jawns

This reminds me of a billboard I saw about 15 years ago when the state of Delaware was considering changing its laws to permit new casinos in addition to the three that had been grandfathered in when the restrictions went into place.

Delaware Park, one of those three casinos, put up a billboard opposing the bill, and it said, "No more casinos! THREE IS ENOUGH!"

It just goes to show that corporations will take any position -- even a casino taking an anti-casino position -- as long as it's self-serving.

I am a big fan of both enclose.horse and gerrymandle.com. I play both daily.

But this rip-off of gerrymandle.com makes me feel less inclined to continue playing enclose.horse.

And yes, it is a rip-off, not merely a riff on the general puzzle game of this type.

It's akin to joke stealing among comedians. It makes you lose respect for the joke stealer, even if their original stuff is good.

"DoorDash and Instacart believe that communities benefit when Main Street competes"

That's rich! Communities benefit when small businesses compete against each other. Announced as part of a merger of two giant public companies.

I can understand alphabetical ordering in some circumstances, but if the point is to indicate which model family is lighter or heavier, surely atomic numbers should be taken into account?!?

Argon - 18

Boron - 5

Carbon - 6

I don't think I'll be able to cope with this level of elemental disorder.

Even if we can show that it is technically possible to model a universe like ours to the degree that our current perception of reality suggests exists, there are three other big factors that would need to be weighed:

Is it feasible? What Dyson sphere level of power would be needed to maintain such a simulation? Is that level of energy available to whomever is running the simulation?

Is there a positive ROI? What does this advanced civilization get out of running such an expensive simulation?

Is it moral? The simulation involves sentient creatures who are capable of deeply contemplating their own existence, capable of feeling rapturous pleasure and indescribable pain and loss, and ostensibly capable of making moral choices that range from heroic to depraved. Doesn't there come a point where the beings in a simulation are so close to the beings in "base reality" that the same moral principles apply? If you press a button that kicks off a simulation where humans can torture and murder each other, behaving essentially identically to humans in "base reality," aren't you in some sense facilitating those deaths?

I've been a user for more than 20 years. With their shared hosting plan, which was about $5/mo. when I joined and is now $13/mo, I've been able to host my personal blog and professional site, as well as probably 3 dozen other sites over the years, including several that have hit the HN front page and never got hugged by the squeeze of death.

Honestly, compared to some of the professional environments I've worked in, it's a joy to have an idea, create a few PHP files, and in a matter of seconds have that idea live.

I know the log scale of that chart is valuable when surveying the full breadth of possibilities, but I would encourage people to make decisions between nearby models based on linear scaling. Linear cost is often more useful for making the actual decision.

It's the prisoner's dilemma.

My guess is they'd all prefer to cooperate, but they know that if any of their competitors defect, then they're worse off for it. Plus, there are legal hurdles to direct cooperation among competitors.

We saw a show of uncoordinated unity after the Jan. 6 insurrection, but as soon as that unity showed signs of fraying, it became hard to sustain.

I doubt this livestream will actually happen, but if it does, I hope people will realize ahead of time that this will not be enjoyable or entertaining to watch.

A paralyzed guy, sitting in a wheelchair, will be shot, slump over, die, blood will ooze from the wound, and then that's it.

His actions were murderous and atrocious, but there is no value in watching his life being extinguished in real time. Just because it is available to be seen doesn't mean it benefits us to see it.

I am afraid that many people will realize that too late and have to deal with the memory, if not the pangs of conscience, of having watched a snuff film.

In my neck of the woods "Linux ISOs" is a euphemism for porn.

It is generous of you to share your "Linux ISOs" with your family and friends.

One thing I've noticed with the bigger gas station chains near me is a push to have users download their mobile app, set up ACH payments, and use that as their payment method instead of credit cards in exchange for 10 cents off per gallon. From the merchant side of things, they're paying about $0.60 to process the transaction via ACH, versus $2-$2.50 for credit card transactions, per fill-up. So even if they're merely breaking even once the discounts are factored in, they're still disrupting the credit card companies' dominance.

I would not be surprised if rather than continuing to battling it out with the credit card companies to negotiate for lower fees, more and more retailers adapt to the cashless economy by leaning on ACH in lieu of credit cards, especially in market segments where repeat business is common (basically any retailer that has an existing loyalty program).

To put it another way: Sure, litigation is an option, but even if you win the concessions you want, it will leave the credit card companies entrenched. Pushing more customers to pay via non-credit-card methods has the benefit of more immediate financial impact, less reliance on the legal system, and deterioration of the power that led to the anticompetitive behavior in the first place.

There's obviously a strong incentive for homeowners to participate: they don't have to pay for a service that is often valued at hundreds of dollars.

But what is the incentive for contractors to participate, and how does it overcome the enormous disincentive of "You are training your replacement"?

My guess is that truly skilled contractors in these trades are not hurting for work. So I doubt they're going to be swayed by just a few more extra jobs added to their docket.

Less skilled contractors who are desperate for work might be taken in, but then the quality of their output is likely to be worse, and the value of that training data is likely to be low.

My guess is that people in skilled trades who are used to working with their hands are going to be even more skeptical than white-collar folks about an AI revolution, and more guarded against change in that direction.

The worst is homogeneously misinformed.