hnhg (u/hnhg) - Readit News

hnhg commented on Is 4chan the perfect Pirate Bay poster child to justify wider UK site-blocking? torrentfreak.com/uk-govt-... · Posted by u/gloxkiqcza

considerdevs · 2 days ago

True, awareness of misinformation is higher today. But, being aware that all channels are polluted with misinformation doesn’t automatically make someone better at distinguish the truth. Also older generation automatically are not buying everything they see https://www.mpg.de/24132917/0205-bild-online-misinformation-...

Actually, having "misinfo everywhere" goggles can push people think that everything is propaganda or nothing can be trusted. This is also one way Russia and China is using its propaganda: give so much multi meaning information that normal governance information is also considered as something that cannot be trusted. Or atleast trying.

hnhg · 2 days ago

I concede that but awareness is a better starting position for potential improvement rather than ignorance. I guess we are agreeing on the substance but I am taking an optimistic view rather than a pessimistic one. I accept that I might be very misguided.

hnhg commented on Is 4chan the perfect Pirate Bay poster child to justify wider UK site-blocking? torrentfreak.com/uk-govt-... · Posted by u/gloxkiqcza

brap · 2 days ago

I mean, yes, but also…

Not specifically related to this “child protection” thing, but you can’t deny that the free flow of information also leads to some pretty terrible things, driven by actors such as states, magnified x1000 by social media, and now also AI.

Every platform these days is full to the brim with misinformation and propaganda (which ends up in mainstream media as well), deliberately making many of us hateful and sometimes violent. The free flow of information is undoubtedly being used for harm.

I’m 100% for personal liberty and accountability, and admittedly I don’t have a solution for this.

I do think the Elon Musk approach (“just let people decide for themselves”) is very naive at best.

Again just to be clear this has nothing to do with the UK thing which I strongly disagree with.

hnhg · 2 days ago

Look at the positives: now you are aware that every channel is full of misinformation and propaganda and treat it all as such. That gives you better media literacy than previous generations who tended to trust everything that was given to them "from above" - it enables us to be more intellectually mature and honest with ourselves about the nature and history of news media, even if you might not actually find that pleasant or convenient to deal with.

hnhg commented on Monte Carlo Crash Course: Quasi-Monte Carlo thenumb.at/QMC/... · Posted by u/zote

hnhg · 20 days ago

This feels like a crash course for people already very familiar with it all. For everyone else, Steve Brunton's courses cover a lot of the foundational stuff here on probability and stats and might be a lot more accessible: https://www.youtube.com/@Eigensteve

hnhg commented on How AI conquered the US economy: A visual FAQ derekthompson.org/p/how-a... · Posted by u/rbanffy

hnhg · 20 days ago

I found this the most interesting part of the whole essay - "the ten largest companies in the S&P 500 have so dominated net income growth in the last six years that it’s becoming more useful to think about an S&P 10 vs an S&P 490" - which then took me here: https://insight-public.sgmarkets.com/quant-motion-pictures/o...

Can anyone shed light on what is going on between these two groups. I wasn't convinced by the rest of the argument in the article, and I would like something that didn't just rely on "AI" as an explanation.

hnhg commented on Palantir is extending its reach even further into government wired.com/story/palantir-... · Posted by u/mooreds

giancarlostoro · 23 days ago

Its really easy to read this and be scared without being given any context, not everyone in the room knows who you are referring to and if your reading of their remarks are accurate.

You got a name and a raw source?

hnhg · 23 days ago

You can also sign up to Curtis Yarvin's Substack and read the kind of thinking that Thiel likes to surround himself with: https://graymirror.substack.com/

hnhg commented on VPN use surges in UK as new online safety rules kick in ft.com/content/356674b0-9... · Posted by u/mmarian

specproc · a month ago

Can we talk about the successful investments then?

What I see is every national asset, every successful company, and increasingly land and housing sold to (typically overseas) capital, with the proceeds sucked offshore.

Whether it's new housing in London, ARM, the water, the electricity, most products and most supermarkets: the beneficial owner is outside the country, being largely taxed outside the country, and spending their money outside the country.

We're discussing this in the context of a deeply dysfunctional Britain. If the "wealth creation" route were in any way effective, we'd be in a very different place right now. There's been concensus among pretty much every party in my lifetime around supporting "growth", "investment", number go up. It's clearly not working for most of us. Everyone but a select few in this country is living on the edge.

I personally see a major component of our malaise as the rentierism practiced by largely foreign interests throughout our economy. Alternative explanations are welcome, but it's hard to see how we'd be worse off without the vampire squid up each and every orifice.

hnhg · a month ago

Private equity is absolutely taking over the UK - so many stories like this: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/taxes/private-equity-boom-ne...

hnhg commented on Countries across the world see food price shocks from climate extremes bsc.es/news/bsc-news/coun... · Posted by u/littlexsparkee

luckys · a month ago

Portugal. You would have to live here I guess. It was about 2 years ago and I don't have any sources to give you. Ask the locals if you know any.

Olive oil may be more expensive in general now because of poor harvests but at the time local production had been good and there was no reason to raise the price. The rationale? I guess it was profit.

hnhg · a month ago

I feel across Europe at least companies are using data to optimise price by demand closely - large corporate suppliers almost definitely have the staff at hand to increase prices using data in the same way that "surge" pricing is calculated these days. They have every incentive to do so since they want to maximise profit.

hnhg commented on The bewildering phenomenon of declining quality english.elpais.com/cultur... · Posted by u/geox

deadbabe · a month ago

Most 2020s cars are completely unaffordable or overpriced and over engineered but maybe by 2040s this will be largely solved.

The 2010s was peak car.

hnhg · a month ago

Don't forget the planned obsolescence in 2020s cars.

hnhg commented on Stalking the Statistically Improbable Restaurant with Data ethanzuckerman.com/2025/0... · Posted by u/nkurz

giantfrog · 2 months ago

This is a really fun exercise; a rare example of something that's "data-centric" without being soulless.

I think it's fascinating how it illustrates weirdness about how Americans think about and categorize "ethnic" food. For example, the author's analysis of Google data shows Glendale, CA ranks #1 for "Highest prevalence of Mediterranean Restaurants." But I am nearly certain the majority of these, given Glendale's demographics, are in fact Armenian or Persian restaurants. Both Iran and Armenia are of course quite far from the Mediterranean region, but for whatever reason (rice? flat breads? grilled things on a stick?) have gotten lumped in with some Americanized, genericized conception of "the Mediterranean" that's indistinguishable from "the Middle East." I would imagine you'd find the same thing happening on Yelp etc.

hnhg · 2 months ago

Plus lots of salad and olive oil. I believe the use of "Mediterranean" is to avoid strange expectations about Middle Eastern food, which many people seem to erroneously expect to be more like Indian.

hnhg commented on Spain and Brazil push global action to tax the super-rich and curb inequality news.un.org/en/story/2025... · Posted by u/Traces

cloverich · 2 months ago

top 1% net worth is around 10 million says google. That's enough to live off and not need to work at any age. It's clearly not middle class.

hnhg · 2 months ago

It depends on where you are. There are parts of the USA where a 10 million net worth does not mean you are "yacht rich" (but certainly very comfortable).