wheelie_boy

13 ms·

91.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
Absolutely. I don't hand-create machine code. I don't write assembly. I write in the highest-level language that still lets me fully specify everything I care about, and then all of the lower levels of code generation are complet
92.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
Yeah, I don't think it's a literal quote, unless it was in a very specific context. It was making fun of the 640K limitation of MS-DOS, and the implicit reasoning behind that hard limit.
93.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
The biggest problem I see with deflation is that it becomes rational to avoid actually using the currency. This massively decreases demand. Not many people are using bitcoin to buy pizza any more, because there's a hope that if they j
94.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
> A whole world currency that is potentially immune to inflation and government manipulation. There are lots of ways that powerful governments can still put their thumb on the scale. US taxes still need to be paid with US dollars, and t
95.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
To me the argument is the opposite: what is the reason for cryptocurrencies to exist if not for money laundering and generally avoiding regulations/fees you'd otherwise be subject to?
96.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
Backwards compatibility isn't free. In this case, the root cause is probably the CPUs changing from 32-bit to 64-bit. There are costs of having 2 versions of all of the system libraries - maintenance dev time, RAM usage, battery life,
97.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
In the far future when food, shelter, and other necessities are basically free, attention will be the last valuable commodity. There will always be a scarcity of attention.
98.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
If there are people who need an answer, and people happy to provide that answer (and perhaps a bit of kind coaching on how to find answers in the future), what is the downside of letting them connect on stackoverflow? Nothing is forcing pe
99.
by wheelie_boy 8y ago
I think the core problem is that they've focused too much on being like wikipedia (a single authoritative, comprehensive answer to each important question), and not enough on helping people to learn. Over time a site will grow a cultu
100.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Same here, I always use an incognito window for facebook.
101.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Yes, it has by far the largest user community. If you do a google image search for 'grasshopper geometry' or 'grasshopper architecture', you'll see a lot of buildings designed with grasshopper, including many which
102.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
An interesting thing that's happening alongside 3d printing is the emergence of visual programming languages specialized for geometry, the most popular being Grasshopper.
103.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Reminds me of Tom Duff's Essay 'Reading code from top to bottom': http://www.iq0.com/notes/deep.nesting.html
104.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
http://winblows.com is available!
105.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Yes, it is good and valuable for a society to be tolerant of diverse backgrounds and viewpoints. The limit to tolerance is being tolerant of intolerance. The left has intolerant people as well. "No matter what side of the argument yo
106.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
The issue with the independent as a source is that it is obviously designed to be consumed as entertainment rather than a serious look at the topic. You can cherry-pick studies that show something entertaining, but that doesn't tell y
107.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
That's not a great source. It also tells men to wear red and eat garlic.
108.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
There might be some interesting analysis there, but the social science underlying it is awful. If you base your analysis on unsubstantiated priors, you get useless results.
109.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Yeah, being hard to forge is necessary, but not sufficient. There are a ton of electronic currencies that are difficult to forge, for example Flooz, Beenz, and the gems in clash of clans.
110.
by wheelie_boy 9y ago
Agreed, it's almost like the asset has no fundamental value, and is driven completely by speculation.