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Self-driving cars, computer speech recognition and the collapse of the federal reserve system. Things that are going to perpetually happen next year since the i

Self-driving cars, computer speech recognition and the collapse of the federal reserve system. Things that are going to perpetually happen next year since the inception of Hacker News.

clows 6y ago
Is "Linux on the Desktop next year" still a thing?
- tim333 6y ago
  I haven't seen that for a while. It seemed to drop off a bit with Chromebooks which are kind of desktop linux.
- jeltz 6y ago
  No, it has not been used seriously for about 5 years. The last time was probably when SteamOS was released.
- neogodless 6y ago
  Sort of, now that Microsoft announced native GUI support coming to WSL2 next year!
- dhruvmittal 6y ago
  I think we called it a win on "The year of desktop linux" when it was clear that Linux was mainstream enough for Microsoft to tie it up with a bow and offer in their app store. Jokes aside, we're at the point where everyone who wants linux on the desktop can get linux on the desktop without having to struggle. Big, known enterprise-friendly companies like Dell and Lenovo will sell you their flagship and business laptops and desktops running Ubuntu, and it's not uncommon for engineers at the 8000+ not-a-software-company I work at to casually have a Linux machine instead of a Mac or PC. It's not 2010, where you had to be willing to navigate UEFI and "will my broadcom wireless work?" to weed out the casuals from the true-believers.
  - marketingPro 6y ago
    It was never hard to run Linux. It was always hard to make Linux perform at the same expectations as Windows. Messing around with chromium versions and netflix's plugin was not fun when you just wanted to watch a show. It's not polished, any distro. But Linux server is GOAT.
    - pessimizer 6y ago
      It's often been hard to run Linux, and the expectations of Windows are very low. When I was being pressured to switch to Linux by peers, it was because of the crappiness and instability of Windows, not any particular merit to Linux (other than not crashing constantly and not having to be restarted after every update.) edit: I have to say that I don't use netflix or play video games.
- goodcanadian 6y ago
  Is "Linux on the Desktop next year" still a thing? I'm really sick of this trope. I have been using Linux on the desktop almost exclusively for 15 years. Yes, I still have to fix weird issues on occasion . . . about as frequently as I have to fix weird issues on my wife's Windows machine.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    You have, but general adoption of Linux-lineage OS's is focused in the mobile tech space. Desktop adoption is still exceedingly low. Statscounter shows Linux installs about on par with ChromeOS installs [https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide]. Both are beaten out by the "Unknown" category; there are literally more people running we-can't-tell-what OS than a Linux-derivative OS. I think these days, the roadblock isn't reliability; it's Linux being off-mainstream. Network effect, essentially. Most of the (non-Internet) stuff the average person hears about in tech media and by word-of-mouth is not guaranteed to be available on Linux and is basically always guaranteed to be available on Windows, MacOSX, or both. Linux archs have done a decent job of solving the "Can I see my screen with the latest graphics card" problem but are still behind the curve on the "Can I buy Photoshop off the shelf at Best Buy and run it on my computer" curve.
    - goodcanadian 6y ago
      . . . are still behind the curve on the "Can I buy Photoshop off the shelf at Best Buy and run it on my computer" curve. Or I can use GIMP for free. You are correct that Linux on the desktop is not mainstream and that is largely down to network effects, but I don't understand the next logical step in the argument. How does that make Linux on the desktop "not ready" or "incomplete?" In my opinion (and I recognise that this is just an opinion), Linux has been a superior experience to Windows for a long time. All common problems have several robust solutions. Uncommon problems often also have a good solution (which isn't guaranteed on Windows either, at least not without spending a lot of money). The idea that Linux isn't "Desktop Ready" is a tired trope. Just because people don't, doesn't mean they can't. Linux doesn't have a marketing department (and I wouldn't want it to).
- yk 6y ago
  That was a thing before everybody used android.
- fsflover 6y ago
  No, it's the year of Linux on mobile already! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinephone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinephone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librem_5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librem_5
- mhermher 6y ago
  I mean, it clearly isn't. When is the last time you heard that in earnest and not as a joke?
FactolSarin 6y ago
But Elon says it's happening next year!
- dathinab 6y ago
  Oh it will happen, temporary. Until some really big accident happens in a situation where even a drunk driver wouldn't have messed up that way. After that self driving will be limited to situations like while you are in a traffic jam or limited to 30km/h and having it's own track or similar.
  - yreg 6y ago
    That would be rather unfortunate. If a system generally performs significantly safer than humans, its use should be encouraged. Outlier incidents shouldn't matter.
    - dathinab 6y ago
      The Problem is that it might not be significant safety outside of well suited situations. This systems expect the user to shim in fastly if something goes wrong, which just can't work reliable given how human brains work. Furthermore the situations which can make a self driving car crash are not the same which make a human driver crash. Such crashes can be pretty arbitrary. Random things like advertisement on a bus has the potential to trick of the self driving car. Similar at least some systems are not very good at handling situations where the lanes are unexpected changed e.g. around a construction site. I had been in more than one situation where the lanes markings what completely messed up and only common sense was left to prevent a potential dangerous situation. This systems don't have common sense. There already was at least on deadly incident where a Tesla crashed for no apparent reason (blaming the dead driver for not taking over fast enough which again isn't realistic at all, through legal maybe valid). Tesla is supposedly the leader wrt. self driving cars, but people where easily able to trick that car to drive into the lane for the opposite direction and it has since a while one of the worst emergency brake assistants. The problem boils down to self driving cars not being good at "unusual" situations but situations which are unusual for the self driving car are in practice pretty common given how much people drive cars and they are not necessary recognizable as such by humans. Another problem is that traffic's in different countries have different rules and dynamics a self driving system working well for idk. the US might not at all be safe to use in idk. insert arbitrary EU country here even if trained for that country. Humans can normally adapt to a degree in the fly, which makes them not have a crash, or less bad crashes in some situations. But the self driving car has no such common sense and might not even realize it's in a situation it's not trained for. I see a lot of potential to make traffic more safe.(non stuff driving but assistant systems, self driving in traffic jams, slow self driving buses in car reduced inner cities, on highway self driving truck convoys, etc.). But at least on the close future I'm not convinced "general purpose"/"everywhere any speed" self driving cars are more safe. I mean we also shouldn't forget that a lot of deadly accidents happen because of negligence, so while self driving cars still require a driver hand over, they still all happen because the driver is as negligent (or might intentionally not use the self driving feature to get faster to work etc.). Edit: Swipy keyboard mess ups.
marketingPro 6y ago
The federal reserve won't collapse, they have the ability to create money. The currency the federal reserve multiplies? That could collapse. Since 2020, the dollar menu is gone, home and stock prices skyrocketed. In a year I've seen ~30% inflation. There's no reason for the inflation to stop there. (Note, I have lots of investment, inflation may help me)
- question000 6y ago
  Ok make any kind of verifiable prediction about this and we will see if it happens or not.
  - marketingPro 6y ago
    Download taco Bell or McDonald's app. what is the current price for 400 calories? Mine is $1.30, in February this was $1. For stock info, look it up. Not sure where to get historical real estate prices, I'm just looking for a second property and everything is at least 10% higher than in February as you need to offer more than the selling price in this economy.
    - question000 6y ago
      Ok make a prediction about the "currency collapsing" and we will see. An actual prediction of the value of the currency not just a remark about prices seeming unusually high to you personally.
      - marketingPro 6y ago
        I run a website that tracks food costs. Not sure if you are looking for Data or a psychic. I do the former.
        question000 6y ago
        Ok why do you believe this if you can't make one verifiable prediction that it will happen? Will it happens tomorrow? In 20 years? In 5 months? It's just a feeling you have that isn't backed by data. I can't really ever disprove this because you're not really making any claim. This is every FED conversation on HN. People totally believe hyperinflation is "just around the corner" but it never happens only standard normal levels of inflation always within FED projections. What's your website BTW?
pessimizer 6y ago
Don't forget the universal adoption of 3D television.

Self-driving cars, computer speech recognition and the collapse of the federal reserve system. Things that are going to perpetually happen next year since the inception of Hacker News.

clows 6y ago

Is "Linux on the Desktop next year" still a thing?

tim333 6y ago
I haven't seen that for a while. It seemed to drop off a bit with Chromebooks which are kind of desktop linux.
jeltz 6y ago
No, it has not been used seriously for about 5 years. The last time was probably when SteamOS was released.
neogodless 6y ago
Sort of, now that Microsoft announced native GUI support coming to WSL2 next year!
dhruvmittal 6y ago
I think we called it a win on "The year of desktop linux" when it was clear that Linux was mainstream enough for Microsoft to tie it up with a bow and offer in their app store. Jokes aside, we're at the point where everyone who wants linux on the desktop can get linux on the desktop without having to struggle. Big, known enterprise-friendly companies like Dell and Lenovo will sell you their flagship and business laptops and desktops running Ubuntu, and it's not uncommon for engineers at the 8000+ not-a-software-company I work at to casually have a Linux machine instead of a Mac or PC. It's not 2010, where you had to be willing to navigate UEFI and "will my broadcom wireless work?" to weed out the casuals from the true-believers.
- marketingPro 6y ago
  It was never hard to run Linux. It was always hard to make Linux perform at the same expectations as Windows. Messing around with chromium versions and netflix's plugin was not fun when you just wanted to watch a show. It's not polished, any distro. But Linux server is GOAT.
  - pessimizer 6y ago
    It's often been hard to run Linux, and the expectations of Windows are very low. When I was being pressured to switch to Linux by peers, it was because of the crappiness and instability of Windows, not any particular merit to Linux (other than not crashing constantly and not having to be restarted after every update.) edit: I have to say that I don't use netflix or play video games.
goodcanadian 6y ago
Is "Linux on the Desktop next year" still a thing? I'm really sick of this trope. I have been using Linux on the desktop almost exclusively for 15 years. Yes, I still have to fix weird issues on occasion . . . about as frequently as I have to fix weird issues on my wife's Windows machine.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  You have, but general adoption of Linux-lineage OS's is focused in the mobile tech space. Desktop adoption is still exceedingly low. Statscounter shows Linux installs about on par with ChromeOS installs [https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/desktop/worldwide]. Both are beaten out by the "Unknown" category; there are literally more people running we-can't-tell-what OS than a Linux-derivative OS. I think these days, the roadblock isn't reliability; it's Linux being off-mainstream. Network effect, essentially. Most of the (non-Internet) stuff the average person hears about in tech media and by word-of-mouth is not guaranteed to be available on Linux and is basically always guaranteed to be available on Windows, MacOSX, or both. Linux archs have done a decent job of solving the "Can I see my screen with the latest graphics card" problem but are still behind the curve on the "Can I buy Photoshop off the shelf at Best Buy and run it on my computer" curve.
  - goodcanadian 6y ago
    . . . are still behind the curve on the "Can I buy Photoshop off the shelf at Best Buy and run it on my computer" curve. Or I can use GIMP for free. You are correct that Linux on the desktop is not mainstream and that is largely down to network effects, but I don't understand the next logical step in the argument. How does that make Linux on the desktop "not ready" or "incomplete?" In my opinion (and I recognise that this is just an opinion), Linux has been a superior experience to Windows for a long time. All common problems have several robust solutions. Uncommon problems often also have a good solution (which isn't guaranteed on Windows either, at least not without spending a lot of money). The idea that Linux isn't "Desktop Ready" is a tired trope. Just because people don't, doesn't mean they can't. Linux doesn't have a marketing department (and I wouldn't want it to).
yk 6y ago
That was a thing before everybody used android.
fsflover 6y ago
No, it's the year of Linux on mobile already! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinephone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinephone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librem_5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librem_5
mhermher 6y ago
I mean, it clearly isn't. When is the last time you heard that in earnest and not as a joke?

FactolSarin 6y ago

But Elon says it's happening next year!

dathinab 6y ago
Oh it will happen, temporary. Until some really big accident happens in a situation where even a drunk driver wouldn't have messed up that way. After that self driving will be limited to situations like while you are in a traffic jam or limited to 30km/h and having it's own track or similar.
- yreg 6y ago
  That would be rather unfortunate. If a system generally performs significantly safer than humans, its use should be encouraged. Outlier incidents shouldn't matter.
  - dathinab 6y ago
    The Problem is that it might not be significant safety outside of well suited situations. This systems expect the user to shim in fastly if something goes wrong, which just can't work reliable given how human brains work. Furthermore the situations which can make a self driving car crash are not the same which make a human driver crash. Such crashes can be pretty arbitrary. Random things like advertisement on a bus has the potential to trick of the self driving car. Similar at least some systems are not very good at handling situations where the lanes are unexpected changed e.g. around a construction site. I had been in more than one situation where the lanes markings what completely messed up and only common sense was left to prevent a potential dangerous situation. This systems don't have common sense. There already was at least on deadly incident where a Tesla crashed for no apparent reason (blaming the dead driver for not taking over fast enough which again isn't realistic at all, through legal maybe valid). Tesla is supposedly the leader wrt. self driving cars, but people where easily able to trick that car to drive into the lane for the opposite direction and it has since a while one of the worst emergency brake assistants. The problem boils down to self driving cars not being good at "unusual" situations but situations which are unusual for the self driving car are in practice pretty common given how much people drive cars and they are not necessary recognizable as such by humans. Another problem is that traffic's in different countries have different rules and dynamics a self driving system working well for idk. the US might not at all be safe to use in idk. insert arbitrary EU country here even if trained for that country. Humans can normally adapt to a degree in the fly, which makes them not have a crash, or less bad crashes in some situations. But the self driving car has no such common sense and might not even realize it's in a situation it's not trained for. I see a lot of potential to make traffic more safe.(non stuff driving but assistant systems, self driving in traffic jams, slow self driving buses in car reduced inner cities, on highway self driving truck convoys, etc.). But at least on the close future I'm not convinced "general purpose"/"everywhere any speed" self driving cars are more safe. I mean we also shouldn't forget that a lot of deadly accidents happen because of negligence, so while self driving cars still require a driver hand over, they still all happen because the driver is as negligent (or might intentionally not use the self driving feature to get faster to work etc.). Edit: Swipy keyboard mess ups.

marketingPro 6y ago

The federal reserve won't collapse, they have the ability to create money. The currency the federal reserve multiplies? That could collapse. Since 2020, the dollar menu is gone, home and stock prices skyrocketed. In a year I've seen ~30% inflation. There's no reason for the inflation to stop there. (Note, I have lots of investment, inflation may help me)

question000 6y ago
Ok make any kind of verifiable prediction about this and we will see if it happens or not.
- marketingPro 6y ago
  Download taco Bell or McDonald's app. what is the current price for 400 calories? Mine is $1.30, in February this was $1. For stock info, look it up. Not sure where to get historical real estate prices, I'm just looking for a second property and everything is at least 10% higher than in February as you need to offer more than the selling price in this economy.
  - question000 6y ago
    Ok make a prediction about the "currency collapsing" and we will see. An actual prediction of the value of the currency not just a remark about prices seeming unusually high to you personally.
    - marketingPro 6y ago
      I run a website that tracks food costs. Not sure if you are looking for Data or a psychic. I do the former.
      - question000 6y ago
        Ok why do you believe this if you can't make one verifiable prediction that it will happen? Will it happens tomorrow? In 20 years? In 5 months? It's just a feeling you have that isn't backed by data. I can't really ever disprove this because you're not really making any claim. This is every FED conversation on HN. People totally believe hyperinflation is "just around the corner" but it never happens only standard normal levels of inflation always within FED projections. What's your website BTW?

pessimizer 6y ago

Don't forget the universal adoption of 3D television.