Turkey bans Grok over Erdoğan insults (politico.eu | comments) Turkey has imposed a ban on Grok, an artificial intelligence tool developed by Elon Musk, due to content deemed insulting to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The decision reflects ongoing tensions between the government and social media platforms over freedom of expression and content moderation.

• That same day they blocked Zendesk’s entire asset domain (zdassets.com), claiming that illegal betting is used to finance terrorism. A lot of websites are broken now.
• I do wonder want Grok thinks of the Thai Monarchy, that is similarly protected from insult or ridicule?

Final report on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 in-flight exit door plug separation (ntsb.gov | comments) The final report on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 reveals critical findings regarding the in-flight exit door plug separation incident. Investigators focused on mechanical failures and potential oversight in maintenance procedures. The report emphasizes the need for enhanced safety protocols to prevent similar occurrences in future flights.

• > dDevelop guidance Good to know it was written by a human and not an LLM.
• The NTSB remains very good at its job and should serve as a model for government. A beacon of hope.
• i think proximate/ultimate breakdown would be more readable here. Proximate cause: poor installation. Ultimate cause: bad docs and quality control.

Belkin ending support for older Wemo products (belkin.com | comments) Belkin is discontinuing support for older Wemo smart home products, meaning that as of a specified date, users will no longer receive updates or assistance for these devices. This decision impacts users relying on older technology in their smart home setups, prompting potential shifts towards newer alternatives.

• 14 years is not long for things built into a home... Imho there should be some kind of electrical standard of how these things are controlled (specified in voltages, relays, ... and not changing over the years nor between companies), and then have something that can be interchangeable that can be upgraded "with the times" to control all this.

Matt Trout has died (shadowcat.co.uk | comments) Matt Trout has passed away, leaving behind a legacy reflected in the 'ripples they cause in the world'. His influence on the community will be missed.

• Thanks for all the invaluable teachings about Perl stuff.
• Super sad to see this. I worked with Matt around 2004. Super smart kid, very nice to work with. I ended up supporting one of the systems he built (in Perl). I used his Cataylst Perl framework for some projects after that because of him.

Underwater turbine spinning for 6 years off Scotland's coast is a breakthrough (apnews.com | comments) An underwater turbine off the coast of Scotland has been generating electricity for over six years. Located around 40 meters underwater, this turbine harnesses ocean tides, marking a significant advancement in renewable energy technology.

• One thing is not immediately obvious is just how hostile that area is. Firstly sea water is corrosive, plus if you add all the sand and other particles that are in there it becomes abrasive as well. BUT the tide also reaches speeds of 30kmh (18mph) twice a day.

German court rules Meta tracking technology violates European privacy laws (therecord.media | comments) A Leipzig court has ruled that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, must compensate a German user €5,000 ($5,900) for violations of European privacy laws due to its tracking technology on third-party websites. This landmark decision may pave the way for similar lawsuits against the company.

• I really hope it turns into a class action because I'd so wish to be part of it
• And, just like always, nothing meaningful will be done.
• Interesting that the court emphasized identifiability even without logging in. That cuts right through the usual "anonymous tracking" defense a lot of companies hide behind

Grok: Searching X for "From:Elonmusk (Israel or Palestine or Hamas or Gaza)" (simonwillison.net | comments) Grok 4, an AI platform, has been observed running searches for Elon Musk's opinions in response to controversial questions, notably about the Israel-Palestine conflict. This behavior raises questions about its programming, given Musk's ownership of xAI, which developed Grok. Users note variability in responses based on phrasing, highlighting the AI's complex nature.

• I think the wildest thing about the story may be that it's possible this is entirely accidental. LLM bugs are weird.
• This is so in character for Musk and shocking because he's incompetent across so many topics he likes to give his opinion on. Crazy he would nerf the model of his AI company like that.

AI coding tools can reduce productivity (secondthoughts.ai | comments) A study reveals that AI coding tools can lead to reduced productivity among developers, contradicting expectations of drastic efficiency gains. Experienced developers significantly overestimate the benefits, underscoring potential pitfalls in reliance on automation for coding tasks.

• I've been using Claude Code heavily for about 3 months now, and I'm pretty sure I'm between 10 and 20 times more productive while using it. How I measure performance is how many features I can implement in a given period of time. It's nice that people have done studies and have opinions, but for me, it's 10x to 20x better.

Bret Victor on why current trend of AIs is at odds with his work (dynamicland.org | comments) Bret Victor critiques the current trend in artificial intelligence (AI), arguing it conflicts with his vision of a humane dynamic medium as promoted by the Dynamicland initiative. He believes this trend overlooks the importance of physical interaction and communal context in computation, which his work embodies.

• RealTalk has some interesting features that I wish there was a more complete writeup that explained it in detail. Like, you can write a script that talks to functionality that may or may not exist yet. Programming by moving pieces of paper around deservedly gets attention, but there's a lot more to it.

The death of partying in the USA (derekthompson.org | comments) Young Americans today partake in 70% fewer parties than they did at the start of the 21st century. This significant decline raises questions about cultural shifts and societal factors influencing social gatherings. The article delves into the reasons behind this trend and its broader implications.

• "The typical female pet owner spends more time actively engaged with her pet than she spends in face-to-face contact with friends of her own species." Spurious. This has likely always been true unless you live with said friends.
• Everyone's looking at their phones instead.

Code and Trust: Vibrators to Pacemakers (punkx.org | comments) The article compares software for vibrators and pacemakers, emphasizing the critical nature of trust in programming for life-dependent devices. It discusses the complexity of pacemaker software and the importance of rigorous standards, questioning whether AI can write safer code compared to human programmers. The author argues for radical transparency in code development to build trust.

• I'm surprised not to see a mention of formal methods in the article. I know these are kind of the "nuclear fusion" of Computer Science, but so were neural nets until relatively recently. I would have guessed that AI ought to be pretty good at converting code into formally verifiable forms. Is anyone working on that?

I used to prefer permissive licenses and now favor copyleft (vitalik.eth.limo | comments) The text delves into the author's transition from preferring permissive licenses, which allow unrestricted use and redistribution, to favoring copyleft licenses, which mandate that derivative works also be shared under the same conditions. The author outlines their motivations for this shift with reference to free open source software principles.

• My favourite licence has always been the MPLv2. It's basically the best of both worlds, it's copyleft for your code while keeping the ability to statically link (crucial for Rust, Go and other languages that do that by default).
• This is the Ethereum guy. Was something forked and made proprietary that he needs to be open source?

Show HN: Pangolin – Open source alternative to Cloudflare Tunnels (github.com/fosrl | comments) Pangolin is an open-source alternative to Cloudflare Tunnels, providing users with a means to securely access their services without relying on centralized services. It aims to offer similar functionalities, enabling seamless connections and improved control over web traffic management.

• I have been using pangolin for a few months already and it's awesome. Installed in a small VPS (static IP) as an entry point for all the services I want to expose to friends and family from my homelab (dynamic IP), completely secure and very easy to manage.

The ChompSaw: A Benchtop Power Tool That's Safe for Kids to Use (core77.com | comments) The ChompSaw, a new benchtop power tool specifically designed for safety, allows children to engage with woodworking in a fun and secure way. Unlike traditional jigsaws or scrollsaws that pose serious injury risks, the ChompSaw provides a safer alternative by integrating protective features while still enabling creative projects.

• "The nibblings are collected in a bin below, allowing you to recycle the waste." In my area, this type of waste is not accepted in the recycling. Just like you can put paper in recycle, but you can't put shredded paper. This would work pretty well in the compost pile though.

Show HN: Open source alternative to Perplexity Comet (browseros.com | comments) BrowserOS is an open-source browser designed to run AI agents locally, prioritizing user privacy. It serves as an alternative to Perplexity Comet, enabling users to gain enhanced control over their browsing experience with integrated AI functionalities.

• I would prefer this as a browser extension, not as its own browser application.
• Is BrowserOS-OS on the roadmap? (Will you ever make a better FydeOS, or if you're laser-focused, perhaps be open to sharing some with them, so they could?)
• Would love to see this show up on homebrew!

Grok 4 (simonwillison.net | comments) Grok 4 was released recently, featuring both API access and a subscription model for end-users. Enhancements include image and text input with a context length of 256,000 tokens. It reportedly outperforms competitors on various benchmarks. However, recent controversies surrounding previous versions raise concerns about model safety and bias.

• Claude Code converted me from paying $0 for LLMs to $200 per month. Any co that wants a chance at getting that $200 ($300 is fine too) from me needs a Claude Code equivalent and a model where the equivalent's tools were part of its RL environment. I don't think I can go back to pasting code into a chat interface, no matter how great the model is.

FOKS: Federated Open Key Service (foks.pub | comments) FOKS (Federated Open Key Service) is a beta platform providing end-to-end encrypted Git hosting and a secure key-value store. Utilizing post-quantum cryptography, it ensures data remains encrypted during transit, safeguarding it from quantum attacks. FOKS supports federated team management and device management with YubiKey integration.

• The fact that this already has git support is amazing. I can easily migrate my Keybase git repos with a single command.
• How does the "federation" work? I assume the actual team data is stored on a single foks server, the one the term is on, so I guess from there you basically have some lightweight SSO for team members using their server?

Show HN: Typeform was too expensive so I built my own forms (ikiform.com | comments) In response to high costs associated with Typeform, a developer created Ikiform, an open-source alternative for building forms and surveys. Ikiform boasts features for data collection and response analysis, providing a budget-friendly solution for creating interactive forms comparable to established platforms like Google Forms.

• What kind of setup did you have that Typeform was costly? We are on the $299/month plan coming from $99/month, and if you run a money making business of Typeform, this cost should be negligible compared to all other costs of running a business.
• how many time have you been working on this?

Kite – News App by Kagi (kagi.com | comments) Kagi introduces 'Kite,' a news app designed to offer a streamlined and aesthetically pleasing reading experience. The app features dark mode support, customizable themes, and a focus on minimalistic design to enhance user engagement while providing access to important news stories in an elevated format.

• I can't find where it specifies how the news is "distilled". I assume it's an LLM summarization, given Kagi is in the AI business in other ways, but it would be nice if they could clearly state that. Knowing who or what I'm listening to is a fundamental part of being able to trust it or not.

Thunderbird 140 "Eclipse" (thunderbird.net | comments) Thunderbird 140, codenamed 'Eclipse,' showcases the new features and enhancements in its Extended Security Release. The update promises improved performance, user-friendly interfaces, and enhanced security measures, signaling a bright future for Thunderbird users as it emphasizes ISO-approved standards.

• I’ve been using Thunderbird more and more over the past few months. I’m glad it’s finally getting some decent attention. I’m especially curious about the new account management in 140. I couldn’t add my iCloud calendar easily before, hope this rectifies it. If you haven’t given Thunderbird a shot yet, you should.

Postgres LISTEN/NOTIFY does not scale (recall.ai | comments) Postgres's LISTEN/NOTIFY mechanism suffers from significant performance degradation under heavy write concurrency, primarily due to a global lock applied during commit operations. This article elucidates the underlying issues affecting scalability and offers strategies for preventing service outages in high-traffic environments.

• I appreciate this post for two reasons: * It gives an indication of how much you need to grow before this Postgres functionality starts being a blocker. * Folks encountering this issue—and its confusing log line—in the future will be able to find this post and quickly understand the issue.

Bear-Sized Giant Beavers Once Roamed North America (smithsonianmag.com | comments) Giant beavers, once native to North America, grew to the size of a bear, representing a unique chapter in prehistoric mammalian evolution. These beavers, part of a group known as Castoridae, roamed the wetlands and were significantly larger, illustrating the diversity of prehistoric species. Their remains provide insights into ecosystem dynamics during their era.

• I wonder if they were tasty. You never hear of people eating beaver.
• But were they dangerous?
• They say it "could have weighed up to 200 pounds". How do they know? Are they just guestimating based on modern animals about the same size? Or maybe weighing/measuring a modern beaver and scaling up size and weight?

Measuring the impact of AI on experienced open-source developer productivity (metr.org | comments) A randomized controlled trial revealed that early-2025 AI tools lead to a 19% increase in the time taken by experienced open-source developers on their own projects, indicating a slowdown in productivity. This unexpected finding could challenge assumptions about AI improving developer efficiency.

• So they paid developers 300 x 246 = about 73K just for developer recruitment for the study, which is not in any academic journal, or has no peer reviews? The underlying paper looks quite polished and not overtly AI generated so I don't want to say it entirely made up, but how were they even able to get funding for this?

Red Hat Technical Writing Style Guide (stylepedia.net | comments) The 'Red Hat Technical Writing Style Guide' serves as a comprehensive resource for writers and editors, providing guidelines for grammar, design, and usage specific to Red Hat documents. This edition emphasizes clarity and consistency in technical documentation, while adhering to industry standards.

• Wow, this is a really terrific guide. It's quite long, but it's long because of it's breadth, not because of being overly verbose (IMHO). I particularly appreciate the clear explanations and large number of examples that really help make the concept more concrete. I think this is quite broadly useful even for people that don't work for Red Hat.

Analyzing database trends through 1.8M Hacker News headlines (camelai.com | comments) An analysis of 1.8 million Hacker News headlines over 18 years reveals notable trends in database popularity. The findings indicate PostgreSQL as the leading choice among developers, while DuckDB and ClickHouse are experiencing significant growth. In contrast, cloud SaaS database engines face a substantial decline as we approach 2025.

• Sqlite seems to be growing recently which matches my perception, but it‘s not listed among the growing databases. Weird.
• More unsolicited feedback: Month-by-month is kind of noisy. You might do 3 month average to smooth it a little and make the trend clearer.

Is Gemini 2.5 good at bounding boxes? (simedw.com | comments) Gemini 2.5 Pro is evaluated as a competitive object detector, achieving results comparable to Yolo V3 on the MS-COCO dataset. The author benchmarks Gemini against traditional convolutional neural networks (CNNs) in object detection, addressing limitations and the model's handling of complex prompts and outputs in generating bounding boxes.

• Really interesting piece, the bit about tight vs loose bounding boxes got me thinking. Small inaccuracies can add up fast, especially in edge cases or when training on limited data. Has anyone here found good ways to handle bounding box quality in noisy datasets? Do you rely more on human annotation or clever augmentation?

The Origin of the Research University (asteriskmag.com | comments) Universities have transitioned from being purely academic institutions to centers of research, particularly from the 19th century in Germany. This fundamental shift changed their role and responsibilities, establishing a new legacy in higher education.

• Those Trailblazing Teutons…

Mini robots detect and fix water pipe leaks without digging (foxnews.com | comments) Researchers at the University of Sheffield have developed 'Pipebots', miniature robots capable of navigating through water pipes to detect and repair leaks without the need for digging. This innovative technology aims to simplify the maintenance of water infrastructures and reduce disruption caused by traditional methods.

• Is there work going on with regards to robots in filthy environments, because these guys look like they're about to get tangled up in a hairy fatberg. I'm dealing with a clogged and nasty kitchen sink right now, and man, and these guys seem so happy to be in their laboratory test plumbing :)

How to prove false statements: Practical attacks on Fiat-Shamir (quantamagazine.org | comments) Researchers have identified vulnerabilities in the Fiat-Shamir proof methodology, a technique widely used in cryptography for secure digital communications. The findings reveal critical security flaws that could affect blockchain systems and other encryption frameworks, underscoring the need for revised security protocols in these technologies.

• > When he shared his thoughts with Ethereum’s cryptographers, he was startled to learn that they were unfamiliar with this work It would be nice if the article included timelines. Ethereum researchers have been talking about GKR since 2020,so it's hard to imagine the lack of familiarity.

Optimizing a Math Expression Parser in Rust (rpallas.xyz | comments) The text discusses the optimization of a math expression parser implemented in Rust, focusing on enhancing its speed and memory efficiency. Rust's performance benefits make it suitable for such tasks, and the optimization process aims to improve computational efficiency when evaluating mathematical expressions within software applications.

• thought it would be fun to write this in raku grammar Arithmetic { rule TOP { ^ <expr> $ } rule expr { <term>+ % ['+' | '-'] } rule term { <value> } rule value { <number> | <parens> } rule number { \d+ } rule parens { '(' <expr> ')' } }

The most otherworldly, mysterious forms of lightning on Earth (nationalgeographic.com | comments) Researchers are investigating rare forms of lightning called red sprites, green ghosts, and blue jets, which occur high above thunderstorms. These phenomena, still not fully understood, present intriguing challenges for scientists aiming to comprehend their origins and behaviors in the Earth's atmosphere.

• The curious phenomena of red sprites, green ghosts and blue jets are clearly derived from the red, green and blue pixels of the simulation aether.
• NG forces people to enter email address without a close button.
• Why is there a paywall article on the front of Hacker News?