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RandallBrown

6,838 karma · joined February 8, 2011

My biggest side project right now is Thoughtback, a micro journal that helps you get your thoughts back. www.thoughtback.com
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RandallBrown··on Nashville uses eminent domain to block data center near zoo
> That's the unfortunate thing about the current climate around datacenters

I always get a chuckle when I see people complaining about datacenters on the Internet.

RandallBrown··on Upper stage impacting the moon on 2026 August 5
I kinda think it's more mobile friendly than desktop friendly (although it isn't great on either.)

It's sorta hard to read text that spans the whole screen and at least on mobile, that's not nearly as wide.

RandallBrown··on The lost joy of music piracy
Never had that happen to me (or heard of it happening) and I used iTunes for like 15 years.
RandallBrown··on Steam Machine launches today
When the Xbox 360 came out decades ago, the store I got mine from did this. They had like 10 consoles and there were like 200 people there. They did a raffle for the consoles and I got to buy one. It felt like I won the Xbox even though I still had to pay for it.
RandallBrown··on 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York
It's cruel to have people spend time and energy applying for a job that doesn't actually exist and they have no chance of being hired for, despite their qualifications.
RandallBrown··on 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York
A sensibly written law could close loopholes like the one you described.

I'm not sure an ATS would be required either. Simply having a law that requires a response when inquired about the status of an application after a certain amount of time would suffice.

I was ghosted by a Fortune 500 company after making it to the final round of an interview recently. It took me weeks of sending emails to get them to tell me they didn't want to hire me.

RandallBrown··on Apple's weird anti-nausea dots cured my car sickness
How does it help if you aren't using the phone?
RandallBrown··on Age verification tech could put children at greater risk, says think tank
> once you give a teen a smartphone your control over what websites they visit ends.

Isn't it pretty easy to set up a whitelist of apps/websites kids are allowed to use?

Whether or not that's a healthy thing for your parent/child relationship is a different question.

RandallBrown··on OpenAI Is Preparing to File for an IPO Soon
Isn't SpaceX the only one of those that actually makes money?
RandallBrown··on AI is making me dumb
> Eventually, there will be a lot of bugs, and developers will complain that we need additional human resources

I just hope I can last that long.

RandallBrown··on The Self-Cancelling Subscription
> More often than not, the first thing I do when I sign up for a service is cancel it (after confirming I can use it for the billing period).

That's what I loved about Apple controlling their App Store subscriptions. All subscriptions keep working through the billing period and there isn't really anything an app can do about it. It also gave me an easy centralized place to view and cancel subscriptions.

RandallBrown··on California farmers to destroy 420k peach trees following Del Monte bankruptcy
> "carbs are recognized now as seriously unhealthy" is absolutely untrue

I don't think they meant that the medical community recognizes carbs as unhealthy. I think they meant the general public.

It's not true that carbs are unhealthy, but I think it is true that people recognize them as unhealthy.

RandallBrown··on City Learns Flock Accessed Cameras in Children's Gymnastics Room as a Sales Demo
Robbery may not be the main reason for a camera. Having a video of any incident that happens (broken equipment leading to injury, angry parent, etc.) would be valuable.
RandallBrown··on Alphabet Announces First Quarter 2026 Results
How do you find the place to buy the thing you're looking for?

I just tried asking ChatGPT where to buy a backpack I'm looking for and it just... did a search. It would have been considerably faster to just do the search myself instead of wade through the slop about how "This backpack is hard to find in stock, you'll need to buy it directly from the brand yada yada yada".

RandallBrown··on Localsend: An open-source cross-platform alternative to AirDrop
Sending someone a link to a photo is a much worse experience than sending them the actual photo directly to their phone.

Sending a photo over text message often compresses it, which isn't always desirable. (Not actually sure if it gets compressed when sent of iMessage)

I've also used it to send people photos when we were in places without cell service like on hiking and camping trips.

RandallBrown··on Used La Marzocco machines are coveted by cafe owners and collectors
If you're ever in Seattle you can visit the La Marzocco US headquarters and actually try out their machines.

I actually hate coffee, but I go by their building every day and the machines are very impressive looking.

RandallBrown··on Bodega cats of New York
What about Seattle's trash was crazy? I've lived here for 14 years and never noticed anything weird about it compared to other places I've lived.
RandallBrown··on Lime (bikes) is a data company
That would pay for a very nice e-bike or scooter to use on most of those rides.

But by using a Lime instead you don't have to worry about theft, maintenance, or storage, which could definitely be more valuable to lots of people.

RandallBrown··on Why the global elite gave up on spelling and grammar
I end all of my sentences with periods and I was told that I have a negative attitude at work because of it. Seriously, my manager's advice was to stop ending my sentences with periods.
RandallBrown··on DARPA’s new X-76
Can it hover?
RandallBrown··on Helsinki just went a full year without a single traffic death
Agreed. That's what I put in my original post.
RandallBrown··on Helsinki just went a full year without a single traffic death
You probably don't need to go faster in the city center, but you need to get to the city center somehow.
RandallBrown··on Helsinki just went a full year without a single traffic death
I can't say I'd be excited about 19 mph speed limits enforced by cameras, but I don't doubt it would work.

I'd love for my city to just focus on making other forms of transportation more appealing. More bus lanes, more (properly designed) bike lanes, etc.

RandallBrown··on Helsinki just went a full year without a single traffic death
Seattle lowered the speed limit on a lot of roads, but didn't do much else beyond add a few "No turn on red" signs.

So now you have a road where the speed limit used to be 35, but is large and straight enough to comfortably go 45, with a speed limit of 25. That causes people to go wildly different speeds and (in my opinion) makes it a lot more dangerous.

RandallBrown··on NASA announces overhaul of Artemis program amid safety concerns, delays
I think you're purposefully missing my point.
RandallBrown··on NASA announces overhaul of Artemis program amid safety concerns, delays
So let's say you want to check something like a new fuel nozzle.

SpaceX might design and build the nozzle, then put it in the rocket and launch it. It might work how they intended, or it might not, but they'll find out immediately. They'll make changes, build a new nozzle, launch another rocket, and continue until it works like they want.

NASA will do a lot more testing, simulation, redesigning, etc. until they KNOW that the nozzle will perform perfectly on the first try.

On the surface, NASA's approach sounds cheaper because you aren't wasting rockets. In reality it looks like SpaceX's approach might be better.

RandallBrown··on NASA announces overhaul of Artemis program amid safety concerns, delays
When SpaceX launches a rocket, they think it will work. When NASA launches a rocket they know it will work.

The cost of going from "I think this will work" to "I know this will work" is really expensive. It might be cheaper/faster to fail a few times and fix those problems than it would be to verify everything up front.

RandallBrown··on Tell HN: YC companies scrape GitHub activity, send spam emails to users
If someone took the time to look through my GitHub contributions then pitched me with a job relevant to that work I would absolutely consider them. That's exactly the kind of recruiter I would like to work with.

If it's obviously just a bot scraping emails and sending generic job requests, that's very different.

RandallBrown··on The Hydrogen Truck Problem Isn't the Truck
Doesn't Nio have a few thousand battery swapping stations in China?
RandallBrown··on Why isn't LA repaving streets?
It works correctly in Safari's reader mode
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