperson.

Problem solved? Probably not, but it's an interesting thought experiment. I'm sure there are a bunch of loopholes I haven't fully through through, too.

New comment by zucked in "Show HN: A subtly obvious e-paper room air monitor"

zucked — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 22:45:47 +0000

Cool project. I've done something similar using defunct crypto Awair AQI sensors tied into Home Assistant. They have an LED panel in the front that can show overall AQI or any of the pollutants they track: https://www.getawair.com/products/element

The sky is the limit as to what you can do with Home Assistant automations.

It's surprising how quickly a room with a closed door and one person can go from ~ambient CO2 levels to 1000ppm+.

New comment by zucked in "Gigantic VHS videotape hoard of videos being given away for free"

zucked — Mon, 17 Nov 2025 16:23:06 +0000

Even mundane recordings become interesting to me once enough time passes. I've watched a bunch of Nickelodeon/Cartoon Network programming from early days and to be honest, the commercials are more interesting than the cartoons because they so perfectly capture where we were as a society -- toys starting to integrate new technology, sugary cereals being touted as part of daily breakfast, etc. Fascinating stuff.

New comment by zucked in "Gigantic VHS videotape hoard of videos being given away for free"

zucked — Mon, 17 Nov 2025 16:15:10 +0000

>so we'll probably never see them digitized

That seems to run contradictory to the author's claim in the article and what I believe to be true about the internet archive. Can you elaborate?