Hacker News Reader

bsimpsonon An update on Wayback Machine access

It's an open secret that you can often circumvent paywalls by searching Wayback.

bsimpsonon CSS-Tricks in Limbo

TIL Chris Coyier sold CSS Tricks in 2022.

bsimpsonon Steam Frame starts at $1059

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesa_(computer_graphics)

Started by not-Valve in 1995

bsimpsonon Steam Frame starts at $1059

Interesting that Alyx is still listed as "Windows only" even though the reviews say it includes a native Linux port:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/546560/HalfLife_Alyx/

bsimpsonon Steam Frame starts at $1059

Doesn't wearing a headset in public have antisocial "Glasshole" vibes?

Honestly, people who cowork in public already give me the ick. Maybe immersing yourself in a headset is just a physical manifestation of the digital immersion that is already plaguing public spaces.

bsimpsonon Steam Frame starts at $1059

I got a Legion Go 3y ago for this reason. Alyx and SteamOS were both draws as a lifelong Mac/Nintendo kid.

bsimpsonon List of references on Sony websites to players "owning" their digital games

Copyright has been broken for decades. Disney famously lobbied to pervert it for a century longer than reasonable. (Hence, the Mickey Mouse Protection Act.) I'm honestly amazed we finally have new entrants to the public domain again.

We absolutely need reform, but it seems difficult (nearly insurmountable) when we have an ineffectual congress and highly effective lobbyists.

bsimpsonon Shopify acquires Tailwind

I often feel like I'm the only person using jsxstyle, which is wild since it was done by Pete Hunt, same guy who spun React out of Instagram.

bsimpsonon iPhone Duo

The aspect ratio is the biggest problem with foldables.

The main reason I'd want a bigger display is for more immersive content like videos, which are typically 16:9. On a Pixel Fold, you have all the added complexity of the fold to make the videos you watch on the train 1cm taller.

The iPhone Duo unfolds to be the same height as the iPhone Pro Max. Sounds like it has the exact same problem - a bunch of added complexity without a practical use for it.

-----

> Touch ID is integrated into the side button

Another major flaw with the foldable form factor - it's hard to distinguish holding the device e.g. to pocket it and holding the device to use it. My foldable does the smartphone equivalent of butt-dialing way more often than any phone I've had before because it likes to unlock itself when I'm putting it in my pocket

bsimpsonon Shopify acquires Tailwind

It's my primary role. I started using jsxstyle a dozen years ago alongside React and really liked the ability to style my components in situ without breaking browser architecture assumptions.

I recently had to help out on a vibe coded project that inherited Tailwind (I think from Figma). It was a short assignment so I didn't dig that deep, but I don't understand the value prop of Tailwind. There was no obvious improvement over what I've been used to; in fact, it seemed a lot messier.

bsimpsonon No Man's Sky Cosmos

My Legion Go came with a free Game Pass trial. I spent 20 minutes playing No Man's Sky in VR and liked it, bought it on Steam, but haven't actually played it yet.

Maybe this is the nudge to move it higher in my queue.

bsimpsonon I-have-ADHD: A skill to stop coding agents from burying the answer

I often use Google Deep Research when I want it to actually go out and find an answer for me, but the prompt must have a high school essay requirement in there. Nothing I can do prevents it from giving me a page of background that tries to make the question sound important and interesting, even when it isn't.

I usually follow up with an "I'm not reading all that" and make it summarize.

bsimpsonon Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

That's assuming there's an alternative.

Yes, the language should be clear and precise.

Also, if the whole industry string-replaces "lease" for "buy," I doubt the effect will be much.

bsimpsonon Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

It's incoherent.

They're also forcing Stage Tour to include discs with their guitar bundles, even though many PS5s can't play discs.

bsimpsonon Sony makes bold claim about game ownership

Then the button becomes License and everyone knows that's the one you click to buy.

As much as I empathize with (and even support) the reasoning, I wonder if it would have a tangible effect. Is there anyone who was gonna click "buy" but not "license" (presuming they relabel the button and everything else is the same)?

bsimpsonon Google avoids a breakup of its ad tech business

> said Attorney General Pamela Bondi.

That must have been in drafts for a while.

bsimpsonon Playa Phone

There's a hot spring under the ocean off the coast of Steep Ravine in Stinson Beach. It emerges for like 6h at a time - twice a month - for low tide.

People who were young and adventurous before there was an internet have been going for decades. They intentionally leave bad reviews on places like Maps and Yelp to try to dissuade new people from crowding it.

bsimpsonon StemDeck, a free, open-source and local AI stem separator

Funny - Stage Tour (a Rock Band revival game) announced this week. There was a big chat in their Discord about AI, and stem separation was one of the use cases that came up.

As a side, it's a bummer how many similar names there are. I keep seeing stuff about Stream Deck too. Apparently it's a custom keyboard for videographers, but it gets confused with Valve's Steam Deck gaming hardware when I see it in my feed.

bsimpsonon Trade (and Tariffs)

Economically, it's a problem long-term. Dollars only have value if you can buy things with them. Japan, China, Saudi Arabia - countries we've had trade deficits with - have been buying our business, infrastructure, and real estate.

Not defending tariffs, but there's a reason people care about trade deficits.

bsimpsonon Zohran and the Short Link

Which takes us back to the root of this thread.

His perception when he was running was "popular, well intentioned, and naive" for the reasons you're outlining. Yet what people have been experiencing isn't a mayor trying to try a bunch of bad-sounding ideas; it's a mayor who is visibly trying to make the city more livable.

In an overpriced and dysfunctional city with a history of self-aggrandizing, useless governance; livability is appealing.

The moderate take is "I don't care if he calls himself a socialist as long as he's making the city run better."

bsimpsonon Twitter Viewer – View Twitter Without Account

I've never had an Instagram account, and I'm trying to keep it that way.

bsimpsonon Twitter Viewer – View Twitter Without Account

Are there any Instagram equivalents that don't suck?

People love to virtue signal by linking to Twitter proxies, but Instagram is still a walled garden that all sorts of useful information (event details, restaurant menus, etc.) is locked inside. I occasionally have luck with whatever the top Google results are, but they're all encrusted with dodgy ads.

bsimpsonon Tim Curry has died

Robin Williams broke my perception of a lot of things when he died. I was 27 then, and it's already been a dozen years.

bsimpsonon Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children

It's kind of funny that Facebook tried to launder its brand by renaming itself Meta, and its vile reputation is haunting that brand now too. New name is so abstract is sounds vaguely dystopian.

Not sure that it matters though, because Instagram and WhatsApp are still in everyone's pockets. Even in hippie circles, they're almost mandatory to stay connected.

bsimpsonon Meta reaches $17B settlement over social media harms to children

Have they?

I know a lot of my peers went to college for free with the Millennium Scholarship.

But so many young people vape now that it's becoming cool to smoke analog cigarettes. I barely knew anyone who smoked 10-20y ago. Many people that age now do.

bsimpsonon FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

My mom had T1D onset in her 50s. (It's usually thought of as a children's disease.)

She figured it out because she recognized the symptoms of ketoacidosis. That sent her to the hospital, which has thankfully allowed her to outlive her pancreas.

bsimpsonon The entire city of San Francisco as a video game

I found my own Vespa!

bsimpsonon CIA funding helped keep NeXT afloat in the 80s

According to the article, budgets were cut when the USSR fell.

bsimpsonon California's new tire efficiency rules could save drivers $1B a year

Ridiculous regulations have been California's MO since at least the middle of the last century.

Why in the hell should the government be regulating this?