It would introduce some basic humanity into the situation. It would be a form of accountability.
Readit Newsspit2wind commented on DHS keeps trying and failing to unmask anonymous ICE critics online arstechnica.com/tech-poli... · Posted by u/duxup
spit2wind commented on Launching the Handmade Software Foundation handmade.network/blog/p/9... · Posted by u/DeathArrow
I never understood the Handmade Network. AFAIU, it came from people who watched Casey Muratori's Handmade Hero, a game developed on video over several years from scratch. But Casey, as far as I know, didn't start the Network and it never seemed to align with the intent of Handmade Hero.
The purpose of Handmade Hero was to show people that they are capable of making a game themselves and to learn things which have a reputation for being too hard. There was, of course, an emphasis on the hard things being hard because of complexity introduced by things like OOP, C++, etc. But the main purpose always felt like education and enablement. Casey's a great teacher and the videos are very informative.
The Network, on the other hand, was some weird "we want to make stuff by hand", whatever that means. That's fine. But that's not what Casey spent like 7 years doing. He didn't do it "just cuz". Instead, it was to teach and share. That seemed lost on the Network.
As a result, it seemed just like a less toxic Suckless project without the focus on making a new ecosystem. It was just a forum to say, "Hey I made this thing", all the while co-oping the feel-goods from Casey's Handmade Hero.
spit2wind commented on ‘ELITE’: The Palantir app ICE uses to find neighborhoods to raid werd.io/elite-the-palanti... · Posted by u/sdoering
> focus on the criminals and dangerous people first
That's what they say they are doing? Every time I read about them arresting somebody who was "just picking their kids up from school", it turns out to be some professional agitator who was trying to get arrested in exchange for a photo op.
How does one become to be a professional agitator? Indeed.com comes up with no results. I have a friend who's bored with their job.
spit2wind commented on The Palantir app helping ICE raids in Minneapolis 404media.co/elite-the-pal... · Posted by u/fajmccain
If all those things happened in Spain where I live, I'm 99% we'd have actual riots on the streets, together with a lot of other unpleasant-but-needed civilian action, until things got better, like we've done in the past (sometimes maybe went slightly overboard with it, but better than nothing).
Why are Americans so passive? You're literally transitioning into straight up authoritarianism, yet where are the riots? How are you not fighting back with more than whistles and blocking them in cars? Is there more stuff actually happening on the ground, but there simply isn't any videos of it, or are people really this passive in the land of the free?
Are people inside the country not getting the same news we're getting on the outside? Are you not witnessing your government carrying out extra-judicial murders and then being protected by that same government? I'm really lost trying to understand how the average person (like you reading this) isn't out on the streets trying to defend what I thought your country was all about.
Americans are not passive. Look at the videos of any of these incidents. People are supporting those under attack, collecting evidence, and protesting. The message is clear.
Peaceful protest is the key. Riots, violence, and fighting are not peaceful and only play into the administration's aims.
When Americans resist and protest peacefully, as they have been in the largest numbers ever in the country's history, it exposes the brutality and baseness of those commiting the heinous acts.
Through such peaceful protest as we see, America will overcome this.
The big question is, what next? How to hold people accountable, fairly, while rebuilding the system and rebuilding trust?
spit2wind commented on Show HN: 22 GB of Hacker News in SQLite hackerbook.dosaygo.com... · Posted by u/keepamovin
This is pretty neat! The calendar didn't work well for me. I could only seem to navigate by month. And when I selected the earliest day (after much tapping), nothing seemed to be updated.
Nonetheless, random access history is cool.
spit2wind commented on Rich Hickey: Thanks AI gist.github.com/richhicke... · Posted by u/austinbirch
Tangentially related, "slop" really isn't a negative enough term for unwanted LLM garbage. "Slop" which is fed to pigs, has utility. "Slop" as a verb doesn't necessarily have a (strong) negative association ("It was slopped on the plate, but it was tasty").
I use the term "barf" more often. Barf has no utility*. Barf is always seen in a negative context. Barf is forcibly ejected from an unwilling participant (the LLM), and barf's foulness is coerced upon everyone that witnesses it. I think it's a better metaphor.
I know that this is just semantics, but still.
* even though LLM output __can__, and often does, have utility, we are specifically referring to unwanted LLM output that does not have utility. I'm not trying to argue that LLMs are objectively useless here, only that they are sometimes misused to the users' detriment.
This is an interesting observation. One could argue that some AI generated or driven things does have utility, and thus qualifies as "slop" (although not for those on the receiving end). For example, when used to drive clicks and generate revenue, to troll, or to spread propaganda. You get the idea.
In this instance however, I agree, barf is more accurate.
spit2wind commented on List of domains censored by German ISPs cuiiliste.de/domains... · Posted by u/elcapitan
Except for the late night home raids rooting out "hate speech". Opposite of chill.
I'll also take the bait. As far as I understand it, these rules come, fundamentally, from the German Basic Law which was drafted, in part, with direct support from the US after the war. There's certainly always room for healthy debate about what is meant by freedom of speech. But it strikes me as ignorant to come from a US "absolutist" perspective and not understand the history (of US involvement). No clue if the poster is approaching it from that perspective; I'm trying to raise the point of historical context in response to the category of such responses I've encountered.
Sad.
And perhaps a controversial take but consider the counterfactual: Should it be illegal to fire employees that recent took mental health leave? Get a bad review or put on a PIP? It's already becoming a common strategy to immediately take mental health/sick leave.
Sounds like the kind of thing a union or works counsil could help with: enforcing a fair policy. That and revisiting the concept of at-will employment.
spit2wind commented on Ask HN: What skills do you want to develop or improve in 2026? · Posted by u/meridion
I was lost not sure of my career and I put too much focus on it, since now things are more stable, I want to:
- Work on projects that actually interest me, not just to fill the CV.
- Learn CS fundamentals but I know web development but not how computers work under the hood.
I have been ignoring my mental and physical health for years, so working on these is a top priority.
Do you have any particular resources lined up?
Regarding how computers work under the hood, i can recommend Nand2Tetris.
" Shortly before beginning the GNU Project, I heard about the Free University Compiler Kit, also known as VUCK. (The Dutch word for “free” is written with a v.) This was a compiler designed to handle multiple languages, including C and Pascal, and to support multiple target machines. I wrote to its author asking if GNU could use it.
He responded derisively, stating that the university was free but the compiler was not. I therefore decided that my first program for the GNU Project would be a multilanguage, multiplatform compiler."
And not only was the university 'free' and the compiler not, neither was 'Minix', which was put out there through Prentice Hall in a series of books that you had to pay a fairly ridiculous amount of money for if you were a student there.
So the VU had the two main components of the free software world in their hand and botched them both because of simple greed.
I love it how RMS has both these quotes in the same text:
"Please don't fall into the practice of calling the whole system “Linux,” since that means attributing our work to someone else. Please give us equal mention."
"This makes it difficult to write free drivers so that Linux and XFree86 can support new hardware."
And there are only a few lines between those quotes.
I'll be honest, I don't understand your point here?