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rralian

373 karma · joined February 10, 2011

Full-stack web developer and entrepreneur.
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rralian··on Cloudflare to introduce pay-per-crawl for AI bots
My gut reactions…

- I agree that something like this is necessary or the whole model of the internet will be broken, like Matthew Prince [explained in this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5C9EL3C82Y).

- Their approach seems very imperfect, but I understand that you have to start somewhere.

- They are paying per crawl… but in fairness it should really be per usage. It’s like paying music artists once when they upload to Spotify rather than per-play -- even though one artist gets zero plays and another gets ten million. Sure, the idea is crawlers will bid more for the popular content author, but what if a nobody author has a one-hit-wonder piece of content. They’ll still just get a couple bips per crawl and then the cat is out of the bag.

- One solution to this would be requiring a GDPR-style forget mechanism, where the author is granting a limited-duration license for the content (say… one week), after which it must be deleted and re-licensed. This would be a huge fix for the whole thing… and the more I think about it the more I think it’s essential for this to work.

- The auction mechanics are biased to the crawler… if there is a spread between artist price and crawler max price, then the crawler pays the lower price set by the artist. It should be the average.

- They will need to provide content authors with analytics about the pricing mechanics for the bids the crawlers are making.

- If this whole thing works, then products that optimize bid mechanics on behalf of authors will be a big growth industry.

- If Cloudflare are setting themselves up as the clearing mechanism for payments, that’s far too much power and profit for one company. It’s even worse than the Google monopoly. Somehow the payment mechanics need to be democratized.

rralian··on I'd rather read the prompt
I’ve used ChatGPT as an editor and had very good results. I’ll write the whole thing myself and then feed it into ChatGPT for editing. And then review its output to manually decide which pieces I want to incorporate. The thoughts are my own, but sometimes ChatGPT is capable of finding more succinct ways of making the points.
rralian··on Always go to the funeral (2005)
> In my humdrum life, the daily battle hasn't been good versus evil. It's hardly so epic. Most days, my real battle is doing good versus doing nothing.

Wow. This part really resonated with me. I will try to keep this in mind.

rralian··on Touchscreens are out, and tactile controls are back
Interesting. I’ve noticed this happening for me but I thought it was because my fingertips are calloused from playing guitar. But I’m also in my late forties. So it’s probably a double whammy for me.
rralian··on Show HN: I built the most over-engineered Deal With It emoji generator
Nice work klimeryk!
rralian··on Why World War WordPress Will End with a Zombie Fork
WordPress doesn't have employees. It's open source software. Do you mean Automattic (i.e., wordpress.com) employees or WP Engine employees? Or just anyone who is employed and working on WordPress?
rralian··on Some Automattic employees accept severance package offer
I think this is correct. Some people were misaligned, but the majority seemed to be taking advantage of a generous severance for different personal reasons. And anyone on a pip would have a hard time turning it down.
rralian··on Confessions of a Theoretical Physicist
Not sure why this is getting downvoted. The idea that the act of observation impacts an experiment (or how particles behave) is one of the most counterintuitive and surprising “truths” I’ve ever heard. I would love to hear a logical explanation of why (not just a description of it).
rralian··on Neural Network Diffusion
New generations build onto the scientific knowledge of previous generations. It may not be fast but that sounds like recursive improvement to me. It seems reasonable for AI to accelerate this process.
rralian··on "A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer" Simulated by GPT-4
I personally loved the ending to the three body problem series. It felt really satisfying to me.
rralian··on Ancient fires drove large mammals extinct, study suggests
I don’t understand your point. It seems to be that Western media is somehow biased, but I’m not sure in what way. I’m pretty confident that global temperatures will continue to rise and that sea levels will rise and cause massive problems for coastal populations over my lifetime. But I’m mostly consuming Western media. Do you disagree with these points? And what non-Western media do you feel is more correct?
rralian··on Reddit Threatens to Remove Moderators from Subreddits Continuing Blackouts
I agree with you. And in fact I have mostly removed myself from social media. But I can’t help pointing out the irony of sharing this sentiment in what is essentially a form of social media. Doesn’t dilute your point. Just made me smile a little.
rralian··on Improper Nouns
There is an elaborate joke here that I find hilarious. I am in awe of the author.
rralian··on Tumblr's Internet Legacy
I'm sorry to hear that. Maybe I can help. Will email you to get details.
rralian··on President Daniels responds to Chinese student's harassment
It’s like saying “I’m from Austin, not Texas.”
rralian··on Energy, and How to Get It
I had an epiphany about personal energy a while ago that came from self-reflection, reading philosophy (stoicism in particular), and exploring mindfulness. And it's formed a big part of my personal philosophy. I will share in hopes it is useful to others.

I realized that I was waiting to have energy before doing something. Blaming my lack of action on a lack of energy.

But energy -- of the vim and vigor variety -- is not a tank that you must fill before you can use it. It's a choice. It is in fact _created by action_. It's getting up and making things happen even when your tank is empty.

And this doesn't happen by shaming yourself or hating yourself for not being that person. It happens by choosing to be that person. It happens by making that part of your identity.

So no, there is no magic pill. No external thing that will turn you into that energizer bunny type who seems unstoppable. Other than the realization that you choose who you are every moment. So why wouldn't you be the best version of yourself that you can be?

Yes, of course, exercise, eat healthy, drink in moderation, get enough sleep, and manage your stress. All of those help. In fact they're all part of the same choice of who you want to be.

You are not your situation, your possessions, your achievements, or your past. You are your choices and your actions in the present. Think about the kind of person you admire -- their qualities and their actions. Then _be that person_. Choose to make that a core part of your identity. Not your past choices or your past actions, but who you are _right now_.

Realizing this and making that choice may be one of the most energizing moments of your life. It's free and available to everyone. No prescription required.

rralian··on Strategies to Reduce Brain Fog and Improve Clear Thinking
It’s all in the wording. I think the point is to avoid momentum and autopilot. But challenging yourself and learning new things doesn’t need to mean unwelcome stress or discomfort.
rralian··on Talent Is Largely a Myth
This is a fantastic comment. I agree 100%. The smartest things I have achieved came from not giving up and not being too lazy to just do the hard work the hard way when I couldn’t find a shortcut.
rralian··on Spike in Autism May Be Linked to Preservative in Processed Foods, Study Suggests
Even if this isn't rock-solid I'd rather see a backlash against processed foods than against vaccines.
rralian··on Apple is rebuilding Maps from the ground up
Actually what am I thinking. The long tap (press?) makes sense as hover. And basically acts as that now.
rralian··on Apple is rebuilding Maps from the ground up
Interesting. iPhones have the force tap. I assume android has something similar. We could use that as the hover action.
rralian··on Phaser 3.0: HTML5 game framework
FYI, I just tried your game on windows 10 and the "enter" key is not working to start the game. So I can't get past the start menu. No errors or warnings in the console.
rralian··on Why Do We Still Commute?
> I wonder what is a "cushy tech job"

Probably a job that is extremely well paid for knowledge work in technology and where workers are highly sought after so employers provide lots of perks.

rralian··on The U.S. Isn’t Prepared for the Next Recession
I was thinking this the other day actually. That we are generally best served when people extrapolate their interests for the long term. And this is a big part of religion and faith. But they don't always help people value the collective long-term interest.
rralian··on Jeff Bezos Surpasses Bill Gates as World's Richest Person
I think that's a community of ex-retailers.
rralian··on Why Should I Start a Startup?
> In contrast, diverse ecosystems mean that one creatures wastes are another's nutrients

Wow. This is so insightful. When applying this lense to one's failures or struggles or disappointments... this really clicked with me to put it all in perspective. Thank you!

rralian··on Show HN: EatHow – Figure out what to make with the food you already have
Looked pretty cool but I wasn't able to get past the "add ingredients" step in the tutorial. The button didn't work for me. Testing on iPhone.
rralian··on Why Our Super Bowl Ad Failed
I don't think it's American-ness that dictates whether or not you get it, but rather your familiarity with cards against humanity, their product, and their marketing style.
rralian··on Amazon soars to more than 341K employees, adding 110K people in a single year
They're doing some interesting things on the front-end web front. Electrode in particular and some surrounding libraries look pretty cool. https://github.com/walmartlabs/electrode I had the same reaction when I had heard of Walmart Labs. But I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss.
rralian··on Tesla Flips the Switch on the Gigafactory
Maybe the rich will get poorer. I suspect income inequality would decrease however. Median income would increase.
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