Hacker News Reader

vmurthyon More than 12M eye drops recalled contamination could harm vision

From the article :

"The eye drops in the alert were: Rohto Cooling Eye Drops ALL-IN-ONE, Max Strength, Optic Glow, Digi Eye, Dry Aid and Cool Relief "

"It is not clear whether any are contaminated, but the FDA has marked this a Class II recall, meaning there is a temporary, and reversible, risk to the eyes and vision if the products are used"

vmurthyon Una GPS smart watch – Repairable, USB-C charging, developer-friendly

EUR 240 if someone’s pondering the cost-benefit equation ..

https://unawatch.com/products/una-watch

vmurthyon Domain expertise has always been the real moat

>One of the things he told me, and that I also observed, was that the vast majority of financial experts (basically, the people in the accounting department of companies) had an extremely difficult time just telling him what the rules of any particular transaction should be

We have internalized more knowledge than we can explain sounds like the textbook definition of Polanyi's paradox:"Polanyi's paradox, named in honour of the British-Hungarian philosopher Michael Polanyi, is the theory that human knowledge of how the world functions and of our own capability are, to a large extent, beyond our explicit understanding" [0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polanyi%27s_paradox

vmurthyon I built an AI receptionist for a mechanic shop

A bunch of comments around the theme of "Is it worth it for _this_ use case?" misses the point of "Which of these techniques/lessons from the blog can I use for _my_ use case". I found the blog post a good starting point for some agentic stuff I want to do for my use case. Good on you for experimenting and good luck!

vmurthyon I built a demo of what AI chat will look like when it's “free” and ad-supported

Ah the science of influence : the masterpiece on influence is this book [0]. Came my way by a mention in one of Charlie Munger’s speeches. All the things you mention here and more are there in case you want to broaden your understanding

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28815.Influence

vmurthyon Why India's big cities are becoming unliveable

You’ve gone from corruption (which I agree with) to something about dominant religion thinking of truth and morality as subjective ( which is debatable as you have cited nothing - infact seems like it’s your opinion and nothing else) to low trust ( which I agree with). What’s the logical link to cities being unlivable? The article says that mayors and councillors lack powers which is the major problem.

vmurthyon OpenAI needs to raise at least $207B by 2030

> have you seen Amazon's "Rufus"? It's hilariously useless.

I'd argue -- for now. Maybe it's an incentive/urgency thing. At the moment, Amazon isn't seeing ChatGPT do the buying of goods bypassing Amazon's own search. I expect Rufus to drastically improve especially given that Amazon has an AWS offering of LLM(s) [0].

[0]https://aws.amazon.com/ai/generative-ai/

vmurthyon Why Everyone Is Leaving New Zealand [video]

I asked ChatGPT to summarize the video and avoid the ad etc.

"The real reason: opportunity.

NZ’s economy offers few paths beyond agriculture and real estate.

Larger, more diversified Australian cities (Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane) offer broader careers and education options

In Summary

New Zealand’s paradox: a high-quality society built atop a narrow economy. Its openness with Australia, while culturally beneficial, drains the very people it needs to sustain growth. Until it diversifies beyond real estate and agriculture and offers more opportunity to young professionals, the exodus is likely to continue"

vmurthyon Grapevine canes can be converted into plastic-like material that will decompose

The 20 year old me would have been so excited about something like this. The 39-year old (ok 40 next month) is more reserved. It is not that I don't think this will be adapted but more like : What needs to happen (government, civic groups whatever economic forces) for companies to adapt this? It's going to be a slow burn for sure if this needs to work at a global scale but the impetus should begin with incentives, sadly.

vmurthyon iPhone dumbphone

One aspect of no phone is how to deal with payments. Specifically UPI payments in India. These are QR code based payments and it is getting more difficult to pay by cash at many locations.

Right next to that is OTPs from financial institutions.

vmurthyon What brain surgery taught me about the fragile gift of consciousness

What a beautiful, thought provoking article! When I saw the title , I thought it was a book summary of “My stroke of insight” [0]. This book is by a neuro-anatomist who had a rare stroke resulting in the left hemisphere of her brain being incapacitated. That led her to experiences similar to that of the article’s author. Do check out the book and pair it with the article

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/142292.My_Stroke_of_Insi...

vmurthyon Double Bishops: The Silent Killers of Chess

FWIW , the blog post doesn't really show any famous games where double bishops helped someone win or anything like that. It's a small fragment of games where players with double bishops improved their position etc.

vmurthyon Show HN: OverType – A Markdown WYSIWYG editor that's just a textarea

Went down the rabbit hole which is the overtype.dev website (nice work btw!) and found and even nicer rabbit hole - https://hyperclay.com/ Single HTML apps :). Enjoy!

vmurthyon Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is 'Addictive Use,' Not Screen Time Alone

I would also pair this article with "Stolen Focus" ( a book I am currently reading -- fascinating read ) [0] . I am only 10% in and the book is captivating. Read the book to understand the "whys" of this article .

[0]https://www.amazon.com.au/Stolen-Focus-Attention-Think-Deepl...

vmurthyon Real Risk to Youth Mental Health Is 'Addictive Use,' Not Screen Time Alone

https://archive.is/jHp7u

vmurthyon Klarna's AI replaced 700 workers. Now the CEO wants humans back after $40B fall

Human agents + AI empowered . Gives a new definition for Agentic AI , no ? :-P

vmurthyon Baby is healed with first personalized gene-editing treatment

Cue the book "The Code Breaker" [0]. I read it a long time ago and such an incredible book and journey by Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuel Charpentier. Do check it out

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Code_Breaker

vmurthyon Klarna changes its AI tune and again recruits humans for customer service

I've been thinking that they probably are smart enough to know this but see utility in spewing such lies. Because optics implies higher valuation. It's follow the money as usual :(

vmurthyon Buffett to step down following six-decade run atop Berkshire

If you’re talking about Mary Buffett, it is his ex daughter-in-law. How to read financial reports like Warren Buffett is the book (I think)

vmurthyon Careless People

Ugh. I’ve blocked it from my memory. Deplorable. At some point, it’s just power play. Not even lust.

vmurthyon Careless People

From the book, it appears that Sheryl used Meta as a platform for promoting her own image and book rather than do the things that prevented a lot of bad. It’s beyond sad

vmurthyon Careless People

I read the book. It’s a very interesting read. A few things stood out ( no spoilers )

- Casual indifference at exec level to atrocities happening because of FB/ Meta.

- Money/power does make you insensitive

- Tech bro view of the world permeates most decisions that Meta takes.

- Casual sexual harassment for women ( follows from the tech bro worldview I guess )

- US centric world view influencing how execs treat world leaders.

All in all worth a read or two!

vmurthyon Show HN: Rank And File – a platform for employee activism

@ideashower, In principle, I agree . But the overlords won't care or will quash it down. This way, the employee collective wields some power in a legal way and the overlords have to work harder to quash it down

vmurthyon Show HN: Rank And File – a platform for employee activism

@nextts: I think that even having a single share is beneficial in that it enables the platform as a whole from becoming another venting place. Having shares means skin-in-the-game so I wouldn't go down the route of not having shares

vmurthyon Ask HN: What are you working on? (March 2025)

https://rankandfile.me

At the moment, I am validating demand for Rank And File, a platform for employee activism. Think Institutional Investors but instead of suits, it is employees who own a large number of shares in their own company and act as a collective.

R&F aims to provide a private forum for employees to discuss company policies and act as a platform where employees can connect with legal experts and activists who will help them

vmurthyon Mindfulness mediates the association between chronotype and depressive symptoms

From my understanding, mindfulness does not imply no thinking. It is more like not reacting to the thoughts that arise. I am a beginner so don't quote me here, though!

vmurthyon India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

I agree re KPIs and engineering. But, statecraft is people. You’re not dealing with bits :)

vmurthyon India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

A few things that stand out (not that it's that shocking!)

- Narratives matter -- a lot . Second order effects of such subjective rankings are real . Imagine getting a credit downgrade because someone perceives the democracy to be under threat

- "the government had reverse-engineered the ranking, strategically identifying procedural tweaks that directly boosted India’s scores in Delhi and Mumbai—the two cities evaluated by the World Bank" .

I love the whole cynical nature of this. This is statecraft at it's finest ( I render no moral judgements here :) ). This is reminiscent of Machiavelli or Kautilya (Chanakya) [0]

A lot more to digest but will post them as a reply on this thread.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanakya

vmurthyon Ask for no, don't ask for yes (2022)

I like the general idea. I read the book “Start with no” a long time ago and the lessons stuck. The first principle here is that people have an innate need for autonomy and giving them the option to say no gives them peace of mind. Highly recommended.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/689417

vmurthyon The year I didn't survive

I rarely cry when I read (or in general) but the poignancy of this article was too much . I remember how many changes my wife's body went through during our second pregnancy . Juxtapose all the things that Bess went through, it is too cruel to even think of . Have strength Bess <3