rsynnott

9 ms·

211.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> blue You'd be surprised: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argyria
212.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
I was there last week. It was 37 degrees one day. Not most peoples' idea of a good time.
213.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> That's what it takes in 2026 to make EVs still not quite cheaper than ICE cars. That's beginning to change. VW Polo base model in Ireland: 25000 eur (of which about 3000 VRT). VW id.Polo (VW has changed its electric car namin
214.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
For most people, in most countries, very rarely if ever, but it may be a psychological barrier.
215.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Assuming this continues, it'll be interesting to see what happens in about a decade as demand for petrol collapses. My general sense is that there's a fairly _large_ minimum demand required before the fuel distribution network bec
216.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
It seems a particularly bad idea for bars/restaurants because people are very, very sensitive to food that looks _wrong_. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen an ai-generated food image that didn’t look offputting.
217.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
... Wait, is there? This is a fairly common hypothesis for _violence in general_ (it seems to rather neatly explain the big fall in violent crime in most of the developed world in the 90s/noughties, though it's a bit of a just-so
218.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
People have been predicting the collapse of the EU and its predecessors since, essentially, day one. Haven't been right yet.
219.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
I'd be a little surprised if any of the hyperscalers (except for Oracle) die, though they may be quite badly burned.
220.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
That's a mildly weird take. Historically, by the time a bubble becomes broadly visible/acknowledged, it has already burst; it's just that the shockwave hasn't quite hit yet. You really only saw _widespread_ "eh, thi
221.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> What's going to happen in the future is that May will be a month of extreme electricity abundance, with a good chunk of the electricity just not being collected at all because the grid doesn't need it This is already a thing
222.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
They needed a two person crew, was the main problem, AIUI.
223.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Was this a comparable environment (big city vs big city, or rural vs rural)? This is a thing for rural services in Ireland (one type of service does this officially; you can ask them to pick you up at your house!), but very much not one for
224.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
It will often be a company owned by the state. In Ireland, most buses are run by CIE, a state company. In Dublin, for the last couple of decades, some routes have been run by GoAhead, a private company (Dublin Bus (part of CIE) and GoAhead
225.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Huh. I'm Irish; it would never occur to me to try this. Buses will sometimes delay departure if someone is visibly running for the stop, but that's as far as it goes. I think maybe France might be an outlier there. Honestly, openi
226.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
It's a very common complaint in countries where one city is disproportionately dominant (London for the UK or Dublin for Ireland, say). It's arguably a bit more surprising for Berlin, because Berlin isn't so disproportionate
227.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
… Wait, so what is the _point_ of him, then? I assumed he’d just say they should get more orgone energy or pray to xenu or whatever. Like, he has spent decades on the anti-science bandwagon; it’s a little disconcerting to see him just turn
228.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
The largest electric car vendor in terms of sales in Europe is generally VW AG. VW AG is European.
229.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> Effectively no modern car "looks cute" or good The Renault 5 is kinda cute.
230.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
At least in Europe, they were only the top seller for about 18 months (overtaking Nissan, then being overtaken by VW AG). Don’t think they were ever in the lead in Asia. That they had an ‘enormous lead’ in the US was more down to the paucit
231.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Arguably the CEV version is clearer, because approximately no-one knows the difference between ‘prophet’ and ‘seer’ in English (a seer is a practitioner of divination). I’m assuming that the distinction was similar in the original (ie that
232.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Cedars, fwiw, are not found in most of Europe either. Small parts of the Mediterranean (also parts of the Himalayas, bizarrely; closer than you think!) They likely show up in Western works a lot because they’re mentioned in the bible a good
233.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> Linguists have resorted to spying on people in parks and shops and restaurants, to get "natural" language unperturbed by observer effects, audience tailoring, the filter of writing, etc. Hence the common phrase, found in most
234.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
I mean… c’mon, now. Guess.
235.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Ol’ minihands apparently now entering late-stage George III territory. By next year he’ll be demanding that Barron marry a fig tree.
236.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> Milwaukee claims to be the inventor of the weekly transit pass … so, really? In the 20th century? I’m _almost_ certain that the Dublin and Kingstown Railway (1834) did season tickets; remember seeing one once. Even if not that, surely
237.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Journalists should not be using LLMs. Most proper papers ban them from using LLMs to write their stuff, for instance see https://www.rte.ie/news/2026/0319/1564281-mediahuis-peter-va...
238.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Meta-commentary on this discussion: okay, I know the ‘hacker news’ thing has always been kinda a misnomer, and has gotten moreso. But it’s still kind of shocking to me how little people here value making something, versus pretending to make
239.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
> they have to contend with authors who are only interested in making money. This isn’t _really_ a thing. If you’re into writing for the money, you’re probably in the wrong business. Even some quite successful/popular authors have a
240.
by rsynnott 3mo ago
Writing docs is, at best, only marginally creative work. Though honestly, still probably skip the LLM if you’ve any pride in your work; LLM-‘assisted’ docs are generally worse than those written by people.

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