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vinay427

3,389 karma · joined October 19, 2014

Website: https://vinayh.com

Email: mail<at symbol><my website domain>

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/vinayh; my proof: https://keybase.io/vinayh/sigs/41-hKsHeI3oMd_Ql4oDBFTDp_27PIpIx1vJnO0J3YLQ ]

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vinay427··on Apple Pass Designer
> Maybe what you want is for the screen to support turning up brightness for just one part?

That’s what their comment is asking for, which is why they mention HDR displays which are already common on Apple products.

vinay427··on Japan moves to tighten rules for foreigners
> But rather than admit that this is a thing which exists, others just want to press tired arguments about race and racism.

It seems like your preceding paragraph argues that this racism exists, without using that specific word.

> How arrogant are we really to think that we can dictate who and what others allow in their homes?

How often do you see that, as opposed to people simply stating how they feel about who/what others allow in their homes? I’ve rarely seen the former and almost always see the latter.

vinay427··on Dutch central bank moves share of gold from U.S., Canada to London
To the extent this is the justification, why is Canada included?
vinay427··on How Thailand Resisted Colonization
> The UK is not a federal system like the USA, and so there is very little that counts as UK law as such.

This seems quite far-fetched. Parliamentary sovereignty alone would be unthinkable in the US model, where US federal legislatures have fairly delimited powers that they cannot arbitrarily change. The Scottish government, for example, essentially exists at the whim of Westminster and (in this iteration) was only created a few decades ago.

vinay427··on Why American ambulance rides are so expensive
Similar story here in Switzerland, with a 0 minute ride (they decided I didn’t need to be transported) that resulted in a bill of about 600-800 CHF.
vinay427··on Organic Maps
> I think they should stick with toponyms, instead of trying to be some sort of political arbiter.

This can mostly work for sub-national names, but doesn’t really address cases such as Taiwan, Cyprus, etc.

vinay427··on Verizon is about to break our Gizmo watches
This isn’t the case for these watches in the UK as well, as they only work on certain partner networks, but I’m unsure whether this is due to the GP claim or something else.
vinay427··on U.S. allows Anthropic to release Mythos AI to ‘trusted’ US organizations
> This is exactly what they’ve been asking for.

This doesn't directly follow from the first part of your comment, and more importantly seems inaccurate with respect to Anthropic's public statements on this situation. For example:

> As we have stated publicly, we believe the government should have the ability to block unsafe deployments, as part of a statutory process that is transparent, fair, clear, and grounded in technical facts. This action does not adhere to those principles.

https://www.anthropic.com/news/fable-mythos-access

vinay427··on Digital euro clears key hurdle as EU seeks to break free from U.S. credit cards
US “bank cards” as in US payment processors such as Visa, not “US bank” cards.
vinay427··on AMD silently removes memory encryption from consumer Ryzen CPUs
I’m not sure what the featured article has to do with Europeans? In any case, not only are the vast majority of people not in Europe but surely Europeans (in any sense of the word) are not the primary groups targeted by a “hitler salute” in the US.
vinay427··on Accenture to acquire Ookla
While neat that a government operates this, I’m not sure it’s a viable alternative for most users given that the servers are AFAIK all in Norway. For example, the latency from my network was 150-200ms (compared to 6ms for the Speedtest.net server) and the speed test results appear less consistent than they may be in/near Norway.
vinay427··on Netherlands blocks US takeover of vital digital supplier
> Argentina's ministry of education did something like this with university software. The one used by students to sign up and by teachers to track grades, etc.

For what it's worth, this seems roughly equivalent to Moodle, which is open-source (GPL) and used globally, apparently especially popular in some of western Europe, the US, etc. [1] School systems can and do of course customise it as needed.

[1] https://stats.moodle.org/

vinay427··on West Coast Cities Turn to Vacancy Taxes to Grapple with Housing Crisis
Given that their reply is on decreasing development fees, it seems that they understood the sarcasm.
vinay427··on Waymo says can't avoid bike lanes because riders want to be dropped off in them
I don’t live there, but for what it’s worth, this seems to be followed fairly consistently in the San Diego area whenever I’ve visited.
vinay427··on Filing the corners off my MacBooks
To add to this, I notice this more frequently in the UK and EU countries than in some other parts of the world (although it varies within each country quite a bit).
vinay427··on 27-year-old Apple iBooks can connect to Wi-Fi and download official updates
This can be a relevant reminder at times, but based on their phrasing, I think they’re aware:

> Personally I prefer […] looks extremely dated to me now.

Compare to the GP comment, for instance, where this may still be the case but is less clear from phrasing:

> They're just so much more pleasant

vinay427··on Amazon One palm authentication discontinued
There were apparently 19 (I had only been to 4-5), but apparently they closed a month ago roughly in line with the closures in the US.
vinay427··on Amazon One palm authentication discontinued
In the US, you also wave your phone over the card reader, it goes "Pling!" and that's your stuff paid for. The GP comment is not about paying (although it can do that too [1]), but rather about providing their Amazon account details for Amazon Prime discounts and other benefits.

A similar process is the case in the UK as well at Amazon Fresh stores, last I checked.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=...

vinay427··on San Remo Pasta Measurer
Some quick Googling says this brand is Australian. This pattern of making Europeans, Australians, and virtually everyone else on the internet “American” when it’s convenient is getting a little old.
vinay427··on VW is bringing physical buttons back to the dashboard with the ID. Polo EV
> The numbers are centigrade, which for the local market is mostly very obvious and widely understood. 22 is roughly room temperature, so it's good that's at 12 o'clock.

I'm aware of centigrade, I've lived in places that use centigrade. :) My issue is that absolute temperature markings don't seem appropriate for a manual climate control system that isn't matching a temperature. Here, the traditional blue/red-style markers or similar are probably more informative.

> You hand can feel the angle the dial is pointing. It was a non-issue for me. the white is illuminated softly at night, and one very quick glance can confirm the position anyway.

Fair, if it's clear with some tactile difference and is visible at night that seems quite alright!

vinay427··on VW is bringing physical buttons back to the dashboard with the ID. Polo EV
This has a few other issues to me compared to many similar dials.

It’s unclear what the temperature numbers actually mean if this isn’t an automatic climate control system (or is in manual mode).

The part that rotates also appears to be symmetric, which means one may need to find the white marking to decipher where the dial is pointing. That can be even more difficult in a dark environment than trying to read a display.

vinay427··on Lawmakers want to ban VPNs
From my reading, the GP comment isn’t claiming otherwise, but just that that sort of VPN ban isn’t enforceable in advance of some of those changes. They do directly suggest they don’t know how long this will remain the case.
vinay427··on Rights groups urge UK PM Starmer to abandon plans for mandatory digital ID
In particular, this is already done using a digital ID for foreign residents (at least on most visas) in the UK, which was phased in over the past few years.
vinay427··on NYC Telecom Raid: What's Up with Those Weird SIM Banks?
> I don't believe the US had that kind of issue or, they did, it was so long ago that nobody remembers.

There is still a similar issue of not knowing whether an area code is for another country in the North American Numbering Plan. It’s fairly common for me to see an unfamiliar number and be unsure whether it’s from the US or Canada, for instance, without additional context.

vinay427··on Japan city drafts ordinance to cap smartphone use at 2 hours per day
I tend to agree, and the vast majority of policies that I've seen (e.g. US states) do in fact target the use of phones, not possession. Schools in the CA bill can continue to implement or exceed those requirements as they see fit.
vinay427··on Japan city drafts ordinance to cap smartphone use at 2 hours per day
I’m not sure what ‘the US’ means here. In California it’s now required (as of next year) for schools to limit or restrict student phone use, and several other states have done similar things as mentioned in the article [1].

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/24/california-s...

vinay427··on Wikipedia loses challenge against Online Safety Act
The GP comment specifically refers to the contemporary connotation, and at least in English there is some consensus around constitutional governments in this modern sense (e.g. Ireland, India, Germany, etc.) as opposed to those that aren’t.
vinay427··on Indian Sign Painting: A typeface designer's take on the craft
> My personal theory is that this is because you can make every sound you hear in English using the Devnagari script, but not the other way around.

This is not very close to true. English (even a given accent) has a rather high number of phonemes, and they don’t overlap very closely with Hindi. What is probably more relevant here is that Devanagari is relatively phonetic so writing in it is useful to describe English pronunciations, more so than the English script is for Hindi (or English, for most unfamiliar words).

A very incomplete list of languages by approximate number of phonemes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of...

vinay427··on iOS 26 Will Let You Add Your U.S. Passport to Wallet for Identity Verification
At least with a physical ID document, you don’t also need to provide your boarding pass at many updated TSA checkpoints.

https://www.afar.com/magazine/no-need-to-show-tsa-your-board...

vinay427··on WhatsApp introduces ads in its app
Message history still can’t be backed up on iOS, and also can’t be moved between Android and iOS in either direction AFAIK. There are far more gaps here than just imperfect users, which is often a UX problem as others have noted.
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