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TL;DR: Looks like a step toward the AlphaSmart of programming

If you don't remember the AlphaSmart[1], it was a line of typewriter-like devices with small LCD displays. They ran on batteries for hours and had limited save space. You could hook them up to a larger computer to save your drafts.

Where's the programming version of that? The recent HN post[2] about running a Mac 128k on a RPI2040[3] got me thinking about that. In theory, you could get real work done on a system like that, although it wouldn't be very good for entertainment.

So, where's the AlphaSmart of low-power computing?

1. "Real" keyboard

2. Low-power display, ideally a larger e-ink one

3. Not connected to the internet

To be clear, I don't mean a TI-83-like[4], TI-92[5], or even the recent NumWorks[6]. Those are meant to be calculators and have inconvenient calculator-like form-factors.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaSmart

[2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40699684

[3]: https://axio.ms/projects/2024/06/16/MicroMac.html

[4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-83_series

[5]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TI-92_series

[6]: https://www.numworks.com/

TL;DR: I think you're right. Ty for maintaining HN!

> are more a statement about the perceiver than about HN itself

I may have some rose tint to my oldest memories of lurking HN. Not only was I younger, but I was also seeing hours-old threads instead of comments arriving in real-time before any sorting or flagging.

In other words, thank you for maintaining the site all these years.

> I think it's a bit reductive to flatten the conversation so much.

Is that because I added a TL;DR line, or my entire post?

> I shouldn't feel ashamed for taking some interest and studying machine learning. I shouldn't feel ashamed for having some degree of cautious optimism - the kind that sees a slightly better world, and not dollar signs. And yet.

I agree with this in general. I didn't mean to criticize having interest in it.

> And the degree of how emotionally charged it is does lead me to think that there's a degree of further discontent

Do you mean the discontent outside the C-suite? If so, yes, I agree with that too. But if we start discussing that, we'll be discussing the larger context of economic policy, what it means to be human, what art is, etc.

> At that point, is it a problem of most of the comment thread, or the way it was written?

Maybe OP's fault for posting it here, then. It's angry cathartic humor, so you're right not everyone will appreciate it.

> This doesn't come across as a good-faith argument.

It was meant to be, but you're also right that it no longer seems to be true:

* the aggressive knee-jerk stuff is getting flagged quickly

* more comments have been posted

> It's very demeaning.

I see your point given the way the thread is evolving. However, the posts I was referring to were implying OP is a schizophrenic[1] or bipolar.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40734705

TL;DR: Yes, and I think that's why some of these comments are so hostile to OP.

> it's impossible to try and make them understand, they just don't care. I can't make them care. It's a clash of cultures, I guess.

That seems to be what OP's cathartic humor is about. It's also (probably) a deliberate provocation since that sub-culture doesn't deal well with this sort of humor.

If that's the case, you can see it working in this thread. Some of the commenters with the clearest C-suite aspirations are reacting with unironic vitriol as if the post is about them personally.

I think most of those comments already got flagged, but some seemed genuine in accusing OP of being a dangerously ill menace to society, e.g. "...Is OP threatening us?"

In a sense, OP is threatening them, but not with literal violence. He's making fun of their aspirations, and he's doing so with some pretty vicious humor.

TL;DR: Do you have a stance on HN's change in culture?

It seems like HN comments are shifting from technical focus toward:

* Early Reddit's low-effort but tame "snark"

* Aggressively moralizing posts dismissing sardonic criticism as dangerous mental illness

I haven't seen much of OP's style lately, especially since n-gate[1] went inactive.

I'm wondering whether that's a bad thing. Although the tone is hostile on the surface, there's usually some aspiration toward competence associated with it.

[1]: http://n-gate.com/

TL;DR: This is intentional hyperbole and satire

1. "ludic" means playful[1].

2. The blog's tagline implies this is satire:

> "Wow, if I was the leader of this person's company I would immediately terminate them." [2]

It seems like most of the comment thread failed to pick up on this.

That's understandable. The post's humor is a style which won't make sense if you're not fluent in both English and online culture.

Even if you understand the style, you also might not like it.

1. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ludic

2. https://ludic.mataroa.blog/

TL;DR: "Solvable" sounds like you're mistaking a social and human issue for a technical challenge

> the code and cost to generate misinformation is essentially free

It's always been pretty low. People also want to believe things which feel good, especially when they're blatantly fake. That's not a technological problem, but a social one.

It's like the quote about people having trouble understanding ideas which threaten their income[1], but the payoff is emotional instead of financial.

[1]: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/21810-it-is-difficult-to-ge...

Hello again, and thank you for checking!

It's been a while since I've worked on anything Creatures-related. Are you still working on getting old things working on more recent platforms?

> I'd love to know about software shipping with DirectMusic soundtracks!

The Creatures series used procedural music for their MNG format[1] starting with Creatures 2, but I don't know if it's backed by DirectMusic. It may be on Windows, but I never did any disassembly to check.

Regardless, thank you for posting something procedural which isn't backed by LLMs!

[1]: https://creatures.wiki/MNG_files

My top 3 questions:

* Is this a one-off toy, or is it part of a larger interest in skeuomorphic[1] design?

* Since your site[2] mentions you first tried to write code seriously at 27, did a prior interest in cars help lead you to programming?

* If not cars, did any interests help or hinder you?

1. https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/skeuomo...

2. https://trizuliak.com

> The problem is for videos that have no transcript.

Whisper or other models can help with that too, but remember to preprocess to cut silence. The dataset tends to include ads in the captions, which results in hallucinated in from silence.

You could also add a transcript-evaluation step which checks whether this actually looks like a step-by-step video, but I'd consider skipping it for cost and efficiency. Trying to be helpful by evaluating whether the video is instructions or not is added complexity where bugs and strange behavior can creep in.

TL;DR: Yes

There are also some fun interactions like telling a model that it's ChatGPT can improve its output quality [1]. Training on output from other models has its own risks, as do techniques like model merges.

[1] https://twitter.com/abacaj/status/1736819789841281372

TL;DR: This post is great and it raises questions about automating phylogeny guesses about game components.

I think I remember seeing a similar post about Chinese bootleg games for non-PC systems. The commonality was comparing pixel data to trace what the bootlegs had taken parts from. That raises a question: can we automate inferring the copying and modification of parts between older games?

In biology, there's a similar technique. Phylogenetic analysis compares sequences to reconstruct evolutionary relationships between samples. From what I understand, it seems possible to do something similar for the pixel data of game assets.

However, there are limits: you have to stay above a certain pixel size for results to have meaning. The lower your resolution, the more each pixel font looks the same. The same seems to be true for sprites representing in-game elements.

> I've had enough negative experiences with Valve Support

That's surprising to me, but your reaction is understandable. GOG's business model also caters exactly to the type of fan and scenario I was talking about in my top-level comment. For example, GOG has Daggerfall, an early TES game from Bethesda [1].

> from GOG or anything-other-than-Valve

How do you organize your games for launch? I've heard of people using Steam as their main UI, but it seems you probably use another option to browse and launch.

[1] https://www.gog.com/en/game/the_elder_scrolls_chapter_ii_dag...

In addition to what jerlam and others said, simple bug fixes can tip nostalgic fans over into purchasing again for a low price.

As to Skyrim, there's a chance that's on Bethesda's side rather than Valve's. I haven't used their publishing tools, but it's possible someone specified the upgrade criteria incorrectly. Even if it's late, you could try reaching out to Valve's support. They might say no, but it's worth trying.

TL;DR: To my understanding, this article makes no sense because Skyrim's re-releases funded Starfield.

> You play it, you have a great time with it (or not), and you move on with your life.

There are series with fans who will play and buy multiple times. Bethesda's own actions prove this: they re-released Skyrim for a decade.

That's not hyperbole. The trademark was registered in 2013 [1]. Bethesda used a decade of Skyrim (2011)[2] re-releases to fund Starfield.

> For context, Elden Ring had less than 5 percent of its peak player base six months after release.

Elden Ring and souls games have an enduring fanbase. I don't know if Bethesda has good will left for that. First Fallout 76 went poorly, then Starfield. Now? Bethesda is Microsoft property.

To me, that reads as a practical way of dealing with what Todd and others probably saw: there's not enough long tail left, and game studios without strong culture seem to fall apart after a while. Bethesda is no exception.

[1] https://www.gamespot.com/articles/zenimax-entering-starfield...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_V:_Skyrim

> Why would you go through the effort to move around?

If a headset can be light enough, it can be a tool for AR documentation overlays. It's like taping a manual up next to the thing you're working on.

For example, engine components. I've seen airline mechanics consulting laptops as they work on engines. I didn't get a close enough look to be sure, but it seemed like it was a combination of manuals and running diagnostics.

> it's that there's no reason to.

Some monitors come with swivel mounts to support both horizontal and vertical modes. It's common enough that I think it's worth exploring.

> except you're adding annoying glass and plastic attached to your face.

This is absolutely true. Getting headsets down toward the same weight range as regular glasses is probably a major hurdle for use outside industrial or piloting applications and into the office.

Grandparent, as in the grandparent post.

TL;DR: Starting with AR overlay monitors + mouse would simplify deliverables to focus on hard technical hurdles could be the focus

IMO, some of what you mentioned is contradictory. That's not a bad thing. For example, virtual monitor and gesture-based headset-only devices might have different use cases. It's like the difference between a an iPhone, iPad, and ARM-based Mac. All might share software and hardware components, but they're each good at very different things.

To my understanding, focusing on the virtual monitors first has a number of benefits:

* Simplify deliverables and OS integration significantly

* Help developers by providing cheaper multi-monitor setups

* Dogfooding

* Get certain technical parts (foveated rendering, etc) right before trying to nail new input methods

TL;DR: The killer app is boring (virtual monitors) and we don't have good enough headsets to do it yet

> There may be some useful 3D visualizations for understanding things

> Moving a mouse is so much faster and easier, even more-so with abstract filter/assistant tools.

Exactly. The only thing I'm hyped for so far is the idea that one day, we'll have virtual monitors. First, we need good enough headsets. The technology has improved since OP's article, but there's more work to do.

Some of it is software. We'd have to do the awful work of implementing backward-compatible virtual monitor and window management. Look at X vs Wayland for an example of how hard it is to get things right.

Despite how hard all of this is, I suspect it's the way forward because:

* it'd be cheaper and more flexible than complex multi-monitor standing desks

* thousands of years after inventing writing, we still rely on writing 2D characters on 2D surfaces for language

* we can inset AR and 3D panels into manual windows the way we already do to reality with physical 3D displays

I think GP's taking the pessimistic view that the VR headset will be forced on the user for cost-cutting reasons. It's a real worry, but I was taking the optimistic view where I can choose where and how I set up my workspace enough to be comfortable.

TL;DR: I agree and favor the "boring" uses, but chose emotional examples since GP sounded disappointed by those

I intentionally chose heroic examples because GP's viewpoint is understandable. Not everyone is as excited by window management and good UI as I am.

OP's article touched on attention management through UI a little bit, but I think that concern isn't given enough attention. Using the most heroic scenarios possible helps drive the point home without getting grim, but I will now. To be blunt, it's a historical fact that bad UI kills people [1][2].

> AR definitely has real industrial uses but 90% of the examples people can think of are not better or are worse than current methods.

I agree completely. My main concern is pinning manuals or reference sheets next to my work, even if paper fallback is still crucial. That's pretty much the use case for multi-monitor anyway.

The surgical example is the same thing: CT scans are used to tell the surgeons where it's ok to cut. However, there's an extra benefit here: reducing the need for a physical 3D print of the skull reduces infection risk. It's one less thing to moved into and out of the OR.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25

2. https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/uss-m...

We already have neck strain with multi-monitor setups and bad office ergonomics. I know it's not likely in the nearest future, but I'm still hopeful we might be less sore if headsets become both light and common enough.

TL;DR: There was no intentional structuring, just Conway's law[1] in action

I think you misunderstood: the organizations where PageRank worked best also put zero thought into it. I think it's more like holdovers from 90s and 2000s management trends emergently created an intranet structure which fit the assumptions underlying PageRank. Even interdepartmental tensions may have helped due to imitating the company behaviors of those eras.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_law

It's about being able to display information anywhere. Many work tasks consist of using reference material to do something else. This isn't limited to the office.

> thats not a Very enticing proposition

Consider the following use cases:

* A surgical team consulting a 3D CT scan as they remove the tumor threatening to kill you or someone you love

* A firefighter who can overlay a building's plans over thick smoke

* A rescue helicopter pilot who can see LIDAR and IR data as needed

All of these are literally life-saving. However, office uses such as replacing multi-monitor desks are far more pleasant to encounter.

TL;DR: People want useful or fun, not "VR"

> If they can't sell VR, I don't think anyone can sell VR

Imagine having as many monitors as you need. Anywhere. Rearrange them whenever and however, even on airplanes! It all weighs under 1 pound (0.45 kg).

How much would you pay? I'd pay at least $600.

> where we'll know what people want to use it for/if it's capable of living in the mainstream

A cheaper, better multi-monitor replacement would be very useful. It might even be fun in some cases, but it's still mostly a productivity tool.

Unfortunately, short-term incentives seem to limit funding to projects with potential for:

1. Platform lock-in (Apple Vision, Oculus)

2. Ecosystem extension (Apple Vision, Valve Index)

> or if it's forever going to live as a niche product

Is having 2+ monitors an obscure niche? An overwhelming number of offices and other workspaces disagree.

TL;DR: They're close enough to make people argue and publish papers about similarities to the human hippocampus

I have a hunch these models are approximating an important subset of what we call reasoning. In dangerously reductive terms, it's a question of how closely and how much of a function's output we can approximate.

There was at least one paper[1] showing similarities between AI models and the hippocampus. That lines up with another part of human neuroscience: at least part of human reasoning appears to take place inside the hippocampus itself [2].

From my neuroscience background, the takeaways seem to be:

* Carmack is right: we're missing some important bridging concepts for AGI.

* Whether current LLMs can reason depends on how you define reasoning

I'm unsure whether finding answers in those areas would be good thing. Instead of alignment issues or misuse, I'm more worried about how quickly people would overreact to it. We might already be seeing that in business.

1. https://arxiv.org/abs/2103.07356

2. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3312239

TL;DR: It seemed to work for organizations which fit the appliance's assumptions

> hyperlink based search ranking method of the day doesn't really work on relatively small data holdings of an individual organization

In my experience, it depends on what you mean by relatively small. Cloud editing and permissions aside, there seemed to be the 3 key factors:

1. Structure: hub-and-spoke sites interlinking crucial documents and pages

2. Culture: interdepartmental and personal rivalries which demand links as credit

3. Size: lots of employees creating and maintaining sites and content

I was too young to understand it then, but all of these help an intranet's content resemble the web of the 90s and 2000s. That's the era Google's algorithm was designed for.

The results weren't always perfect, but they were nearly always better than the alternatives. In-house or pre-existing alternatives tended to be awful, especially not having any search at all.

Keep in mind, all of this was ~10 years ago. My memory isn't perfect and a lot of things have changed since then.

I even made sure some of them did. It was my job at a few, but the relationships and boundaries between these were complicated. For convenience, let's say n_observed roughly equals 4.

TL;DR: I don't understand how adding homomorphic encryption makes a cloud virus scanner for physical pathogens a better idea

> Only authorized researchers should be able to obtain DNA permitting them to assemble pandemic-capable agents.

Imagine this becomes legally mandatory. What happens when they get breached? For example:

* Does it enable denial-of-service attacks by returning false positives hospitals legally can't ignore?

* Does it return false negatives as part of another attack? Example: printing known or novel virii which will be introduced in a specific lab?

* Does the attacker selectively perform these behaviors as part of an action against a specific person or area?

Metadata seems like it would enough to target the physical parts of an attack usefully, even without plaintext.

The best security & privacy approach I've seen in hospitals is keeping critical services on-prem, or at least strictly intranet-only. The latter ends up being forced by physical scale once a medical complex grows large enough to span multiple buildings.

The firmware embedding mentioned on their site seems better than cloud, yet still seems misguided. How will you debug problems, especially if you never have access to the plaintext? Formal methods and verified programs? Provably equivalent encrypted and plain operations?