HNHacker News
TopNewBestAskShowJobs

slovette

607 karma · joined June 29, 2012

Me@colterlovette.com
submissionscomments
slovette··on Ask HN: Home monitoring solution without subscription
Ubiquiti has all of this as part of their Protect product line. No subscriptions.

They were/are the answer for me once i didn’t enjoy having to play troubleshooter anymore on the less polished type setups like Home assistant.

slovette··on Ask HN: Custom domain for personal email – yay or nay?
No
slovette··on Amazon made record breaking profit but still laid off more than 18000 employees (2023)
I came into the comments to say this as well.

Why are these two completely different metrics being put into the same title as if they correlate in some rational way?

The answer is they don’t, but it incites irrational reactions. Which, in my mind, is what Reddit is for; not HN.

slovette··on A love letter to bicycle maintenance and repair
This is how marriages end in divorce. Haha.
slovette··on My sixth year as a bootstrapped founder
I run an IT firm. Pretty sure you’ve solved a huge problem with remote hardware diagnostics for us. Ordered one for test.

Thanks for making this.

slovette··on Ask HN: Why is Google search unusable lately?
This. The problem with YouTube is often enough, I’m looking for something specific that takes 10 secs to convey. I don’t want to watch a 10 min video to get the 10 secs I need.

Maybe LLM’s auto transcribing and pinning timelines to them (like loom does) is the solve.

slovette··on Launch HN: AgentHub (YC W24) – A no-code automation platform
So, is this basically N8N with an OpenAI module?
slovette··on Tesla Cybertruck needs separate battery pack in the bed to get promised range
I don’t know a single person that bought a Tesla solely because they thought they’d be income generating “robotaxis”. Not a single one.
slovette··on TV: Now What?
While perhaps a nominal iteration of improvement, cable was this way too. You didn’t have to have the $100 /month service package. There was always the $30 /mo basic cable (no guide box).

The industry simply recycling its business model in new delivery methods is a valid complaint/perception.

slovette··on Why banks are suddenly closing down customer accounts
Ehm. No.

Innocent until proven guilty, not guilt until proven innocent.

Being de-platformed from financial infrastructure is tantamount to being economically jailed and instantly forced into life altering poverty. This isn’t some silly app you’re getting banned from…

Banks shouldn’t be allowed to ban anyone. They should need a court order to lock up/ban someone from access/mobility of their own property.

That said, this is likely a narrow lens statement. The problem is more complex around governments/judicial systems incentivizing banks to behave like governments. In reality, our regulatory agencies need to do their jobs: regulate/enforce and be held accountable when they don’t (instead of passing that enforcement on to banks through threat of liability).

slovette··on Never pay for online dating (2010)
Match rates where true for me as well in comparison to other apps. However, what I found interesting is that I’d routinely run out of matches on my last month of being “premium”. As soon as the paid gig was up, all of a sudden, profiles of potential matches in my area that I had never seen prior are numerous. BUT.. to like or match, I have to resubscribe… hmm…

Another obvious manipulation by Hinge (and the other apps) is I’m almost 100% positive they artificially limit who they show you by stacking the deck with a bunch of profiles of women they know haven’t logged into the service in awhile. Basically priming the pump with “possibility” to keep you engaged; diluting the active profiles and spreading any likely match possibilities out over time.

It’s things like these two realizations that made me decide these apps are not in existence to help you find a match. They’re incentive is the same as Facebook, engagement. You matching means you no longer using the app and that’s bad for business.

slovette··on How we end up with different intuitions about problems
Yeah, I honestly think this is an overly complex analysis that’s genuinely simple in reality:

You get out what you put in.

We spend attention bandwidth to those we relate to. Those that don’t, we naturally let those text messages go unattended. We don’t think about it, we just naturally decline to foster any meaningful connection or development of one to those we don’t relate with.

It’s not all that smart sounding list of reasons, it’s simply subconscious behaviors that have created this reality.

slovette··on Peter Thiel to step down from Meta’s board
I don’t understand how this rating is calculated? The fide profile doesn’t have any recorded matches or statistics on him, just the rank number that I can see.
slovette··on Adobe tricks users into a 12 month contract
Privacy.com
slovette··on Ask HN: What would be possible on an iPhone with M1 Max?
I think there’s a future where phones are all-in-one devices. When in my pocket, it’s a screen-first mobile device. When plugged into a dock, it’s a full-blown MacOS machine. I could then have “profiles” for personal and work environments.

I think these devices are going to become more tied 1:1 to our individual identities. Where my phone is a digital extension of my self. Acting as my wallet, gov ID, work ID, stores any info about me (or the private keys to get at the data in the cloud). Etc.

It’s really already to that point, it’s just not fully baked the way I describe above. But I think it’s highly likely to be exactly this eventually.

As a person in IT, I see an obvious change where hardware is still separated for people from person and work. people say they don’t want work on their personal devices, but then they’re the first to break that rule. Convenience is key.

So I think the solve is the same we’ve done elsewhere: 1 hardware device, multiple virtual spaces on top, all tied to the me that is the ID.

slovette··on Ask HN: Looking for clipboard app that saves all clips forever and has search
I use ‘Paste’ on my Mac and I LOVE it. Search, easy hot key to a reference window, unlimited history that syncs to iCloud, paste as plain text and I can exclude certain things like my password manager.

$15 /year

slovette··on Show HN: NotOnlyFans – Self-hosted OnlyFans with cryptocurrency payment
Isn’t the real value of things like OnlyFans the marketplace and discovery for consumers? If you remove that component, then it’s just a personal content blog with a paywall, which is not exciting at all.

I don’t intend to be rude, I’m just genuinely curious to the motivation in creating stuff like this when it completely misses the value of the product it mimics.

slovette··on Show HN: Alias – Google Alerts for your favorite people
I have a question:

How do these way early startups put together such animated, great looking website / landing pages?

Are one of you founders just brilliant front end designers? Is there some kind of easy/cheap service I’m missing out there? Did you just spend some crazy money on getting the page custom done for you?

This isn’t just some theme that was altered for you. The graphics, animations and layout are all matching to your message in a customized way in both copy and content.

What did you do?

slovette··on Ask HN: Has there been a WFH preference poll at HN?
I’d like to see one too. But, my suspicion would be most have realized a hybrid work environment is best (at least those in leadership positions).

You simply can’t get rid of certain types of productivity that only come from face:face interactions.

Personally, I like the 16 hrs (in-office) x 24 hrs (remote) default weekly schedule for my teams.

slovette··on How do startups manage laptops/mobile phones for their remote employees?
As a person that’s been in development, devops, secops, network engineering and now co-runs a software backed IT service startup focused on SMB’s, this doesn’t actually work well IRL in my opinion.

Hosted desktops require a consistent, reliable data connection. Which means any time mobility (car, plane, train, etc) is on the agenda or if an employee needs to work from an area without 100Mbps or better broadband (rural), work or access to work is complicated at best. Further, accessing that hosted environment still requires some kind of user hardware anyway.

Dedicated hardware per employee is still the best route in my opinion. At least then, if data connectivity is nowhere to be found, they can still get stuff done.

slovette··on Ask HN: What are some things you learnt from a game that changed your life?
I mean, the only downfall to this is that the fundamental resources you speak of “shelter, water, food...” in a game are infinite duplications of the same model with no “cost”.

In the real world, that stuff isn’t an unlimited, instantaneous resource. Someone has to build that shelter, farm that food, etc.

In order for this to work, we would need to find free labor... that hasn’t worked so well historically. And sure, you could say technology could fill these labor needs to fundamentally reduce the cost of basic resources to zero, but I don’t think that’s really possible either in practice (the robot maker needs some incentive to make the robots that are providing these free services).

Further, you start replacing fundamental tasks with technology and you begin to remove the opportunity for tasks to better your life (like in the game) because technology isn’t just niche applicable generally.

IMO: It works if you ignore the premise that the game represents a complicated issue in the most simplistic way. But as soon as you put some economics to it, it breaks down super fast.

slovette··on Ask HN: Are VPCs the Same as Subnets?
It's highly possible, they don't offer individual private networking.
slovette··on Ask HN: How to make computer elderly proof
Apple is perfectly suited for this with the iPad. But if you’ve ever set an iPad up for a toddler.... you’ll know the nightmare of Apple ID, numerous repetitive authentication issues and their terrible “screentime” UI/functions.

It has completely fudged any hope I have in them doing it with any sort of ease.

What you need, is a device that does literally nothing else but a video call over WiFi. May take some hacking, but may be possible with some effort.

slovette··on Ask HN: Are VPCs the Same as Subnets?
This observation is probably correct.

A “subnet” is simply a predefined and dedicated space of IP addresses given on any type of network (most likely public or at least not-private).

What you probably want is a Private Network (or Private Cloud).

The “cloud” industry has really run rampant with standard networking terminology being used in Marketing and UI labels in ways unaligned to standard definitions, so double check.

But if they have a separate product for VPC/VPN, then the above is most likely true for them.

slovette··on Amazon's Sidewalk Network Is Turned on by Default. Here's How to Turn It Off
Mine was there just now. The Amazon Apps are awful on IOS, I often have to wait a few for a page in the app to fully load with all the options/settings.
slovette··on Tesla Autopilot system was on during fatal California crash, more safety concern
So % of sold cars that end up in fatal crashes:

Tesla: 0.0322% (or 1 in about 3100 cars sold)

Ford: 0.8836% (or 1 in about 114 cars sold)

Its late for me, so check my math, but I think it’s right.

slovette··on What causes me to quit my business attempts?
I’m going to guess that you are young (<30)?

If so, my only advice is just keep doing what you’re doing. Start, get bored, start something else, get bored. Do it over and over again. Don’t stop.

Keep going until you find yourself into something that you don’t WANT to let go.

Life has a way of guiding you on its own. Just keep going until you find it.

There’s nothing wrong with you. You just haven’t found “it” yet. Which is just fine.

Keep going.

slovette··on Ask HN: What’s the Next Big Thing?
Energy. Storage is the topic of the day, but I personally think nuclear science is the tip of an iceberg we are completely blind of today. But when we start turning on the light in that corner, it’s going to rocket technological progress in very short order in ways we only ever dreamed. I’m very sure we’ll soon look back on our understanding and use of energy today like we do with horseback as a primary means of transportation now.

BioScience. So, so, so many things out there we ALREADY know/have/are capable of, but are held back from exploding us forward due to religiously founded governance. Younger generations are less tied to the latter, allowing the former to actually progress.

Both of these will happen faster than we think.

slovette··on Beyond Meat’s Beyond Burger life cycle assessment (2018)
Yes. It’s the cycle of life. Biologically, I am a carnivorous animal, so are you. We simply possess the faculties to choose not to be in a reasonable way, but it doesn’t stop the fact that nature/universe/god/whatever made you to eat the life out of other animals.

Doesn’t bother me either.

Side note: This is beyond the convo of the merit in how we do this today. Whole different convo.

slovette··on Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever
Haha. Could you imagine the horror of a USED DIAMOND!

It reminds me of the scene in Lord of War about the atrocity of a “used gun”.

Page 1 of 6Next →