All Topics

Comments debate the extent to which laws from one country (especially the US) apply to websites, servers, and users located in other jurisdictions, including enforcement mechanisms like geoblocking, extradition, and ISP blocks.

Comments analyze why a specific tech product or startup failed to succeed commercially, debating factors like poor execution, insufficient market demand, premature abandonment, funding shortages, and comparisons to past flops such as Fire Phone, Juicero, and Segway.

The cluster focuses on discussions about fraud detection in payment systems, chargebacks, who bears the financial losses (banks vs. merchants), and the challenges of false positives versus preventing scams.

Users share personal stories about the effectiveness, side effects, withdrawal symptoms of SSRIs, SNRIs, Wellbutrin, and other psychiatric meds for depression and anxiety, often comparing them to alternatives like psychedelics, therapy, and exercise.

Users debate the quality trajectory of TV series across seasons and episodes, often discussing strong starts that decline, slow beginnings that improve, or failures to maintain initial promise.

Commenters demand explanations, examples, and verifications of proofs mentioned in an article, debating their formality, constructiveness, and relation to AI or computer-assisted proofs.

The cluster focuses on capability-based security models for operating systems, advocating for sandboxing, least privilege, and explicit resource access to protect users from untrusted applications, in contrast to traditional Unix-style ambient authority.

Discussions focus on the unexpected stock price movements following a company's announcement, often noting that the stock rose or held steady despite anticipated negative impacts from bad news.

Comments express strong worries about tech apps, devices, and companies engaging in unauthorized spying and surveillance on users, portraying it as pervasive and inevitable.

The cluster revolves around discussions of standard 8-hour workdays, flexible vs. fixed schedules, and sarcasm about typical work hours compared to actual experiences like longer days or shorter weeks.

Discussions center on the toxicity of Hacker News and similar forums, debates over moderation practices like banning users, gatekeeping, and maintaining healthy discourse versus openness.

Comments primarily accusing a Hacker News-submitted story of being fake news, with discussions on its definition, irony, and broader implications like censorship and propaganda.

Discussions center on the difficulties of lacking or providing valid mailing/physical addresses for banks, health insurance, and other services, including workarounds like PO boxes, virtual mail services, and general delivery.

Comments primarily express disappointment or confirm that various software tools, projects, or features do not yet support specific platforms, hardware, or capabilities, often inquiring about future availability.

Users praise smooth animations in a showcased web tool or library, inquire about implementation details, request more demos or faster options, and discuss related animation software and techniques.

Commenters heavily suspect and debate that a reported security incident or hack was actually due to phishing rather than a sophisticated breach, emphasizing phishing vulnerabilities and risks.

Comments debate whether Kubernetes solves specific deployment issues, is overkill for simpler setups, or introduces its own complexities like high resource usage and improper configurations.

The cluster focuses on discussions about methods, challenges, and services for verifying user identities online, including third-party options, social media checks like Twitter's blue checkmark, and concerns over anonymity versus verification.

The cluster debates the role, power, and effectiveness of volunteer subreddit moderators on Reddit, including criticisms of heavy-handed censorship, the ability to fork communities, and Reddit's reliance on unpaid mods versus company oversight.

The cluster discusses whether private or local networks can be trusted or should be treated as untrusted like the internet, emphasizing the need for firewalls, VLANs, isolation, and zero-trust practices to secure devices and appliances.

Commenters dispute a general claim or observation by asserting it does not hold true in their specific location, often naming cities like Chicago, SF, Boston, or Atlanta and asking where others live.

Commenters reference numerous science fiction novels and stories, such as Iain M. Banks' Culture series, Asimov's works, and Liu Cixin's Dark Forest, drawing parallels to the main post's concept of advanced civilizations, space exploration, or interstellar phenomena.

Comments discuss recent major outages at providers like Fastly, Cloudflare, Backblaze, and others, analyzing root causes such as configuration errors, network failures, overloads, and cascading effects, along with praises for detailed postmortem blog posts.

Discussions center on Hacker News' ranking algorithm downweighting posts with more comments than upvotes to bury controversial or flamewar-prone threads. Users also debate comment score visibility, sorting, and related mechanics.

The cluster discusses the ethics, legality, and hypocrisy of AI companies like OpenAI using copyrighted or unlicensed data (e.g., scraped web content, pirated ebooks) to train models, while prohibiting others from using their outputs for training under fair use claims.

Users accuse each other of ad hominem attacks, debate the definition of the logical fallacy, and reference Wikipedia while urging substantive arguments instead.

Users recommend Mastodon instances, discuss Fediverse compatibility, and compare it to the main topic as a decentralized social network alternative.

Commenters debate whether a practice, product, or phenomenon from the article is already common, popular, or unique to Japan, often contrasting it with other countries like the US.

Comments focus on inquiries about RISC-V compatibility, integration, and support for a specific hardware product or board, including hopes for future adoption and current status.

Comments debate the strengths and limitations of two-factor authentication (2FA), especially against phishing, password leaks, device access, and proxy attacks.

The cluster centers on debates about the advantages and disadvantages of wealth taxes versus income or capital gains taxes, including challenges in measurement, enforcement, and comparisons to existing taxes like property taxes or inflation.

Comments primarily celebrate the positive effects of competition, such as driving innovation and improvements, often in tech or business contexts.

This cluster features comments where users abruptly dismiss others, refuse to continue debates, and tell interlocutors to leave or goodbye.

The cluster centers on debates about the Supreme Court's ruling in Trump v. United States granting presidents immunity for official acts, questioning whether this places the president above the law and the limits of executive authority.

The cluster focuses on discussions about using radio frequencies (e.g., low-power FM, shortwave, crystal radios) for communication, including feasibility, detection challenges, regulatory issues, and comparisons to internet or other methods.

Discussions debate the relative worth of time versus money, arguing that time is more valuable and should be traded for money to avoid wasting it on tasks like DIY projects.

Users enthusiastically share that they use the discussed tool or feature every day, regularly, or frequently, praising its utility and indispensability.

The cluster revolves around debates on the flagging and backlash to a news article about Elon Musk's controversial statements, including defenses against misinterpretation, sarcasm claims, and references to his past incidents like the pedophile accusation, journalist bans, and Tucker Carlson interview.

Commenters suggest applying the article's matching mechanism to dating apps, referencing existing services like Tinder and OkCupid while proposing alternatives or improvements.

Comments discuss which companies like Intel, AMD, Nvidia, and others own their own semiconductor fabrication plants (fabs) versus outsourcing to foundries like TSMC or SMIC, including questions about locations, processes, and industry players.

Commenters discuss various cognitive biases like confirmation bias, bias blind spot, hindsight bias, and availability heuristic, often highlighting how people fail to recognize their own biases in perceptions or judgments.

Discussions center on whether Python's syntax, features, and code styles adhere to the Zen of Python principles, such as 'explicit is better than implicit' and 'one obvious way to do it', often labeling things as 'pythonic' or 'unpythonic'.

Discussions center on DDoS attacks affecting websites, including debates over whether outages are genuine attacks, self-inflicted by high traffic, or predictable vulnerabilities, with references to defenses and past incidents.

Comments offer life advice emphasizing doing what you enjoy, focusing on personal priorities and relationships that bring fulfillment, and avoiding overplanning, ambition, or societal 'shoulds' for greater happiness.

The cluster debates whether smartphones and mobile devices are overtaking or replacing traditional PCs and laptops as primary computing devices for everyday tasks like banking, social media, and entertainment, especially for billions without access to desktops.

Commenters question the methodology, reproducibility, robustness, and conclusions of a specific experiment from the post, often requesting links, replications, or more robust designs.

Users vent frustration about annoying cookie consent popups on websites, criticizing dark patterns, GDPR compliance, and calling for browser extensions or built-in features to bypass or automate them.

The cluster discusses how large companies suffer from bureaucracy, excessive processes, reduced individual impact, and overall incompetence due to their size, often contrasting this with the agility of smaller startups.

This cluster consists of comments criticizing mainstream media outlets for producing shoddy, biased, clickbait, and sensationalist tech journalism, often contrasting it with better alternatives or calling for higher standards.

Discussions center on companies and websites relying on advertising as their primary revenue source, debating its sustainability, effectiveness, and alternatives.

Discussions center on the performance shortcomings of glibc's default malloc allocator, comparisons with alternatives like jemalloc, tcmalloc, mimalloc, and arena/bump allocators, and custom allocation strategies in C/C++.

Comments debate differences between older and younger generations' perspectives on technology, social media, and cultural norms, often countering 'kids these days' complaints by noting youth's greater sensibility or normalization of tech.

Comments debate the role of exercise versus diet in weight loss, overwhelmingly emphasizing that caloric deficit through diet is far more effective than exercise, which burns few calories and often leads to compensatory hunger or overestimation.

The cluster centers on debates about the practical value, necessity, and effectiveness of AI features in products, with commenters expressing skepticism, questioning hype, and occasionally defending real-world utility.

Discussions center on the challenges, costs, and economics of deploying fiber optic internet to homes (FTTH), especially comparing rural vs. urban areas, profitability for ISPs, and the role of municipal or co-op providers.

Debate on whether raising livestock for meat is inefficient due to feeding them crops like corn and soy that humans could eat directly, versus animals utilizing non-arable land, grass, and byproducts unsuitable for human consumption.

This cluster centers on criticisms of politicians prioritizing re-election, campaign donors, lobbyists, and personal gain over constituents' interests and societal good. Discussions highlight misaligned incentives, corruption, and how politicians act against public benefit to maintain power.

Comments debate the fundamental differences in use cases, user dynamics, and social graphs between platforms like Facebook (friends and real-life connections), Twitter/Reddit (strangers, interests, and shitposting).

This cluster revolves around debates on the role, purpose, rights, and ethics of the military—especially the US military—often distinguishing it from civilians, police, and government actions.

Discussions highlight astonishing technological advancements over the past 50-100 years, such as computers, internet, and smartphones, to counter claims of innovation stagnation and express optimism for equally surprising future developments.

This cluster focuses on discussions promoting CSS Flexbox as the superior solution for web layout problems like centering elements, contrasting it with older hacks like floats, and sharing learning resources.

Comments primarily express disappointment over the absence of Ruby support in a new tool or feature, request Ruby versions or integrations, and discuss Ruby alternatives or implementations.

Commenters repeatedly attribute observed differences in behavior, perceptions, or practices to culture rather than race or other factors, debating the role and implications of cultural variations. Discussions highlight cultural explanations as the core theme, with some questioning or agreeing on cultural influences.

Comments discuss the environmental consequences of technologies or actions, advocating for reduced pollution and protection of the environment over convenience or profit.

The cluster debates the true costs of self-hosting infrastructure or building in-house solutions versus using managed cloud or SaaS services, emphasizing that developer, ops, and maintenance time often exceed subscription fees.

Users express frustration with paywalls and full subscriptions for news sites like NYT and WSJ, advocating for micropayments, per-article fees, or bundled access across publications.

Users discuss and debate stark regional differences in house prices, contrasting multimillion-dollar homes in high-cost areas like the Bay Area with affordable options under $200k elsewhere, often tying affordability to local incomes and salaries.

Comments noting that a feature, service, or option discussed in the parent thread is no longer available, has been removed, or 'that ship has sailed.'

The cluster focuses on debates about transitioning away from fossil fuels due to their finite supply, environmental impacts, and the need for alternatives like renewables, including discussions on policy, economics, and industry resistance.

The cluster centers on discussions about the reliability, risks, backing mechanisms, and viability of stablecoins as stable alternatives to volatile cryptocurrencies, including debates on fiat-backed vs. crypto-collateralized types like DAI and USDC.

Discussions compare npm's usability, security, speed, and ecosystem to package managers like pip, gem, and Maven in other languages, debating its strengths, weaknesses, and alternatives like yarn and pnpm.

This cluster discusses whether engineering managers should continue coding to stay relevant, the challenges of context-switching as a coding manager, and the overall value and role of managers versus developers in software teams.

Discussions center on criticizing doctors for incompetence, mistakes, self-interest, or poor patient care, often in response to personal stories, with counterarguments defending the profession or noting not all doctors are the same.

The cluster discusses an article on tactics investors use against startup founders, debating perspectives from both sides on negotiations, meetings, pivots, follow-on investments, and whether the advice benefits founders or investors.

This cluster focuses on concerns about backdoors, implants, and compromises in computer hardware and firmware, emphasizing that untrusted hardware cannot be secured by software alone due to supply chain risks and detection difficulties.

This cluster centers on discussions of Scheme programming language implementations like Guile, Chicken, Racket, and MIT Scheme, their suitability for learning SICP, and comparisons to other Lisps.

Users repeatedly accuse a post, article, or comments of being propaganda and demand explanations or elaborations from those making such claims.

Comments debate the strengths and weaknesses of Cixin Liu's Three-Body Problem series, praising innovative sci-fi ideas and worldbuilding while criticizing flat characters, stilted prose, weak plots, and repetitive style.

Discussions center on debates within the FOSS community about the Free Software Foundation's militant ideology, purism versus pragmatism, and distinctions between free software zealotry and open source practicality.

The cluster revolves around debates on the risks of unstable APIs that change frequently, breaking third-party code and integrations, and whether providers should prioritize stability or rapid iteration.

This cluster features developers, mainly full-stack with React.js expertise, posting 'SEEKING WORK' announcements for remote freelance or full-time positions, alongside some related job offers.

The cluster discusses how high housing and living costs in the San Francisco Bay Area make even substantial tech salaries like $120k-$300k feel insufficient for homeownership or family life, often comparing to cheaper regions and debating quality of life.

Discussions revolve around humorous, punny, derogatory, or insider acronyms, backronyms, code names, and nicknames used in tech, programming communities, and companies.

Comments debate whether described actions or arguments constitute or justify digital piracy, its legality, and comparisons to copyright infringement.

Commenters seek, confirm, or provide specific technical terms or names for described phenomena, behaviors, or concepts in HN threads.

This cluster features comments expressing thanks and admiration for cool, interesting, wild, or fascinating stories shared by users in the thread.

Cluster discusses alternatives to React for web development, favoring lighter options like Svelte, HTMX, AlpineJS, Tailwind, or server-side rendering approaches for simpler, more performant web apps.

Discussions revolve around facial recognition capabilities, APIs, effectiveness, detection vs. recognition distinctions, and applications like photo tagging or security, with mentions of tools like FaceID and face-api.js.

Users discuss, identify, and compare distinctive noises from computers, servers, fans, monitors, and other hardware, often evoking nostalgia for retro tech or emulated effects.

Comments in this cluster repeatedly question or assert that the company, project, or entity discussed in the article has already implemented the feature, practice, or action being presented as new.

Commenters repeatedly reference the Netherlands as a counterexample, comparison, or similar case to the article's main topic, debating differences or similarities in practices or policies.

Debate on whether the Hacker News comment ranking, flagging, and moderation system is working as intended, flawed, ripe for abuse, or in need of better alternatives.

The cluster focuses on criticisms of excessive and inefficient government spending, emphasizing that fiscal issues stem from overspending rather than insufficient revenue or taxes.

The cluster focuses on debates about the efficacy of SSRIs and other antidepressants for treating depression, often comparing them to placebo and citing studies on modest benefits, chemical imbalance theory, and alternatives like therapy or ketamine.

Discussions revolve around whether LLMs are overhyped like past technologies such as blockchain and self-driving cars, or truly revolutionary with real-world applications, featuring debates between skeptics questioning their utility and proponents emphasizing their productivity gains.

Users complain about the degradation of Google search results over recent years, citing SEO spam, bias toward recent or mainstream content, and a shift to alternatives like DuckDuckGo, Reddit, or Bing.

Comments linking to earlier Hacker News threads on the same topic, often noting that the discussion is recurring or has been covered multiple times before.

Commenters argue over using probabilities instead of certainties in reasoning, debating the correct application, quantification, and understanding of probabilistic concepts in various scenarios.

The cluster discusses autocomplete, tab completion, and related features in code editors, IDEs, shells, and tools like Cursor, TabNine, Vim, and Emacs, including user feedback, praises, suggestions for improvement, and comparisons.

Discussions center on US visa options for foreign startup founders and employees, including H-1B, O-1, L-1, E-2, OPT, TN, and proposed startup visas, with advice on sponsorship, legal pathways, and challenges for immigrants building companies in the US.