I'll work for 4+ hours straight in my Vision Pro when I'm on a plane or train, but when I'm in a less cramped place I'd rather just use a normal screen
If anything I think the Vision Pro is more discreet on a plane! No big bright screen to annoy or distract other passengers with, plus I can keep my laptop nearly clamshelled on my lap while I work without having to use the tray table
Not the GP, but to me this case feels like extortion.
I have the same problem with paying for extensions like Dark Reader, DeArrow, and any ad blockers. None of these apps should exist in the first place. They were created because the default state of the web is barbaric. And some developers have the gall to charge for the luxury of making the experience tolerable?
But they’re saying it feels like extortion. The problems of the web aren’t the fault of those extension developers, nor can they do anything about it besides trying to mitigate it. It’s in our best interest that they can do so sustainably, meaning charging for it. It’s not gall, they’re fighting it for themselves and making the solution available for all.
That comment places a lot of blame where it doesn’t lie. It’s like calling surgeons extortionists for having the gall to charge for treating you. Yes, ideally that should be free and available to all, and perhaps if those people had the freedom to choose (e.g. having their own needs met so they didn’t have to work) they would do it. But that’s not how the system is setup, and their skills don’t translate to fixing the problem at the root. Not all of us are cut out to be politicians (and as we all know, being well-intentioned as one still doesn’t mean you have the power to enact policy).
The definition of extortion is the coercion of money in "exchange for protection", where the threat to be protected against is typically perpetrated by the coercer. I'm not using the term in the literal sense, as if an antivirus software firm is producing computer viruses. Thus, this case "feels like extortion", not "we are being extorted". (It may as well be advertising firms selling ad blocking software because the net effect to the end user is the same, but I digress.)
FWIW, I don't consider surgeons to be extortionists. That's an absurdity that you are using as illustrative of why I'm wrong to call software developers extortionists when they charge for a privilege that should be a right. There are two issues with the comparison: 1) I did not call software engineers extortionists (but sure, I can see how you drew that conclusion), and 2) people absolutely should have a right to life-saving surgery and should not be denied on the basis of payment.
There is a huge preexisting problem: health care is not a human right [1]. There are other issues with health care that isn't just money. Many life-saving transplant patents are stuck in a wait list, for instance, and many die waiting. I do what I can. I'm a registered organ donor and try not to destroy my liver. I just haven't died yet, and I still need it. But this line of reasoning is off in the weeds, and I won't pursue it further.
Perhaps what it comes down to is that you have a pro-capitalist outlook, and I have They Live sunglasses.
> FWIW, I don't consider surgeons to be extortionists.
Of course, that’s the point of the comparison. If I thought you thought surgeons were extortionists I wouldn’t have used the example because it wouldn’t have served to illustrate the point.
> But this line of reasoning is off in the weeds, and I won't pursue it further.
Indeed, that strayed completely away from the point. This has nothing to do with healthcare.
> Many life-saving transplant patents are stuck in a wait list, for instance, and many die waiting.
I know. I’ve made that point in a sibling comment hours before your post.
> It’s like calling surgeons extortionists for having the gall to charge for treating you. Yes, ideally that should be free and available to all
What do you mean by "should be"? Surgery is free and available to everyone. So why would one accuse surgeons of being extortionists? So I am not sure how the surgeon comparison works. That example supports the parent commenter's point that these extensions should be free.
Of course, there is still the practical question of who will do the work and how they will make a living. We can do what we do for surgeons. Maybe have a nonprofit consortium that people fund, so that it can support the extension developers. Yes, people would be spending money either way, but at least that money would be going toward a larger cause. Just like we pay taxes so the government can fund surgeons, who can then treat people.
I meant “would be”. Not that I think it makes that much difference here.
> Surgery is free and available to everyone.
That’s definitely not true worldwide. I think if you stop for a minute you can come up with at least one country. And even in those where it is free in public hospitals, it’s not uncommon for some to have a waitlist of years to the point you can die before it even happens. Also, did you know there are places where they don’t even have hospitals, let alone surgeons? The world is a big place, lots of disparity.
> So why would one accuse surgeons of being extortionists?
Even given all that, I think if you engage with the argument in good faith and steel man it instead of nitpicking, you’ll understand the point and can come up with your own example to satisfy you. Just pick a job you can’t do and have to pay for someone to fix something which wasn’t your fault or the fault of the other person. I believe you’re a smart person and could surely come up with something with little effort.
> there is still the practical question of who will do the work and how they will make a living.
That’s… The point. Especially for programmers, how many of us would do this shit for free, full time and beyond, for the sole purpose of benefiting others, if we had the opportunity to because we didn’t have to worry about basic needs? A large number. Way less than the number of programmers in the world right now, and that’s a good thing.
> Maybe have a nonprofit consortium that people fund
Fantastic idea. Are you doing it? Can you? Do you know where to start? And if you can’t, is that your fault? Should you be blamed for it? Are you an extortionist? Do you have gall for not doing it?
All fair points. Sorry, I spend a lot of time on regional forums, and I had a brain malfunction and forgot that when I write on HN, I am writing on a worldwide forum. Sorry for the unnecessary nitpicking.
Re non profit, I do donate to a few nonprofits I like, like those working on fediverse and my favorite langs. But I don't know of anything that does this for extensions. I'd have definitely voted with money if something was there. So, yeah, no, I am not doing anything to start a nonprofit for extensions. You have a good point.
> I do donate to a few nonprofits I like, like those working on fediverse and my favorite langs.
You already do more than most, and I commend you for it.
> So, yeah, no, I am not doing anything to start a nonprofit for extensions. You have a good point.
To clarify, the idea here was in no way to put you on the spot. Rather, what I’m saying is that none of us are doing so and that it’s not really fair to blame anyone for it. Most people don’t know how or don’t have the skills or inclination, and that’s understandable.
Hypothetically you take the leading expert of a field and say "they believe in their own field too much - far more than I do as a layman - and therefore surely must have psychosis."
Why should I trust that your assessment is correct? Is it likely to ever be correct in the case of a doctor/mechanical engineer/athlete/economist/whatever? So why do so many people insist that an incredibly intelligent AI researcher has fallen into some obvious trap?
Because we're paying attention? A lot of "smart" people are lost in the AI sauce, grandstanding that they are going to change the very fabric of society. Generally leading experts in other fields are not making the same hyperbolic, self-indulgent, embarrassing statements.
At risk of being "lost in the AI sauce", do you seriously believe that AI isn't actively changing the fabric of society? Almost feels like we're living in totally different realities if that isn't clear-cut
I still put my pants on the same way, eat the same food, talk to my friends and family the same way. I drive to the grocery store, pick out the same food and cook food at the same home. Talk to my kids, take them to activities and watch Bluey.
The only time my reality has changed is when I spend time at a computer or on my phone and even then, its a fraction of the total time. So no, it's not a "totally different reality" for me.
And yet if I open Activity Monitor right now: "Emoji & Symbols" is using 1GB of memory, "Spotlight" using 749MB, "Control Center" using 727MB, despite not having used any of the features recently (and additionally restricting Spotlight to index basically nothing or else it'll drain my battery). Each one of those is larger than any of the Electron apps I always have running (Claude, Cursor, Signal, 1Password).
Yes! Can confirm. I emailed him in March 2020 after my 16-day old MacBook Pro had a logic board failure resulting in endless kernel panics. It was just past the return date so I couldn’t just return it and get a new one, so my local Apple Store had sent it in for repair. Then covid hit and everything shut down, so they couldn’t get it fixed and sent back either.
I had emailed with an explanation of what had occurred, and asked if I could get a refund so that I could just purchase a replacement. Within two hours of sending my email, an assistant from his office called me to arrange sending me a replacement. I was really impressed. I honestly figured I would just have to wait until the repair depot opened again, because I didn’t think I would hear back about my email.
Then a month or so later I got a call from the repair depot asking what address I’d like my repaired laptop sent to, since it was supposed to be sent back to the store for pickup (but stores were closed.) So I guess the right hand knoweth not what the left hand doeth in that case, because the person on the phone from repairs was pretty confused when I said no thanks.
WRT the west coast, mostly. It's about as long as Japan, but only about half the population. It's certainly populated enough that it's not justifiable that rail travel is so slow.
Less so for the east coast though. From roughly DC to Boston is decently connected with rail, but is not nearly as direct of a corridor as Japan.
Cars were already popular in the US and good enough of a solution in conjunction with the highway system, maybe. If basic transportation is solved, it probably reduces the impetus to build passenger rail for rail's sake.
Really? Take it all the time going to NYC even though it's not really very convenient for me to get to a northern station. Amtrak is priced to make it a good idea to book tickets in advance. Shinkansen isn't cheap either, especially if you don't have a pass--not sure of current details.
It's true to some degree now. But it wasn't very true -- or expected to be true -- back when train lines were being established. That was during westward expansion.
I'm very aware! I live in NYC and have taken many trains up/down the corridor. But it still pales in comparison to the experience I get in Japan (which is cheaper, nicer, faster, more frequent, often more direct, connects up better to local transit within cities, etc.)
Ideally, when I create valuable content I am paid and when I consume valuable content I don't pay. Advertising does this but I hate it so I don't want that. So ideally, there is no way to extract value from me but I am able to extract value from others. I think I would support someone who finds a way to enforce this.
But I am also willing to pay for valuable content an exorbitant amount if it is valuable enough. For instance, for absolutely critical information I might pay 0.79€ a month.
But a paywall is a rather useless page, so it shouldn't be shown in search results. Normally, serving Google one page (e.g. a full article) and showing users something else (e.g. a paywall) would be grounds to ban that site forever, but Google built a special exemption for paywalls.
Showing search results that the user can't actually use is user hostile. It's essentially an ad disguised as a search result, with the problem that those ads displace other results that I might actually be able to read.
Of course, if the policy was to not index paywalled content, we might have avoided the paywallization of the Internet. Somehow, decades ago, when the Internet was smaller and there were fewer eyeballs, high quality content could successfully get monetized with non-tracking ads.
Now we have invasive ads that try to profile you, ads that are full of scams because quality control has gone out the window, and yet, somehow, everything needs to be behind a paywall...
You are paying the smartest people in the world to think really really hard, and turns out they might also think really really hard about not making the world a worse place
Is this really the case though? How many smartest people do you really think are there that fit this narrative?! I want to believe there are at least some but I think they are minority in this group… otherwise I think all these pretty much evil corporations would have a awfully difficult time attracting talent? maybe some do but…
Most companies are evil in some way, the question is how evil and how close you are to the evil. Most people will pick "not that evil but pays a lot". A few will take "pretty evil and pays more than a lot". Some will choose "less evil and pays poorly". (It's worth noting that there are a lot of jobs that are not at the Pareto frontier and are "more evil and pay worse" but social mobility etc. cause them to be selected anyway).
Except they do? They are certainly not making it better place. Like, ok, it is money for few companies and salary, it is business and probably fun work.
But it is absurd to claim it is "making the world better place".
I'm not sure you can provide an objective (i.e way to show that it is absurd) means of explaining how an AI researcher is making the world a worse place. It's going to come down to disagreeing about some axiom like "is ASI rapidly approaching" or "Is AGI good to have" and there's no right answer to those.
I'm curious - what were you doing that polars was leaving a 40-80x speedup on the table? I've been happy with it's speed when held correctly, but it's certainly easy to hold it incorrectly and kill your perf if you're not careful
KDB v1 is from sometime in the late 1990’s (I met v2 in 2002; but v1 was internal use only at some investment bank).
But that follows A and A+ which were extremely column oriented and date to early 1990s or even late 1980s ; and to various APL implementations going back to the 1960’s
Columnar DBs were very much a thing among APL users (finance and operations research) but weren’t really known outside those fields - and even in those fields, there was a period of amnesia in the late ‘90s/early 2000’s
Might be tangential but in my recent experience polars kept crashing the python server with OOM errors whenever I tried to stream data from and into large parquet files with some basic grouping and aggregation.
Claude suggested to just use DuckDB instead and indeed, it made short work of it.
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