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threefour

Re:I Don't Like LLMs on Friday September 18, 2026 @05:14AM (#49751889)
Right. When I read this, I think it's a failure to embrace the tool, explore it, understand it, stress test it, and get creative with how to use it.
Re:Pushinka on Friday July 17, 2026 @05:13AM (#48945025)
And yet, it brightened my day
Re:I've Covered Robots for Years. This One Is Different on Saturday May 02, 2026 @03:07AM (#47984068)
“Trillions of dollars flow through the human hand,” Agrawal says. “To me, this is the biggest problem in the world to be solved.”

They need to work on their messaging. "Human hands are a problem" is going to make enemies. Perhaps "relieve humans of menial chores" and "take over dangerous jobs" and "enable precision not possible with the human hand" etc.

Re:Web page annoyances that I don't inflict on you here on Monday January 06, 2025 @08:41AM (#42610471)
True, I'm just saying I don't think that's where the problems originate.

In my practice, I'll try a Jedi mind trick, e.g. "Trying to [state larger goal] makes a lot of sense. An even more effective way to do that is to [state alternate, non-toxic technique]."

Re:Web page annoyances that I don't inflict on you here on Sunday January 05, 2025 @04:26AM (#42600676)
The OP blames "various idiot web 'designers'" for problems, but in my 30 years of being a web designer I have yet to meet one designer that wants to cause these problems. It's usually people responsible for generating revenue.
Re:My Left Kidney on Friday October 27, 2023 @03:07PM (#38042587)
I was born with one kidney, a condition called renal agenesis. I’m 53 years old and in perfect health. Doctors don’t recommend any particular action.

As an aside, I’m also Buddhist so if the kidney goes I’m going with it. This obsession with prolonging life is just a distraction from living it.

It's free.
Re:Ask HN: Working in tech for climate? on Thursday August 04, 2022 @12:31PM (#32345075)
Re:Dont think of price, think of cost per use on Friday June 10, 2022 @07:28AM (#31692584)
This is how I justify the purchase of guitars and bicycles.
As long as the states pay for it. If some people insist on living in the desert, the rest of us shouldn't have to pay for it. Civilization happens elsewhere.
Re:Things I sort of believe about making music on Tuesday April 26, 2022 @08:46AM (#31166785)
On the topic of getting things done, I’ve applied a bit of software development skills to making music. Instead of creating an increasingly growing body of works I focus on a smaller number of “products” that I improve on over time. I get some ideas that are my backlog and I implement them and release a new version. I think of it as an analog to Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass; one work that he made and just kept improving over the course of his lifetime.
Re:Christopher Alexander has died on Friday March 18, 2022 @04:35PM (#30727182)
The most influential person in architecture and software whose influence is difficult to point to.
Re:A beginner's guide to intermittent fasting (2012) on Thursday March 10, 2022 @10:01AM (#30627634)
For me it required both dietary and psychological techniques to deal with feelings of hunger.

- During my morning fast if I'm hungry I'll mix two tablespoons of psyllium husk with water and drink it. Fiber helps you feel full and in this form doesn't break the fast https://www.ifbuddy.com/nutrition/does-fiber-break-a-fast/

- Psychologically I remind myself it's OK to feel hungry. I reframed feelings of hunger from a signal that I forgot to eat to a signal that in a few hours I'll need to eat, as if hunting and gathering will take a few hours so my body is telling me to start now :-)

Re:NASA spacecraft ‘touches’ the Sun for the first time ever on Wednesday December 15, 2021 @01:41AM (#29562831)
Also see: https://www.outsideonline.com/health/wellness/sunscreen-sun-...

"...what made the people with high vitamin D levels so healthy was not the vitamin itself. That was just a marker. Their vitamin D levels were high because they were getting plenty of exposure to the thing that was really responsible for their good health—that big orange ball shining down from above."

Re:reMarkable Connect subscription plans on Tuesday October 26, 2021 @12:12PM (#29002218)
There's a saying that for every trend there's an anti-trend. I do wonder when we'll reach a critical mass of subscription services such that a preference against subscriptions in general becomes a trend.
Re:Singularity – Microsoft’s Experimental OS on Sunday October 10, 2021 @01:54PM (#28820482)
We know how well that worked for Symbian.
Another musician here...

I thought it was awesome what these Argentinians were doing when I moan about the processing power of my oldish MacBook Pro. And I was impressed with the phrasing of the raps.

But of the two examples I clicked through, one focused on violence and the other objectified women. But the sample size of people they profiled was tiny. Maybe if they sought out a female music producer they'd find the Argentinian Grimes?

Re:Software made me loathe my car on Friday August 30, 2019 @05:13AM (#20836960)
I wrote a case study of BMW's iDrive a few years ago, apparently it's still relevant https://www.fastcompany.com/1665496/when-rebooting-a-project...
Re:How not to replace email: lessons from Google Wave on Sunday February 18, 2018 @08:28AM (#16405969)
I wrote a complete case study on Google Wave here: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Fail-Learning-Experience/dp/19...
Re:Ask HN: Why does visual programming suck? on Sunday June 04, 2017 @04:46PM (#14483407)
Imagine a world where people only bought bespoke suits. You go to a tailor and are measured and pick out your fabric and wait a few weeks. Then you pick up your suit. It's perfect. You pay $5000 and take it home.

Most of us don't do that. Most of us make due with off the rack suits with some tailoring for 1/10th the price.

With programming we have an expectation of bespoke design, so anything less, even if it's much easier, seems lame.

A potentially useful reframing of the question is, "What are all the common use cases that could be solved sufficiently with significantly less effort using visual programming?"

If you have to use a command line to install it, it's not for designers and PMs.
Let's not forget when Consumer Reports attacked the iPhone 4 because of the antenna issue. That model went on to set sales records. If we're looking for a signal about the MacBook Pro's success, sales numbers may be a better indicator.
Re:HP: the pros are moving from Mac to Z on Friday October 28, 2016 @10:37AM (#12816297)
Sad. I can remember 20 years ago when I was a SysAdmin lusting after HP machines because they were built better than anything else, the quality of the case and components was unquestionably superior.
Re:HP: the pros are moving from Mac to Z on Friday October 28, 2016 @10:35AM (#12816261)
That actual inspires confidence for me. I expect the opposite -- for HP's marketing people to scrub out anything that isn't positive, and the fact that they're being honest here is refreshing.
It's working for me: MacBook with 10.11.5 and Safari 9.1.1.
Re:Mercury: Instant AMP Results. Zero Development on Thursday May 19, 2016 @01:34PM (#11731978)
Awesome stuff. On reflection, it makes you wonder why Google didn't offer this when they rolled out AMP.
This agency takes content from Howard Stern about Louis CK's site in order to promote themselves, and then doesn't link to Louis CK's site so we can see for ourselves what it's all about.

That's what I hate about the Internet.

Re:Apply HN: Nickel is personal financial planning for free on Wednesday April 20, 2016 @07:18AM (#11533558)
Exactly: automated investing is crowded, but our holistic analysis is different.

Besides LearnVest, there's PolicyGenius (https://www.policygenius.com) who does a good job evaluating your need for individual insurance products and then selling them. They don't do financial planning.

Investment managers such as Personal Capital and Vanguard offer access to advisors if you meet a minimum of assets under management, but the advice is mostly about investing.

SmartAsset and Nerdwallet are focused on content and calculators but have enough funding to move into planning in the future.

Any of the following companies could move into our space, although they all have channel conflicts: Robo investors (e.g. Betterment), Insurance (e.g. Prudential), Banks (e.g. Wells Fargo), Financial planners (e.g. Ameriprise), Investment managers (e.g. Vanguard), Advisor-facing software (e.g. eMoneyAdvisor)

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