News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

alan_wade

Ask HN: Is it just me or did Google search recently get a lot worse?

Past few days(weeks?) I find myself more and more frustrated with google search. It seems to frequently omit the most important keywords I'm typing. I constantly have to click "Must include 'Keyword'", because more than half the links on the first page miss it, even if it's the first one out of 3 words in my query.I'm not the kind of person who thinks about search quality, this is the first...

( Read More... | 100 comments | 188 points | on HN )
Re:Ask HN: Anyone doing business using Estonian e-residency? on Saturday December 29, 2018 @05:49PM (#18786175)
Would this work as a workaround for creating a Stripe account, if I'm living in a country not supported by Atlas?
Re:How AlphaZero Mastered Its Games on Saturday December 29, 2018 @06:14AM (#18783105)
God what a well written article! I don't have much to say on the subject, but this was pure joy to read, it's crazy good. Clear, engaging, to the point, making a difficult subject accessible without dumbing it down, no fluff or unnecessary side stories, just awesomeness.
Re:Epic Games banked a $3B profit in 2018 on Friday December 28, 2018 @04:46AM (#18775846)
Awesome comment! One thing I have problem with is that you keep saying "ripping off" or "steal". There really shouldn't be any shame in taking 2 existing good ideas and using them to make something better, something widely successful.

TF2 or PUBG could've done this but didn't, fortnite did, and nailed it, and now we all get to benefit.

Re:Epic Games banked a $3B profit in 2018 on Friday December 28, 2018 @04:35AM (#18775796)
Anything except Linux apparently.

Unreal Engine works on linux, and Fortnite used to work through wine, but because of their anti-cheating system it's broken now, and their CEO doesnt seem to have any plans for the linux version, he has some weird stance [1] on that.

Such a bummer, I really wanted to play it.

[1] https://twitter.com/timsweeneyepic/status/964284402741149698

Re:Patreon Bars Anti-Feminist for Racist Speech, Inciting Revolt on Thursday December 27, 2018 @07:23AM (#18769066)
Except that in modern culture people tend to call anything they disagree with "abuse", like using a wrong pronoun or not supporting feminism enough.

I want to live in a world where anyone is free to say any stupid idea they want, and anyone else is free to correct them or ignore them or do whatever they like.

Actual harm/abuse/harassment should be illegal of course, like the kind where a person is physically doing stuff to another person against their will.

But if blocking a person on twitter is all it takes to avoid "harassment", maybe that's the best way to deal with that.

Re:Researchers are keeping pig brains alive outside the body on Thursday December 27, 2018 @05:26AM (#18768695)
Maybe it's a new body for Peter Thiel made out of some poor person.

Maybe it's immortality for all of us, ability for a dying person to hop into a young, healthy, good looking clone body.

Re:The Science Behind Making Your Child Smarter on Wednesday December 26, 2018 @05:53AM (#18761591)
Do you really need a source telling you that you can learn stuff from books?
Re:Fortnite was 2018’s most important social network on Tuesday December 25, 2018 @04:39PM (#18759314)
How do people end up finding friends online? I spend 90% of my time online, I post on forums, but I didn't end up making even one lasting online relationship. It seems like a fun thing to do though, how does that usually happen?
Re:Blender 2.8 on Tuesday December 25, 2018 @12:48AM (#18756148)
I have definitely quit blender because of being unable to bear the horrible alien ass-backwards UI, same with GIMP. I love learning new things, but when EVERYTHING in software works the opposite way from what you have expected, it's too much.

ZBrush UI is also alien and counterintuitive, but after you learn it it begins making sense and feeling convenient, not so in blender, here I have to fight it for no reason.

Can you share why it makes for a bad experience?

Personally I've enjoyed the feature.

I find it annoying on youtube though, for some reason.

Edit: Oh, wait, are you talking about autoplaying preview trailers or autoplaying the next episode? I like the next episode feature, autoplaying trailers are annoying.

Clickbait + low quality content is what fatigues users.

Personally I don't mind clickbait if after doing whatever it takes to grab my attention, the creator delivers on an actually solid high quality educational/entertaining content.

Offtopic: it's really weird that it's the end of 2018 and a site called TechCrunch can't figure out how to make a mobile friendly website. Here's how it looks on my iPad Mini (not anything non-standard):

https://imgur.com/a/OQt1Lt9

If you click on the weird X button at the top it says "An error has occured", and if you click back the error still remains.

Snapchat is not equipped to eliminate the world hunger.

Pokemon Go is not going to stop racism.

Breaking news! Apple Watch does NOT cure cancer!

Re:Gut bacteria may offer a treatment for autism on Sunday December 09, 2018 @04:10PM (#18643295)
Hi! Thank you so much for sharing!

I'm suffering from somehing similar. Did you look into Candida? A lot of the symptoms sound very similar. H. Pylori antibiotics could have killed off good intestinal flora, causing candida overgrowth.

Could you describe what other changes did you make, aside from adding S. Boulardii? Diet, supplements, medications? What helped you the most?

Re:Creating Things That Matter [video] on Sunday December 09, 2018 @04:03AM (#18640027)
I highly recommend everyone to read "Perennial Seller" by Ryan Holiday. Really insightful and fun to read book on the same subject that does a much better job of explaining it than this dude.
Re:YouTube top earners: A seven-year-old making $22M on Tuesday December 04, 2018 @06:08PM (#18604346)
Well, it works for me. Keep your snap judgements to yourself.
Re:Absolute Beginner's Guide to Emacs (2012) on Tuesday December 04, 2018 @09:33AM (#18599680)
I have to share it here:

http://emacsrocks.com/

This is an absolutely insane series of tutorials that will explode your mind and make you feel godlike. If you want to learn why people love emacs so much, watch this.

Re:YouTube top earners: A seven-year-old making $22M on Tuesday December 04, 2018 @05:38AM (#18598161)
I don't mind it when instead of candy you get fruit.

When instead of candy you get kicked in the nuts by a horse, that's when you need some of that youtube to get your mind off of things.

Re:YouTube top earners: A seven-year-old making $22M on Tuesday December 04, 2018 @03:58AM (#18597653)
Computers, internet, youtube, games - these things are a part of a real world. I mean, they aren't a hallucination, they don't exist on a separate plane of reality. Experiences are real, joy they bring is real, and for many people, it's far better than what the "real" world around them has to offer.

If people are tempted to escape into a virtual world, it might be because the real world around them sucks.

Re:YouTube top earners: A seven-year-old making $22M on Tuesday December 04, 2018 @03:44AM (#18597574)
You're putting a dark twist on it, but personally, I do feel like many of my favorite youtubers are my friends. I might not be their friend, but I love them, they have taught me a lot, and helped me to get through tough times.

If I'm sad I can always watch their videos and feel happy and connected to other people. I like people who create awesome stuff, I can relate to them a lot more than to the people I meet in real life.

I don't think these feelings are invalid. If people watch someone's content, and learn things, and feel connected, and that makes them feel good and happy - I think that's wonderful.

Besides, it's not like real life people are amazing at being real, everyone has a fake persona they're trying to project. What you can't fake is being funny, insightful, educational, likable, charismatic, talented, inspiring, etc. If you're creating something good, people will like you. Nothing wrong with that.

Your second link is probably the most delightful and awesome thing I have read in a long time. I feel such kinship towards this, it's like all the things I've had in my brain but never shared. You seem really cool =)
Completely agree! I use org-mode for this, I start a new * section every day with a date.

I also use hashtags like #link, #question, #note, #todo, #done, so I can easily search through them.

When I encounter some error, I write down the error, add a hashtag by the topic (like #docker or #ubuntu or #stripe), then URL for a solution I found (like stackoverflow), then a snipped of code that solved it with a brief explanation.

At this point my notes.org is 7.7 megabytes long and contains all the notes from every day of the past several years. So when I encounter an error I've solved before I just do the search and immediately find the solution.

Also I mark all the important thoughts and insights with >> at the beginning of the line, so I can search for ">>" and find a summary of all the most important insights I've learned over the past month.

Replace "being yourself" with "being your best self". You can still try to improve according to your own values, but don't change who you are just to please others.

Being your best self has nothing to do with socializing by the way, hopefully you would be doing that even if you were alone in your room.

Optimize behaviors, not outcomes.

You can directly control the actions you take, but not the results they lead to.

Because there's often luck/uncertainty involved, the results are often not even a good way to measure the quality of your decisions, sometimes good decisions can lead to bad outcomes and vice versa, be aware of this and notice when it happens.

Reward yourself based on taking the right action, use outcomes as analytics to learn from.

Confusing the two leads to anxiety, frustration, and beating yourself up over things you can't change.

Don't burn your mental energy on things outside of your circle of control, instead - try to spend all of it on taking actionable steps.

For me, practicing pick up was an amazing way to find friends and develop new relationships. After watching a bunch of RSD videos I started regularly going out to clubs and approaching girls. As a nerdy and socially awkward guy I didn't end up being a very successful "pick up artist" in terms of getting laid a lot, but I've met some amazing women who ended up introducing me to their friend groups, and that helped me to meet a lot of really cool people and find friends.

Besides, RSD community itself has local meetup groups, so you can find wingman buddies to go out with, and I've met a few great guy friends that way, I know pick up community gets a horrible reputation in modern culture, but the people I met were really smart, cool, and were, like me, into personal development and practicing social skills.

If you can look past the stigma, pick up is an amazing way to meet new people proactively, it's challenging (approaching new people is scary), but fun, free, can be done at any time, and the results depend on how much you practice. I highly recommend it.

Also, I have found a local Go club, and found many awesome people there. It's a fun relaxing game, community is friendly, and it's natural to have conversations and form friendships there.

Older »