apparent

Sure, but when people say something is 5x cheaper or 500% cheaper, what is the math that they are implying? That the expensive thing is 5x / 500% as expensive as the cheap thing?

What does "100x cheaper" mean? Costs are 1 / 100? If so, is there a more appropriate term to use?

There are a couple people I've met on HN, then emailed with, then met IRL.

There are also some people I've known IRL, who then saw my stuff on HN and reconnected with me IRL.

The former is neat, but the latter is even better.

Yeah, like I said, not talking about the boonies. There are plenty of lovely places that are >10km from those two cities, but which are still close enough to services and infrastructure.

Can people live cheaply in the outskirts and work remotely for a foreign company? Or would that still not get you on track to be able to buy in/near Seoul?

I'd think Starlink will help change this. Not for living in the actual dusty Outback (which has its own risks/dangers/inconveniences), but for living in many other places in Australia that are lovely and not too far from desirable areas.

> The Steiners were bombarded with anonymous material including deliveries of live cockroaches and a bloody pig mask. They were threatened online. Much of the material they were sent, including a funeral wreath and a book on surviving the loss of a spouse, suggested imminent death. The security team was on the verge of breaking into the Steiners’ garage to put a tracker on their car when the plot was derailed.

I guess this is why the settlement is so large. These actions are beyond the pale.

Does she use hers for anything else? Do you ever use them with guests, or does the lens/glasses issue prevent that?

So you have two, one for you and one for your wife? What is it like watching a movie next to someone, with both of you wearing headsets?

I would have been much more likely to get one when I was unmarried, but now with a family it greatly reduces my use cases since I don't watch content alone (except when doing the dishes, when I am largely focused on the real world task in front of me).

Can you explain how Apple would make money in the medium-term (let alone long-term) if they used this feature on fully-paid devices?

Also, they have now officially said it won't even be used on leased devices. [1]

1: https://www.theverge.com/tech/972063/apple-upgrade-program-n...

There weren't a lot of details regarding rollout. Does clearing this one hurdle allow them to roll out across the US? I would think that states or local governments might have rules that could prevent this. For example, there are safety concerns, noise concerns, and privacy concerns. And for those thinking about the long run, there are employment concerns, as this will undoubtedly put some people out of work.

> Klarna spokesperson Clare Nordstrom tells The Verge that if customers miss three payments in a row, the company will “terminate the lease agreement and the customer will need to pay the full outstanding balance.”

Considering this is the outcome they landed on, I wonder what negotiations led to the inclusion of this code in iOS27.

I wasn't referring to the purely financial angle. I meant that whatever news is driving this apparent valuation change could have impacts on other companies (like ones that are having to cope with the chip shortages).

> If the contract is no longer in good standing, Apple’s system services can place the iPhone in “Restricted Mode,” which blocks access to most apps until the payment or contract issue is resolved, while keeping a small set of apps available.

I used to listen to and read NPR. Since about 2015 they've been slipping, and at an increasing rate. After submitting several corrections, none of which were heeded, I have stopped taking them seriously. An outlet that does not correct clear-cut falsehoods is peddling a narrative, not reporting news.

So is this good news for the companies that have taken a hit as AI stocks have climbed, and semiconductor shortages have rattled investors?

That gets it backwards. They're not doing this because they want to make devices that are less compelling purchases, but they are aware that their coming pipeline will in general not as be compelling to potential upgraders as in the past. This is largely because the category has matured, and people don't feel the need to upgrade nearly as often as 5-10 years ago.

By getting people to be default-subscribers rather than purchasers who may decide to upgrade, they improve their odds of keeping a larger chunk of their hardware revenue stream.

What do they do to your Mac if you don't make payments?

Interestingly, Apple is apparently going to be able to nerf the devices if the customer misses a series of payments. [1]

Presumably this ability means that Klarna has a lower risk of nonpayment, and is willing to accept a smaller cut of the total price from Apple.

1: https://9to5mac.com/2026/07/21/ios-27-code-suggests-apple-co...

> You know those financially irresponsible people don’t need this program, right? They would have used a credit card to buy it with much worse terms

I thought of this also. The question is whether they will now spend even more on the phone since they won't be paying as much in interest. If so, it's savvy of Apple to suck up that difference instead of letting it go to credit card companies.

Presumably Klarna's share is lower because Apple is rumored to be able to nerf these devices if a series of payments are missed. [1]

1: https://9to5mac.com/2026/07/21/ios-27-code-suggests-apple-co...

> So the goal of the program is the same as every other similar one - they want to turn a one-time device purchase into a perpetual monthly revenue stream, while keeping ownership of the asset at the end.

Yep, which reduces the need to make new devices notably better than old ones, since you'll always have a steady stream of customers coming off their leases.

OK cool, well LMK what the reason would be for Apple to ever do that, and I'll be happy to walk through your thought experiment about how fanboys would love to have their devices nerfed.

What an interesting analogy. What would Apple stand to gain by nerfing phones that customers had already fully paid for? Is the theory that Apple would hold the devices hostage until more payments were made? That would seem to be an unmitigated disaster for the company.

With batterygate, there was a plausible reason for Apple to do what it did, but also self-interest that could have caused it. Here, there is no remotely discernible self-interest that would lead Apple to nuke its reputation by holding fully-paid devices hostage.

I would be more worried about a company doing things that could be done surreptitiously, like spying on users. That could happen for years without the user knowing.

Nerfing a device, OTOH, is very obvious and would create a huge backlash. The safeguards would not be in place solely for the benefit of the user, but also for the benefit of the company.

I remember seeing the original NYT article and thinking of some of the same critiques that this piece raises.

In particular, the NYT authors don't consider that "jobs that can be remote" tend to have different demographics (more highly educated, more female, more dem-leaning) than jobs that cannot be remote. All of these traits correlate with use of counseling, anti-depressants, etc.

So it's entirely possible that the rise in unhappiness among "remotable" workers is an artifact of who is more likely to have those jobs, and the underlying tendencies of those populations.

It seems like this might be what you're looking for then, depending on how the prices shake out.

What's interesting is that it somewhat reduces the pressure on Apple to have compelling new devices, if a large chunk of customers are constantly returning leased devices and getting new ones.

Are you concerned that they are going to do this to purchased devices? That would seem to be a PR disaster if it happened by accident, and a catastrophe if they ever did it on purpose. I assume there would be many safeguards in place to ensure that it cannot happen on purchased devices (though devices purchased on a payment plan could be subject to it).

Notably, Apple seems to be poised to nerf devices after a number of missed payments. [1]

1: https://9to5mac.com/2026/07/21/ios-27-code-suggests-apple-co...

Why does this single headline use two different spellings for the word colo(u)r?

When I saw the title, I thought it was going to be about how it's OK for old techno-phobes to start using AI. What it's really about is how only people with lots of expertise (shortened to "40+ yrs old") should be allowed to use AI.

It's obviously an oversimplification, but it's good to start the conversation so that we might figure out more nuanced guidelines that could make sense for when people should use AI, and for what.