Would you think that maybe the feature set implemented by modern web browsers has grown too large? Perhaps we need to start dropping some features to keep the web browser design lean.

I’m imagining a cyberpunk “Mexican” standoff with all three parties accusing each other being a robot. We’re getting there.

It was just amazing to hang out and focus on playing a game deeply for 24 straight hours with my two closest friends. Can’t recall otherwise being so pleased with how I spent my time.

24 hour Civ 5 marathon with beer and the boys in my college days.

I don’t understand this joke.

It’s also not sufficient to randomize a deck of cards using a 32-bit seed as was once common in software.

Indeed, even with a 64 bit seed, it is not sufficient.

President Musk is an embarrassment.

Yep, we have about 30% macOS clients. It’s clear from Apple decisions that they favor the user as being an individual rather than an organization. The amount of third-party junk stapled onto the OS to enable a semblance of management is very un-Apple-esque.

Organizations can absolutely be the user or consumer of a product. In my Windows 11 Home edition, I definitely feel who they see as the user, and it isn’t me.

The cheap ones make a lot of noise already. I imagine to a passing alien spaceship we look like a giant EMP.

Jamming isn’t so trivial because it’s not really the volume but the signal to noise ratio that really matters no matter how much energy the aliens use. Therefore, I propose that this question doesn’t make technical sense.

Take for example GPS. The signal strength is way below the noise and you can’t really hear it at all because it’s so weak. The background noise is overwhelmingly loud already. You have to process the signal out of the noise using special techniques to collect the energy you care about using statistical correlation. While can still jam the signal in general, jamming requires that you understand how the signal is being used to impact that signal to noise ratio and stop the information flow. Simply screaming into all frequencies might not have all that much impact unless you understand what a signal means for each use case. Many wireless applications are even point to point links that are great at rejecting inputs outside of the intended direction and even the wrong polarization. There are physical limitations that preclude a general all signal jammer.

That said, let’s say the aliens understand all of our wireless communication protocols. I think people would adapt after a short period of disruption because it wasn’t all that long ago that we were using wires for business and critical functions. Heck, some industry still use fax machines and famously a lot of old government tech still has software stored on floppy disc. I think we’ll be OK. Might even be better for our mental health once the phones stop working.

Out of my sympathy network.

Interesting study. However, I think we’re past the point of studies informing our decisions here in the US. I still thought it was really interesting to read.