jhbadger

39 ms·

931.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Really just 1960s tech. Dr. Sbaitso was really just a version of ELIZA with the only new part being the speech synthesis.
932.
by jhbadger 3y ago
I haven't read the novel, and yes, Theroux is generally a good writer, but I'm not really seeing the point of writing a novel about Orwell's time in Burma. It's not like Orwell hid this part of his past -- he wrote a nov
933.
by jhbadger 3y ago
>Somehow, we've hit the point where AIs can write sonnets and play jazz, but proving simple theorems is still science fiction. It's interesting that this seems to be a return to conventional ideas of what is difficult. I rememb
934.
by jhbadger 3y ago
It would have been fun if a "fake" assembly language had to be used (rather than one corresponding to the actual CPU) that MIX from Knuth's books would have been used (yes, current versions of the books use an updated version
935.
by jhbadger 3y ago
The problem with the "Anglophone" strategy of focusing on ideas -- like the old "Designed in California. Assembled in China" statement that used to be on Apple iPods, is what happens when China (and elsewhere) start havi
936.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Reading a book (which I guess you call "consuming media" as if it were a sort of snack) has made me feel better on numerous occasions.
937.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Exactly. It's like how younger people read Snow Crash and think it was prophetic, but that's because they don't know that multiplayer RPGs called MUDs existed when he wrote it in 1992.
938.
by jhbadger 3y ago
I mean in the old days (like 20 years ago) people liked to spend their free time at the mall, so...
939.
by jhbadger 3y ago
In Soviet times people would be posted to places throughout the Soviet Union as the authorities saw fit to fill a position, so you would get Russians in Ukraine, Uzbeks in Armenia, etc. In post-Soviet times some people have assimilated into
940.
by jhbadger 3y ago
I like his 1960s disaster novels -- The Drowned World , The Burning World . The Crystal World , about civilization ending and bands of survivors trying to get by. They definitely had an influence on later works, such as George Romero&#x2
941.
by jhbadger 3y ago
It is weird that Haskell (programming language) is named after Curry's first name though. That isn't generally how you name things (other than people). About the only other thing I think of that works that way is America, named af
942.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Ha! But presumably the bluetooth is there to tell the app what it measured and to visualize it. But presumably through a combination of sensors and accelerometers
943.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Wifi is silly, but there really is a benefit to the Bluetooth/app connection -- it is used to see where you are brushing and spots you are missing. My dentist definitely has seen an improvement in the plaque in my back teeth since I st
944.
by jhbadger 3y ago
This depends on your age. I think you were playing with Lego in the 1980s or 1990s when there was theming like pirates and what not. I had Lego in the 1970s. We really just had sets with square/rectangular blocks of various sizes and a
945.
by jhbadger 3y ago
And the famous early computer scientist Grace Hopper retired as a rear admiral in the US Navy despite not having combat experience either. But that's because she was career Navy, and basically the only way the military can give you a p
946.
by jhbadger 3y ago
In a sense it is -- HPL based Miskatonic on his local hometown university -- Brown is in Providence.
947.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Yes, there is a a rewind feature in the MAME debugger -- I haven't used openMSX so I don't know how similar the feature works.
948.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Yes, the latter is worth mentioning more. Many people think MAME is just an emulator of arcade machines, but it really is an emulator of nearly everything with a CPU including classic home computers (even very obscure ones like the Mattel A
949.
by jhbadger 3y ago
I think it is truer to say that a pirate will pirate stuff they wouldn't buy, because free is free. But they'll still pirate stuff they would buy too.
950.
by jhbadger 3y ago
That was certainly important in the the short term (obviously Gates wasn't doing that to be nice but because having Apple die would look bad in the then ongoing antitrust investigations into Microsoft; it's the same reason Google
951.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Windows 95 also came close to killing the Mac. Before then the difference between Windows and MacOS was so striking that it was obvious that anyone who really wanted a GUI interface would go for a Mac. But then the advantage became much les
952.
by jhbadger 3y ago
>Stephen King is not a filmmaker. You haven't seen Maximum Overdrive then. You fortunate, fortunate person.
953.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Or the Richard Burton/Peter O'Toole movie "Becket" (1964) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057877/
954.
by jhbadger 3y ago
There are only 160 million US passports in circulation (out of a population of 330 million. So roughly half. Of course HN people tend to be middle class or higher so they'd more likely be in that 50%. But still, the US is huge (roughly
955.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Yes, very funny. But they knew what they were doing when they named it that. There was a series of early computers named ILLIAC (because they were created at the University of Illinois and after ENIAC, a famous computer that was "the f
956.
by jhbadger 3y ago
This in is a tradition of earlier simulated ("cardboard") computers such as the 1965 "Little Man Computer" or the 1968 CARDIAC. Like Ordinapoche, they were basically aids to help a person step through a machine language
957.
by jhbadger 3y ago
Exactly, It's like the people who created false Wikipedia pages (complete with seemingly valid references). Maybe the first time someone did that there was a point -- showing how such an article could get past the mods as a wake up cal
958.
by jhbadger 3y ago
I was curious and found the one mention of pg, in the discussion of the Morris Worm: So Bob Morris's son froze two thousand computers. Why? To impress his dad? As a Halloween prank? To show off to a couple thousand computer programmer
959.
by jhbadger 3y ago
And yet The US pronounces "herb" correctly (as "erb") while the UK, pronounces it like the name Herb, with an H.
960.
by jhbadger 3y ago
And before Joss Whedon fell out of favor, a lot of schools had courses in "Buffy studies". Yes, pop culture might seem a silly topic for a course, but clever instructors can use it as an entry way into more serious topics.

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