jetsnoc (u/jetsnoc) - Readit News

jetsnoc commented on What is going on right now? catskull.net/what-the-hel... · Posted by u/todsacerdoti

xeonmc · 9 days ago

In your specific case, I think it’s likely an intentionally pointed response to your use of LLM.

jetsnoc · 8 days ago

I'll admit it. I've done this, but only a few times and only when someone sent me truly egregious AI slop—the kind where it's obvious no human that respects my time ever looked at it.

My reaction is usually, "Oh, we're doing this? Fine." I'll even prompt my LLM with something like, "Make it sound as corporate and AI-generated as possible." Or, if I'm feeling especially petty, "Write this like you're trying to win the 2025 award for Most Corporate Nonsense, and you're a committee at a Fortune 500 company competing to generate the most boilerplate possible." It's petty, sure, but there's something oddly cathartic about responding to slop with slop.

jetsnoc commented on MCP: An (Accidentally) Universal Plugin System worksonmymachine.substack... · Posted by u/Stwerner

mh- · 2 months ago

Unfortunately, I think we're equally likely to see shortsighted lock-in attempts like this [0] one from Slack.

I tried to find a rebuttal to this article from Slack, but couldn't. I'm on a flight with slow wifi though. If someone from Slack wants to chime in that'd be swell, too.

I've made the argument to CFOs multiple times over the years why we should continue to pay for Slack instead of just using Teams, but y'all are really making that harder and harder.

[0]: https://www.reuters.com/business/salesforce-blocks-ai-rivals...

jetsnoc · 2 months ago

I wasn’t aware of this, it’s extremely shortsighted. My employees’ chats are my company’s data, and I should be able to use them as I see fit. Restricting API access to our own data moves them quickly in to the 'too difficult to continue doing business with' category.

The reality is that Slack isn’t that sticky. The only reason I fended off the other business units who've demanded Microsoft Teams through the years is my software-engineering teams QoL. Slack has polish and is convenient but now that Slack is becoming inconvenient and not allowing me to do what I want, I can't justify fending off the detractors. I’ll gladly invest the time to swap them out for a platform that respects our ownership and lets us use our data however we need to. We left some money on the table but I am glad we didn’t bundle and upgrade to Slack Grid and lock ourselves into a three-year enterprise agreement...

jetsnoc commented on Tell HN: Help restore the tax deduction for software dev in the US (Section 174) · Posted by u/dang

andrewlgood · 3 months ago

But the idea behind capitalizing research and development is to eliminate the difference in financial presentation between buying and building software. In both cases, one pays cash to acquire the software then uses it over a period of time to generate revenue. Purchased software is clearly capitalizable. It is then amortized over the expected useful life of the software. Annual maintenance fees are not capitalizable as they are not expected to extend the useful life of the software. Allowing R&D to be capitalized just evens the playing field.

If R&D were not allowed to be capitalized, then a company would have an incentive to create a specific entity to develop its internally used software, then sell that software to parent company. If it set up the entities properly, it would capitalize the software as purchased software rather than R&D. Many firms with international development teams do this to manage in what country they pay taxes - the goal being to derive no value in high-tax countries and high value in low/no tax countries.

jetsnoc · 3 months ago

Thanks for the perspective—makes sense from a financial reporting lens. Curious how you'd balance that with the reality that modern software is rarely a finished asset, and startups often don’t have revenue yet when these costs hit.

jetsnoc commented on Tell HN: Help restore the tax deduction for software dev in the US (Section 174) · Posted by u/dang

amanaplanacanal · 3 months ago

If you buy a building, it is a capital expense that depreciates over years, even though you absolutely have to keep paying for maintenance. Why should software be different?

jetsnoc · 3 months ago

Unlike a building—where you might find one for sale and simply buy it—most companies don’t "buy one software" from a vendor and amortize it like a purchased asset. Instead, they hire full-time teams to build, maintain, and evolve software as a core, continuous function of the business. And most companies don’t "sell one software" either—they lease it to others, as software-as-a-service.

In your analogy, when a company constructs and sells a building, labor costs are deductible as part of the cost of goods sold. Only the profit—when the finished product is sold—is taxable. But under the new Section 174 rules, software R&D labor is treated like the purchase of a capital asset, even though the company is leasing a service, not selling a final, tangible product.

The flaw? Software isn’t a static, finished asset you walk away from. It’s a living system. One update might fix a bug, introduce a feature, and improve long-term architecture all at once. Is it maintenance? Innovation? Infrastructure? The answer is usually “all of the above.” So how does anyone report that cleanly on a tax form? What’s the IRS’s standard test for sorting that out?

Before TCJA, some companies may have stretched R&D definitions to claim Section 41 credits. But after the TCJA change, the incentive flipped. Now, companies are penalized for doing real R&D—the very thing we should be encouraging. Startups are now paying painfully high tax bills simply for building something they cannot lease out en masse yet.

We should want to incentivize invention, not suppress it. We need more startups, not fewer. Software—especially with generative AI—is one of the few options for us left that can create new markets, expand GDP, and drive compounding national growth. The upside is limitless. This is hammering our economy and it’s strangling startups at the exact moment we need them most.

Congress, do the right thing; restore the rules we had pre-TCJA.

Timeline:

- 1981: Section 41 introduced — provides tax credits for qualified R&D activities.

- Pre-2018: Under Section 174, R&D expenses (including software) were fully deductible; Section 41 credits could be claimed.

- 2017 (Dec): TCJA passed by the 115th Congress and signed by President Trump; Section 174 expenses to be amortized over 5 years starting in 2022.

- 2022: Amortization rule takes effect. Companies must now capitalize and amortize R&D expenses.

- 2025: Section 174 amortization remains in effect; Section 41 credits still exist but now come with a steep tradeoff.

jetsnoc commented on Tailscale 4via6 – Connect Edge Deployments at Scale tailscale.com/blog/4via6-... · Posted by u/tiernano

jetsnoc · 4 months ago

We chose Tailscale as our mesh zero-trust platform primarily for its 4via6 subnet routing. Many of our interfacing networks reuse CIDR ranges, and we had no interest in maintaining a custom WireGuard implementation to handle subnet overlaps. The hidden operational cost of bespoke networking solutions is never trivial. Tailscale’s combination of 4via6, fine-grained ACLs, lightweight agents, and a customer-friendly licensing model made it an easy decision for us—especially given their flexibility around node licensing, which erred in favor of the customer and our custom use cases that would have otherwise inflated our COGS.

jetsnoc commented on Zoom outage caused by accidental 'shutting down' of the zoom.us domain status.zoom.us/incidents/... · Posted by u/RVRX

jetsnoc · 4 months ago

They need to implement secondary and tertiary domains—with diverse registrars and hosting infrastructure—for the Zoom client’s calling home. Maybe even a fallback anycast ip address for service discovery. Given how much companies like mine pay for service, it’s reasonable to expect that level of engineering foresight. But hindsight will do—let’s get it fixed. #HugOps to all employees working overtime and taking care of this.

jetsnoc commented on SignalGate Is Driving the Most US Downloads of Signal Ever wired.com/story/signalgat... · Posted by u/bentobean

cdblades · 5 months ago

I read this as you suggesting that signal is somehow at fault here?

If I'm getting that wrong, ignore me, if I'm not, could you expand that? I don't follow how signal did anything wrong here, or was in any way responsible.

jetsnoc · 5 months ago

I interpreted the message sas aying the fault lies with those who transmitted the top-secret through Signal and not a fault of the Signal company/app.

jetsnoc commented on Bruce Bastian, WordPerfect co-creator, has died heraldextra.com/news/loca... · Posted by u/razin

jetsnoc · a year ago

Bruce came into the world and made it a better place. Bruce was smart, kind, thoughtful, and generous. I have never met him personally, but early in my life, his story had a significant positive impact on my life. Like him, I too grew up in Twin Falls, Idaho. It’s a conservative state in an LDS Religious stronghold. My high school technology teacher (Mike) was married to his sister at the time and spoke fondly of him but more importantly, spoke specifically about who Bruce was. In hindsight, he knew I needed to hear it.

I wasn’t out as gay yet, maybe only 15 years old. Of course, it would have been a death sentence for a teenager in Southern Idaho to come out as gay. One day though, Mike told me “You know, you can grow up here and you can be /different/ in many different kinds of ways, you can be a band nerd, a guy who writes software, you can be gay, you can be /yourself/ and no matter what some adults might tell you right now, you will be okay. Not only okay, but you can live a fulfilled and successful life while being authentic and true to yourself. You are never the person that these adults claim you are. They don’t know anything.“ He then went on to tell me Bruce’s story and how in his opinion, of course, Bruce wasn’t “evil” or “wrong” for being gay.

In 2005, I wrote my technology teacher a personal thank you letter. I wrote one to Bruce as well and I asked if it could be shared with him.

Bruce took the time to respond:

  Dear Brian,
  Thank you for taking the time to write your letter.  I was very moved by your story.  There were parts that really reminded me of some of my own experiences in life.
  The beautiful thing about life, at least as I have seen it, is that if you keep trying and never doubt yourself, you really can make amazing things happen both in yourself and in the world around you.  I am sure you too have already touched many people around you and have been a positive influence for them. That's so very important.  You may never realize the good you are doing, but it is happening.
  Being gay is becoming more and more accepted as "normal" and one day maybe it just won't matter.  As for being a geek, I don't consider that a bad term.  The world needs geeks.  But then they need gays too!
  Thanks again,
  Bruce Bastian

jetsnoc commented on Show HN: A “CRM” for personal relationships elim.app/eng/home... · Posted by u/Ritepaw

morning-coffee · 2 years ago

That's why I suggested it... I myself am diagnosed ASD and have realized the amount of time spent finding, curating, tinkering with these "life-hacking" apps... and the diminishing returns they all produce. By all means, use a Contacts, Calendar, and ToDo app to get a reminder... Then take any spare time remaining and actually get out and connect with the people you care about, instead of endlessly optimizing, in solitude, in front of a device, the systems and processes around the meta for personal relationships.

The premise that one of the myriad of other tools that already exist to get a reminder to connect with someone you care about are somehow so insufficient, and that if only I had this new CRM app for personal relationships that I'd finally be able to cultivate those relationships like I've always wanted, is just so preposterous sounding to me that I felt I had to comment.

jetsnoc · 2 years ago

Oh, I see. Thanks for your perspective. I can understand trying to use contacts and calendar for this and the need to keep it simple. I had a really hard time keeping those organized and the data entered but as apps like Messages get smarter and recognize when I say Happy Birthday to someone that it needs to put a birthdate on that contact, it’s getting a lot easier for me to stay organized.

jetsnoc commented on Show HN: A “CRM” for personal relationships elim.app/eng/home... · Posted by u/Ritepaw

morning-coffee · 2 years ago

If "relationships matter" and you need an app to remind you of that, I'd posit you have a larger problem than any app can solve. Consider putting down the device and connecting with your peeps in the real world every once in a while.

jetsnoc · 2 years ago

Might you consider for just a moment, if you will, people who do have a larger problem. People who are neurodivergent who may be challenged with object permanence. Apps like this help greatly. It's not that we don't care or we're stuck with a device in our face, it's that the person doesn't exist unless brought to the front and center.