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ljf

7,023 karma · joined July 1, 2010

ljf
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ljf··on The Evolution of Vending Machines
Which then led me to people who do up washing machines/driers that are dumped at the side of the road, and resell them, which led me to a guy that bought a laundrette - I still watch him, he has a car wash too now...
ljf··on The Evolution of Vending Machines
For a while I seemed to end up on a YouTube algorithm that was full of people doing just that - a good few found success, but there seems to be a good chunk of work to do looking after the machines and stock.
ljf··on My weird new hobby: Wandering around Tokyo on Google Maps
I love wondering around streets I know from my own past. Since my father died I love to 'walk past' his house on Google maps, changing the date to a time when he was still live, and look in to the lights on there and know that at that moment, he's alive and in the house, happy and probably reading a paper or a book. Forever. Somehow it feels even more poignant than my own photos of him.
ljf··on Two-tier encryption in the UK
Off topic - but I am not sure that is true in the UK/EU - did it happen elsewhere in the world?:

Before the COVID restrictions, airlines were required to use their allotted spots at least 80% of the time.[6] During the pandemic, the European Commission temporarily suspended Europe's airport slot rule for a short period.[citation needed] Due to travel restrictions, many flights were cancelled or had limited capacity, which made it difficult for airlines to fulfill all the requirements for possessing an airport slot. The suspension of the slot rule was reinstated in October 2021. After the slot rule was reinstated, the rule only required European airlines to use 75% of their flight slots for the winter season.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_flight_%28commercial_avi...

ljf··on Two-tier encryption in the UK
I don't have time to dig up her post - but she was calling on people to set fire to hotels housing asylum seekers - she had around 10,000 followers, and her post was read 300,000 times: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yl7p4l11po
ljf··on KDE Goes to the Pyramids [video]
This is awesome! |Thank you for sharing
ljf··on El Niño projected to cause 450k deaths in next six months
Agree - 10% of the figure is still a lot of people who would have been here, productive and loved and cared for by their families...

I always think of the compound nature of these things - e.g. this happening along side some major wars, potentially a global recession, then what happens if we get another mass virus or similar at the same time. Any one of those things we can cope with (maybe?) but if/when we pile them on top of each other...

ljf··on Disney+: New user agreement allows ads before movies in all subscriptions
When we first got Disney + it was a winner in our house, then kids loved what they could watch, there was good family viewing too, and then was a few good shows that my wife and I were interested.

Lately, it has been right down our list. I think my daughter still watches it on occasion, but nothing of note that I want to watch. If we didn't get it for free with our bank account, I'd cancel it. And with adverts, I'd be cancelling in a heartbeat.

Juggling subscriptions has become really expensive lately - but the only one I value is Netflix, but even then I don't feel I get great value from it, we seem to watch far less TV or films this year.

ljf··on Canada invited to become first 'associate member' of the EU
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49724141 existing discussion
ljf··on Archiving pirate radio station Kool FM
I came from Northern England, and could get 5 or maybe 7 pirate stations on a good day from my room - only 1 or 2 of which would be my sort of music. In 1999 I moved to London, and bought a really really good (1970s) radio receiver, and couldn't believe the number (and quality) of pirate stations - every bit of the spectrum seemed to be covered. I had a mini-disk player, and used to record some of my favourite shows - but years later sold the player and labelled all the disks as 'blank'.

It felt such an exciting time to hear about new tracks, artists and club nights all across London - but then again I was 20 and had the time and money to go out.

ljf··on 4,400-Year-Old Tomb of Egyptian Judge Found at Saqqara with Colors on Walls
Post it as a submission when it goes live - I'll keep a watch on your account for the link ;)
ljf··on Texas judge rules TikTok misled users on child safety feature
From TikTok:

What Is Restricted Mode? Restricted Mode limits videos that may not be right for all viewers. It filters out mature or complex themes. Some features like LIVE videos and the Following feed are hidden while it is active

So I can only assume that it did not filter out these things.

ljf··on Flights cancelled at UK airports due to ATC issue
Because we very rarely use the term here - it might have been coined here but it has only limited traction. Most people will call them quote marks/quotation marks, and realised that they mean the text is a direct quote of something that has been spoken or written.
ljf··on Flights cancelled at UK airports due to ATC issue
In the UK we use quotation marks when we are quoting some verbatim.

Scare quotes are an Americanism that is gaining traction her, but normally we use it for quoting speach.

ljf··on Doomscrolling ourselves to death
That is also true for me on struggling to complete books, but don't forget when books first become cheap there were letters to the newspapers deploring that young people were reading rather than 'living' by talking with friends or going to the theatre.

I remember for a history project at secondary school reading the notes from a parish meeting in the 1600s from my local church, where the elders were complaining about young people meeting in the porch of the church at night to drink and socialise. Which is pretty much what my friends and I were doing at as a teen (though local park over the church).

ljf··on I asked astra to make playable 4D chess
A quick reminder as to just how bad I am at classic chess, but this is really fun and brain bending
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
Interesting that this remains on the front page @dang - this and the other 3 sites the poster submitted (two others yesterday and one 12 days ago) all appear to follow the same AI generated pattern, all newly registered, AI written and with vague 'about us' pages. I'm not sure if Jakob Greenfeld registered/owns them all, or if it is linked to his marketing/sales business - but it is rather fishy.
ljf··on We analysed 90,651 exhibitor listings. Nine in ten companies never exhibit twice
Sorry for the typo - "Jakob Greenfeld" - autocorrect was too agreesive on my phone and I missed that misspelling.
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
The person you need to google is Jakob Greenfeld - who posted this and other AI spam sites to HN - chasing engagement or proving a point? I'm not sure what his end game is, but it doesn't look great (see his post history for other 'fake' research sites, all just registered, with v limited content.
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
We should check out the ownership of this site, plus the others that the poster posted in the last 12 days...
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
Check the posters recent history with show dead on, he's running a a few different AI generated 'research' sites - while they might have some points, they are essentially experiments in blog spam
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
What is Jakob's end game, to chase clout or get a job out or this?

As Jakob says on his own site:

The bar is shockingly low You’re competing against people who barely care and barely try

ljf··on We analysed 90,651 exhibitor listings. Nine in ten companies never exhibit twice
More AI spam research from the same poster... Not a good look for jakobgreenfeld / Jakob Greenfield who I assume owns/runs these sites amongst others?
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
Both by the same poster? Check out his other recent posts...
ljf··on Three sites made 215,128 “best software” pages for AI. Perplexity cites them
Look at the posters recent posts, these are 4 very similar AI sites, all similarly (badly) written by AI. I'm surprised his submissions aren't flagged.
ljf··on 57% of sites that block GPTBot leave ChatGPT-User wide open
More AI research spam? Do you own all these sites you are posting here? What is the end game, to chase clout or get a job out or this?

As Jakob Greenfeld says in his own site:

The bar is shockingly low You’re competing against people who barely care and barely try

ljf··on Hacking IKEA Furniture
I used to spend hours pouring over the https://ikeahackers.net/ site - but never actually hacked much of our furniture (no more than adjusting the height, or changing handles/worktops).

As cheap as Ikea was, being in London in my 20s just as Freecycle started, meant we ended up with a lot 'vintage' furniture for free or next to nothing - some we still have now.

ljf··on Hacking with Claude on a $27 smart watch
As a note, if you click on the 'time ago' to the right of the posters name on a post you like, you can get to the post specific screen where you can favourite comments.
ljf··on The Iran War Is a Whole New Level of Quagmire for the US
To add to this, in the same way that Rome and the Roman Empire in some ways lived on through the Catholic Church, I think the 'church of capitalism' will mean that the American empire lives in far far into the future, and retains some of its power.
ljf··on Thanks to social media, canned sardines are a scarcity on the supermarket shelf
Totally agree!
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