Hacker News Reader

Comment by blast | Hacker News Reader

I swear this particular rant style is derived from earlier writers who I've read, probably many times, but don't remember. It feels completely familiar, way more so than someone who started working in 2019 could possibly have invented ex nihilo. They're good it though! And somebody has to keep the traditions going.

View on HN

I get what you mean but I have to disagree about this one being good. Epic rants are fun when there's a cold hard point being made, and the author uses the rant format to make the point irrefutably clear and drive it cruelly home.

Here, if you strip away the guff about how smart the author is and how badly he wants to beat up people who disagree, I have no idea what he's trying to say. The rest reads like "these companies who want to use AI are bad, and instead of using AI they should try not being bad", and such. Ok?

I was trying to be nice but yeah, "i'm smarter" and "i crush your skull" are not witty. There are nice twists of phrase in there though. The kid has potential!

To be honest I'm not 100% sure it was meant to be satire - but if it was then I agree with you :D

In short, get him an editor

Maddox was the originator of this style afaik. He's been at it for over 20 years.

https://maddox.xmission.com/

Reminded me of this too

Hunter S. Thompson.

It feels a little bit like a James Mickens rant, but not as funny (not a jab at the author of this, James Mickens is just really funny).

Definitely reminded me of the classic Mickens usenix login;logout columns! Just overall a very engaging communication style for adding some entertainment value to what might otherwise be pretty dry to read in one sitting.

A little bit of Maddox, a little bit of BOFH.

This is just conversational australian english

It has a kind of seanbaby, somethingawful vibe.

Maybe Wilhelm Reich with his book 'Listen, Little Man!'?

Ed Zitron maybe ? Writes on crypto, AI, musk the same way.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com