4mitkumar

I believe there is a bit of hype on both sides, with the labs operating from the mindset of "never let a good crisis go waste".

It is a crisis and the risk of A(G)I is real. But almost all this while in the history of automation, we have blamed implementation of automation when things go wrong. Instead of attributing morality, intent and so many other things that we do with LLMs.

Without having to go in to the philosophical validity of these concepts applied to AI, I feel it's much more useful to focus on the implementation of automation here as well - what risks were opened, how was the env hardened, what was the observability like - how was it being observed anyway, and more.

Done poorly, that can be catastrophic enough. But that sounds mundane. And does not help the hype.

This led me on a 1.5 hours long, entertaining chat session with Gemini learning about stuff in Physics - hopefully without much hallucinations. But definitely with a lot of typical - "You have arrived at a great insight.." like egging on by the AI :D

But learned a bunch about bosons, fermions, QCD, gluons, Kugelblitz, composite bosons and finally Noether’s Theorem on symmetry. Was a wild ride

Oooh..reminds me of something similar I did earlier for own blog a few years back: https://github.com/proxygeek/publish/

I have moved away to Jekyll again but there's always something alluring about single file things - single file webapps, single file LLMs (llamafile) and others

Early Saturday morning and what a simple, to-the-point read about irreverence :D Gave me my new maxim - "Fuck about a bit" Created a poster out of it :D https://nextfive.xyz/bits/2026/04/11/fuck-around-a-bit.html

Try this https://www.worldmonitor.app/ for a hosted version of this...from a different dev but very, very close.

Very cool! Although, the concept, the feeds, the design and everything reminds me of https://www.worldmonitor.app/ - also live and deployed btw, if you want to check out the interface.

This is very interesting because I have been thinking vaguely about a somewhat "opposite" effect. In the sense, talking to LLMs kills my enthusiasm for an idea with other people.

Sometimes, I' get excited by an idea, may be even write a bit about it. Then turn to LLMs to explore it a bit more. An hour later, I feel drained. Like I have explored it from so many angles and nuance that it starts to feel tiresome.

And within that span of couple of hours, the idea goes from "Aha! Let's talk to others about it!" to "Meh.."

EDIT: I do agree with this framing from the article though: "Once an idea is written down, it becomes easier to work with..... This is not new. Writing has always done this for me."

Not quite there yet but Yunohost is a fantastic attempt to get closer to this ideal. Install the OS - and the basic self-hostic-use-case apps are all just there to click and install. From Immich to Kodi to Wordpress and what not.

https://yunohost.org/

Probably those SAP, Salesforce ServiceNow folks come somewhat closer?

Like the author says - fleet-tracking system, a bus-ticketing platform or IoT platform share some basically similar requirements. And this is what those SAP types offer - standardised templated versions of workflows.

But slowly, as they get more and more standardised, they start feeling like calcified systems that the end users start hating. Because they are now forced to work as per the templates.

And then the need for customization. And move beyond IKEA-like standardization.

But I see the allure of the idea.

I have been using this one from Futo for quite some time and love it: https://keyboard.futo.org/

They also have a voice input only version if you still would like to keep your typing keyboard: https://voiceinput.futo.org/

I found just now that my telecom operator - Airtel - randomly subscribed me for OTT services and charged me for it. But upon calling them and contesting, they just asked if I want to unsubscribe and then reverted the charges. No threats, pleading, or back-and-forth involved from either side. Mildly surreal.

I wonder that's a new corporate strategy - charge randomly till someone goes through the pain of IVR and spends 15 mins with support. Must generate quite an upside for them if it is indeed a strategy.

15 sec show case of how it works: https://blog.nextfive.in/guide/#15-sec-showcases

Very interesting... with the marginal cost of basic software dev decreasing but distribution costs remaining high, I have been wondering how that changes software consumption (1).

I suppose this is one interesting pattern for that.

_1: (explored a bit here at https://world.hey.com/akumar/software-s-blog-era-2812c56c)_

There's also some more light CBT-inspired stuff: like reminders when you're stuck, off-screen break suggestions (I consider breaks essential to long term momentum), and automatic summaries showing how far you've come when you feel like you've been just stuck in the weeds (I frequently judge myself a bit too harshly till I see the numbers and am sometime pleasantly surprised)

I made this primarily for myself – I'm someone who gets stuck between "I should be productive" and "I literally cannot decide what to do right now." The pattern I noticed: starting anything small breaks the spell, then I can think about actual goals.

The (optional) AI suggestions are deliberately constrained to be actionable (15-60 minutes tasks that ladder up to your goal) rather than generic productivity advice.

Would love to hear if this resonates with anyone else, or if you have thoughts on the approach.

It's fascinating ...didn't think about the Bus Factor at all wrt vibe coding. Feels obvious in retrospect. But I feel there's the other side of software beyond the maintanable, professional-grade software requirements. There are a lot of use cases for basic software to solve that one problem in that one specific way and get it over with. A bit like customized software with little scope and little expectation of long-term support. Vibe-coding excels there.

In a way, I have been thinking about it [1] as the difference between writing a book and a writing a blog post - the production qualities expected in both are wildly different. And that's expected, almost as a feature!

I think as “writing” and distributing new software keeps getting easier - as easy as writing a new blog post - the way we consume software is going to change.

[1]: https://world.hey.com/akumar/software-s-blog-era-2812c56c

Such a fun thread but this is the kind of applications that perk up my attention!

Very cool!

Do not go by the warning message. It does work just fine on Firefox latest. Cool, demo, btw!

Meanwhile, Google Pay has emerged as the king of UPI payments in India, with annualised transaction value worth $110 billion.

Sometimes, so tightly focused US-only news without even recognising it as such amuses me.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/02/12/india-stumped-on-how-to-cu...

Wow... Would this collection be helpful as a free and curated source of coding blocks to train future LLMs on?

This is indeed fascinating - people not being as passionate about desktop clients than mobile clients.

I wonder if it's to do with desktop usage more linked to typing compared to mobile usage pattern framed around clicks /taps...

Never mind; just realised that they are blocking results to the NewPipe.net.

It still shows up when searching for it directly though

For what it's worth, Google results continue to show the F-droid, GitHub and all other links for NewPipe for me. May be, because I'm accessing it from outside USA

Nope :)

That's straight-up District 13 :)

All the more reason not to keep it anymore, right?

Oh.... Verry Interesting!! Hoping someone has the answer here

Not sure about best but MIT 9.13 The Human Brain, Spring 2019 by Nancy Kanwisher Congress to mind. It's a broad introduction to "core perceptual and cognitive abilities of the human mind and asks how they are implemented in the brain. Key themes include the representations, development, and degree of functional specificity of these components of mind and brain."

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUl4u3cNGP60IKRN_pFpt...

> ... can buy any meal at any restaurant I want and I never care about the price. It’s a glorious feeling. I eat whatever I want.

This. Not quite there yet, but still have a decent selection of restaurants where I do not have to look at the right-margin. It is truly a sense of freedom one can only experience in hindsight (not consciously while looking at the menu).

Good for OP.

The existence and origin of societal expectations can be it's own thread. But as long as it's clear that one party does have other responsibilities to cater to, which in turn leads to lower amount of time available to invest in their chosen professions.

And, what could be the potential factors which lead to " lower working hours" for women compared to their male counterparts?