bgbntty2

Joined 11 months ago

Karma
94
Submissions
85
Member since
Dec 3
Decided to comment after years of lurking. Might stick around if HN is Tor-friendly - haven't tried it yet. I care about security, privacy, ethics, philosophy of mind, qualia and suffering, so I'd most likely comment on related threads.
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Recent submissions

Comment · 9 months ago
I remember buying a magazine full of crosswords and similar puzzles when I was in the mood.

And when there were sites with unlimited Wordle, I played a few in a row.

On the internet, unlike with newspapers, you're not limited to how many levels/games you can make per day. Making it once per day doesn't make any sense whatsoever. It's condescending to the users and feels like a power trip.

Comment · 9 months ago
I seriously don't get the idea behind daily challenges unless you want to keep users hooked to extract some value from them, but that doesn't seem to be the case here, as there are no ads.

Just show all the different levels at once.

Comment · 9 months ago
If it's AI-generated, it should be legal - regardless of whether the person consented for their image to be used and regardless of the age of the person.

You can't have AI-generated CSAM, as you're not sexually abusing anyone if it's AI-generated. It's better to have AI-generated CP instead of real CSAM because no child would be physically harmed. No one is lying that the photos are real, either.

And it's not like you can't generate these pics on free local models, anyway. In this case I don't see an issue with Twitter that should involve lawyers, even though Twitter is pure garbage otherwise.

As to whether Twitter should use moderation or not, it's up to them. I wouldn't use a forum where there are irrelevant spam posts.

Comment · 9 months ago
With apps like Signal, installed via apk, without going through Google on a de-Googled phone, I receive notifications in real time. What's the point of having all notifications go through Google, except to save some battery life and data?

Also, can Google read push notifications going through FCM?

Comment · 10 months ago
Why can I only play #736? What's up with games nowadays that only give you 1 puzzle per day? IIRC the original Wordle was like that. Is it designed to make you bookmark the URL and visit it every day? I doubt most people would do that.
Comment · 10 months ago
I haven't dealt with statistics for a while, but what I don't get is why squares specifically? Why not power of 1, or 3, or 4, or anything else? I've seen squares come up a lot in statistics. One explanation that I didn't really like is that it's easier to work with because you don't have to use abs() since everything is positive. OK, but why not another even power like 4? Different powers should give you different results. Which seems like a big deal because statistics is used to explain important things and to guide our life wrt those important things. What makes squares the best? I can't recall other times I've seen squares used, as my memories of my statistics training is quite blurry now, but they seem to pop up here and there in statistics relatively often, it seems.
Comment · 10 months ago
I'm at home most of the time, yet I prefer to go to the delivery office to pick up my packages. It's a 5 minute walk, as they're all over the city. Might not work well for big car-first American cities, though. I prefer going to the delivery office because I hate waiting for a delivery person to show up and wondering if I have time to go to the bathroom or not.

But I agree that not everything is easy to inspect. Most things seem to be, though. Another issue is not wanting third parties from seeing what you've purchased.

Comment · 10 months ago
Would love to see a new player make ECC RAM or even rowhammer-resistant RAM. I'd accept the price increase and the performance penalties for such RAM.
Comment · 10 months ago
An easy solution - open the package when the delivery person comes or when you pick it up from the delivery office. The delivery person can take a photo and act as a witness. If you take the package from the local delivery office, there are cameras and staff, so I can't just swap a ripe apple for a rotten one.

Where I live we don't have the habit of just putting the delivery on the porch for a few reasons. First, it's ridiculous if you think about it - no one signed for it, so how could you mark it as delivered? I don't get the US in that regard. Secondly, most of the houses have fences, so the delivery person can't come to the house even if they wanted to. You're basically required to meet the delivery person.

Comment · 10 months ago
I agree with the sandboxing and permissions points, but is that related to the OS not being rooted? This is a genuine question - I'm not trying to make a point here, but to learn.

I think Qubes qualifies from a practical point of view, as modern hardware is powerful enough for it, so it's viable to run Qubes on desktop instead of a baremetal OS. I'd even go further and say there's no excuse not to run Qubes if you're familiar with Linux and can afford a compatible desktop or laptop.

Per-app sandboxing or per-OS compartmentalization is pretty similar with regards to security. There are some security and usability trade-offs, but I like the per-OS isolation model, as it's easier for several apps to share everything within a VM - that way you isolate a whole "project" more easily, as everything inside a VM is only related to that project and you assume all the apps would need access, anyway.

Comment · 10 months ago
I've tested a few microwaves from different manufacturers with my phone a few years ago. I think I looked at some file in my router (OpenWRT), but I can't recall. I got a lot of dropped packets each time. The amount of degradation was similar for the different microwaves.

I had to put the phone close to the microwave to detect this. The degradation was obviously stronger when the phone was closer.

If your friend experiences noticeable degradation regardless of the distance within the room, it might be worrisome.

But I think it's normal to have some interference. That doesn't necessarily mean enough of the 2.4 GHz radiation escapes the microwave to be harmful to an animal, as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and so on are very weak, comparatively.

Funny thing is, after putting my phone inside a closed turned off microwave, it got Wi-Fi, although very weak. I didn't try that with all the microwaves, but with 2 or 3 of them.

I think the Faraday cage around the microwave was built to be good enough for safety, but it wasn't built with Wi-Fi interference in mind.

Disclaimer: I might be wrong, as I don't have enough background to make any bold claims.

Comment · 10 months ago
> What I am not considering:

> - Telling him I suspect he has dyslexia. I'm not a doctor.

You don't have to be a doctor to tell him he might have dyslexia or something related. If he goes to a doctor to diagnose it, he'll be better off because of you. Either he'll have dyslexia and he'll know his problem or he won't and he'll start considering other causes.

People nowadays seem reluctant to offer medical advice of any kind. It's one thing to just hand him some pills, it's another to suggest he goes to see a doctor.

Comment · 10 months ago
Comment · 10 months ago
Okay, but could you give me some examples? How is Android or iOS more secure than Linux or Qubes?

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