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BirAdam

4,341 karmajoined 4 jaar geleden
Just a nerd. I like to tinker with Linux/UNIX, and I write computing history. Also, lots of coffee, cigars, books.

https://www.abortretry.fail

Submissions

Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems

abortretry.fail
2 points·by BirAdam·8 dagen geleden·0 comments

Colorado Will Require Age Attestation on Computing Devices via OS

legiscan.com
4 points·by BirAdam·4 maanden geleden·4 comments

The Osborne Computer Corporation

abortretry.fail
9 points·by BirAdam·7 maanden geleden·0 comments

The History of Xerox

abortretry.fail
4 points·by BirAdam·7 maanden geleden·0 comments

SRI and Arc: The Dawn of the Information Age

abortretry.fail
3 points·by BirAdam·7 maanden geleden·0 comments

The QNX Operating System

abortretry.fail
322 points·by BirAdam·9 maanden geleden·142 comments

Creative Technology: The Sound Blaster

abortretry.fail
163 points·by BirAdam·10 maanden geleden·113 comments

comments

BirAdam
·10 uur geleden·discuss
I’ve always hated the use of the word “information” in relation to things like spin.

Information and order are effects of human perception and preference. They exist as abstractions in the mind and not in reality.
BirAdam
·8 dagen geleden·discuss
They’d clearly decide that the cockroach was worshipped.
BirAdam
·13 dagen geleden·discuss
If the US government quit subsidizing oil companies and traditional automakers, there’d be more incentive to make good, affordable EVs, and more incentive for Americans to buy them.
BirAdam
·13 dagen geleden·discuss
Same here. Applications developers and QA often can't really do their jobs, so I get roped in on every problem it seems. Plans to go out with my family on my birthday? Canceled. Plans to go kayaking with my wife on Saturday? Canceled. At this point, I am extremely tempted to leave my job, sell my house, buy some land in Wyoming or something, and just be content to be poor.
BirAdam
·20 dagen geleden·discuss
Well, politicians are generally liars. Trump, Obama, Biden, Bush, Clinton, Reagan… we can go all the way back to McKinley and I could easily say that the campaign people voted for was not what was delivered. Even more, it was usually the opposite.
BirAdam
·20 dagen geleden·discuss
Nah. People actively voted for a guy who said no war. Then he got the USA into a dumb war. Just like all the rest.

Voting has objectively not produced the results that the people have wanted, and this is not new. Voting doesn’t work. Being “informed” changes nothing. The only way the hoi polloi can have any effect whatever is typically through rather violent uprising. This works for maybe a generation, and then it all starts falling apart again.
BirAdam
·20 dagen geleden·discuss
People also forget… XP had more than the one tonka-toy theme from Frog Design. There were several themes. Some appealed to my visual tastes, some didn’t… but I do think they were well designed, which is more than I can say for most UI design today.
BirAdam
·20 dagen geleden·discuss
It was change. People don’t like change.
BirAdam
·20 dagen geleden·discuss
That depends upon the type of SSD. There’s compact flash which is natively IDE, and the controllers are extremely weak, then there are modern TLC SATA drives where the controller would probably be a bit more powerful than the machine’s CPU.
BirAdam
·24 dagen geleden·discuss
I’m not even worried about the weight and heat. How do you do a disk swap or other service on a machine in a datacenter in orbit?
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
Are you in the USA? Brave person if so.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
Nah. You’re assuming that the developer has some experience. The false assurance that the magic of Rust will protect the developer from himself/herself will lead that young developer to make worse decisions. An experienced developer typically has discernment, and has learned, rather painfully, that he/she can make serious errors in any language.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
I have voiced a similar thought more succinctly: “it is your worst software that will live forever.”

The implication is that you should always strive to release software that isn’t overly buggy, isn’t slow, and is general a pleasure to use.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
It’s the solution to the second information problem. Hypertext arose from Bush’s Memex, and the information problem it offered to solve. Now, there is simply so much information available on the modern Memex that it is impossible to make any sense of it all. So, we now have LLMs. There are still some issues with them, but they’re good at what they do.

I have mixed emotions about LLMs and AI more generally. I fear the dystopia, hope for some marginal improvement in human life, and I genuinely enjoy playing around with local models. But, I think there may be near term harms that outweigh the gains. We shall see.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
If this is such a threat, why are there Israeli offices in the Pentagon via the ODC? I mean… it isnt as if the USA has been fighting wars on behalf of Israel for nearly 30 years or anything…
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
In the USA, there was never a need for a military coup. After the Spanish-American war, the MIC was so wealthy that they simply bought influence. A few million handed to influential politicians is far cheaper than a coup.

The USA has the best government that money can buy.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
This is among the "real" differences between workstation/server CPUs and commodity chips for laptops/desktops/handhelds.

Even then, if a commodity chip isn't pushed full tilt at all times, and assuming that the venting and dissipation are adequate, a commodity chip can last a long time.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
You could likely get some funding for a PAC based around this. You just have to get Altman, Musk, and the other to realize that it’s a good marketing move.

“Our AI is so awesome and boosts productivity so much that no one has to work another 5 day week, ever again.”
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
First, I’m not talking about boomers. Second, if I were, those same people paid taxes on that house for decades. Is it not okay for that rate to fall in their latter years? If they sell, they then pay taxes on that sale amount.

Intergenerational war is stupid. Why be angry because someone lived in a time they gave them a benefit? In the case of the boomers, they were also the generation beaten by cops, water cannoned, and shot for being antiwar and pro civil rights. While many boomers are crappy, they’re are also every bit as diverse as any other group.

Finally, the old folks I was thinking of were born in the 20s and 30s, not the 50s.
BirAdam
·vorige maand·discuss
I wrote: “oldest folks I knew” and I was referencing those who are no longer with us, and who were members of generations before boomers…