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e_l

15 karma · joined June 19, 2026

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e_l··on US voters roundly reject data centers in ballot measures
Data centres causes noise pollution which has health impacts. Similarly, a shipping terminal, will generate particulate pollution (until they move to EV and/or trains), noise pollution and perhaps light pollution (if it's a 24/7 port).

But as you've (rightfully) indicated, not all pollution is offensive to all. You might even be able to benefit from that, I imagine housing near industrial areas might be cheaper. And we do need mines; sewage system; leather; satellites...and even data centres.

By no means am I suggesting that polluting industries should be completely banned. I believe there's a middle ground between carte blanche and a complete ban. The backlash against data centres isn't just because they are data centres. It's because they are often located in residential areas and are taking advantage of previous investments by the residents in power/water infrastructure. If they located data centres in industrial (or commercial) zones and invested to upgrade the power/water infrastructure, there'd be significantly less backlash.

Lastly, my reply was primarily directly at parineum's comment which contemptuously rejected people's legitimate concerns as if they lost all rights to democratically lobby for sensible regulation simply because something has a legitimate use in society.

e_l··on US voters roundly reject data centers in ballot measures
By the same logic, you obviously won't mind if there are open-cut-mines; a sewage plant; a tannery; a telecommunications rocket launch facility and a container shipping terminal next to your backyard.
e_l··on The last time my family was replaced by technology
This is a great video, thank you.

As an aside, because of this Technology Connections video, particularly from: https://youtu.be/0KoeY54M5VA?t=746

I now better understand the voir dire scene from My Cousin Vinny: https://youtu.be/1QrTzTe90QA?t=200

I had always loved that scene (as well as https://youtu.be/CFdJza0AbeA ), but I now love it a little bit more. :-)

e_l··on Upgrade your desktop: Ubuntu 26.04.1 LTS is now available
Like most things, I imagine there are multiple audiences for Ubuntu. But for me:

- Inertia, I've used it for a long time.

- It's based on Debian. I like Debian and use it on servers.

- I chose it originally because it had better desktop support than Debian. It's possible that Debian is now also good, but see above...inertia.

- It (mostly) just works on a wide range of hardware, whilst remaining up-to-date with the latest Linux developments.

- I like the release cycles. Debian stable is too stable. Arch/Fedora/Debian-testing are too volatile. Ubuntu allows me to choose whether to follow the 9-month support window of a normal release; or the 5-year window of the LTS.

Everything above is highly subjective and by no means are other preferences invalid. All Linux distros are awesome in their own unique way.

e_l··on Replacing the old battery on rechargeable bike lights
Reminder please, "Be kind. Don't be snarky" (source: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html )

She shared her motivation, which was a simple project to get into electronics to sate her curiosity. And as she concluded, had fun and learnt something new. And as a cherry on top, reduced the amount of waste that went to a landfill, bravo.

Something for all of us to aspire by.

e_l··on Black Holes or Black Hole Stars? Astronomers Spar over 'Little Red Dots'
Yeah, Physics (and particularly astronomy/cosmology) often have huge variances, some of which are even greater.

An example being the number of stars in the (observable) universe which ranges from 10^22 to 10^24 stars...a variance of 100x (or ~10,000%)!!! https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/How_ma...

e_l··on BYD looking to build 5-minute EV charging network in Canada
Well, depends on how cheap are people expecting?

https://www.byd.international/pricing provides an international (non-BYD affiliated) perspective.

Of course, you can't expect prices as cheap as China. There are shipping costs, local regulation compliance overheads and increased labour costs (for dealers, sales/marketing, servicing etc).

But as an example, Australia is a highly developed country with high labour costs/standards -- similar to Canada in many ways (though closer to China geographically). But without a local car industry to protect, there are no tariffs nor quotas on Chinese cars.

Recently, fierce competition between rival (Chinese) brands (BYD, MG, Geely) has resulted in the BYD Atto 1 EV becoming Australia's cheapest car at A$19,990 or US$14,279 (see: https://www.drive.com.au/news/2026-byd-atto-1-becomes-austra... ).

I expect Canada in the short-term to have prices similar to Europe/UK. With car manufacturers focusing on the premium models (which are the highest priced and hence greatest profit). But there's no reason they can't drop further as trade barriers are lifted and manufacturers are subjected to greater competition.

e_l··on Do you think it happened? Research stolen from their Codex private chats
Alternatively, they might train in a different manner than what you expect.

They might have determined that your canaries (whether it is a unique string, URL or similar) have a low signal-to-noise ratio and not worth following up.

Unless you provide more details, it's difficult to ascertain whether your conclusion is correct.

e_l··on Major breakthrough made on Navier-Stokes Problem
Any break-through (even a partial solution) of Navier-Stokes would be a huge advancement.

A famous (possibly apocryphal) quote by Werner Heisenberg goes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbulence#:~:text=Werner,firs...

> When I meet God, I am going to ask him two questions: Why relativity? And why turbulence? I really believe he will have an answer for the first.

Meanwhile, further links that refers to the same breakthrough:

- https://mastodon.social/@tristanbuckmaster/11723341370570119...

- https://mathstodon.xyz/@tao/117233528517340774

- https://analyticsindiamag.com/ai-news/mathematician-alleges-...

e_l··on .name Termination
Because only one lucky person can own `fraser.name` at any one time in your model. And whilst that lucky person might be able to register their family members for free. There will be countless more (unrelated) Frasers who won't be able to register (even for money) their own `FIRST.fraser.name`.

So the argument goes, society as a whole gains more if we prevent anyone from owning `fraser.name`.

A legitimate alternative though, is to register `FIRST-fraser.name`

e_l··on C2PA Cameras Do Not Survive Contact with Reality
I fear that the long-term result might be a small cartel of "trusted" companies that holds the private keys which can attest and lead to the death (or at least limiting widespread adopting) of open-source operating systems.

It won't stop fraud by governments and/or determined/well-resourced attackers, but it'll make it difficult enough for 99.99% of the public. And as usage drops over time, it becomes more socially acceptable to justify further limitations.

Governments and corporations (e.g. banks) will require that you use a "trusted" (meaning locked-down) devices to interact with their services. We're already seeing some companies block GrapheneOS/LineageOS.

e_l··on Our position on open-weights models
> what should be done about open weight bioweapon and cyber-offense capabilities? Is it simply the cost of freedom that we should allow attackers to access these tools?

In short, yes, it's the price of freedom. As others have said, blocking these models won't stop the "bad guys", but will hinder defenders researching/responding to bioweapons and cyber-offenses.

But you're right that there's a lot of difficult nuance aand we should think carefully about its implications. So here's another nuance to think through.

If AI is as powerful as some believe, then there's much greater danger to give a small subset of society the privilege to gate keep who has access to these tools.

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Lord Acton