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Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

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Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#591

Post by Normal_gaussian »

phatbyte wrote: post #547
dave_sid wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has a big flaw. If the future visitors copy all passwords to a usb stick and take it with them then anyone in the present time that gets a copy can pretend to be from the future. Worse still, everyone would believe the phoney future visitors without question.

I'm pretty sure no-one from the future will have a way to plug his/hers mini-USB-XC or whatever the usb name will be at the time in the future (USB standards are just a mess).

I would expect a future that still has a copy of these passwords to be highly likely to have copies of the relevant standards.

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#592

Post by Normal_gaussian »

Jill_the_Pill wrote: post #338
dave_sid wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has a big flaw. If the future visitors copy all passwords to a usb stick and take it with them then anyone in the present time that gets a copy can pretend to be from the future. Worse still, everyone would believe the phoney future visitors without question.

Do you think they'd still be using USB drives and bothering to keep track of antique passwords in the future?

Time machines could be invented in the near future. In fact I am wholly unable to say one hasn't been invented already.

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#594

Post by notetakingBudha »

crabl wrote: post #513

Existing mediums for note-taking (Evernote, Notion, Roam Research) are not sufficient for doing knowledge work over long periods of time. The functions these incumbents serve are primarily as “stores of knowledge” that we save because it’s interesting in the moment but never read through or “scratchpads” that we use once and never get rid of, which end up cluttering our information space like a junk drawer full of sh…

Couldn't you just say "I'm working on this specific thing for this specific purpose that works this specific way" ? Sigh.

Sorry for the negativity, but this post is the perfect example of the wishy-washy rhetoric that people interested in this domain always use.

For examples of what I'm talking about, browse this tedious litany [1] (roam-whitepaper), see if you manage to get pass the first paragraph [2]. BTW, the price for the "Believer" plan of roam [1] is $500 dollars. Roam itself is advertised with the hashtag "#roamcult". Pretty strong BS signals coming from this one.

1: https://roamresearch.com/

2: https://roamresearch.com/#/app/help/page/Vu1MmjinS

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#595

Post by rxsel »

phatbyte wrote: post #547
dave_sid wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has a big flaw. If the future visitors copy all passwords to a usb stick and take it with them then anyone in the present time that gets a copy can pretend to be from the future. Worse still, everyone would believe the phoney future visitors without question.

I'm pretty sure no-one from the future will have a way to plug his/hers mini-USB-XC or whatever the usb name will be at the time in the future (USB standards are just a mess).

I think you just found yourself a business opportunity :)

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#596

Post by collyw »

TimJRobinson wrote: post #244
easterncalculus wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great idea. I would love to use a service like this. One of the downsides of anonymity that many people raise (fallaciously) as an argument against it is that too many of the anonymous people are just trolls, therefore it is a negative quality. Having it be people that are known to the person brings about an assumption of character that can solve this issue, so long as the user associates with people that t…

I've been thinking about the gab problem a lot and have a solution: moderation and votes should be user centric rather than wisdom of the crowd based. Explained further here: https://adecentralizedworld.com/2020/06/a-trust-and-moderati...

Won't that just turn echo chambers into even bigger echo chambers?

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#597

Post by collyw »

silveroriole wrote: post #524
chiefmcloud wrote: post #153

I’m working on a new way to talk online, with the goal of killing cancel culture, increasing understanding, and basically calming down current radicalization. Picture Reddit, but with the ability to anonymously share ideas with other people in your social circles. My theory is that most reasonable people stay off social media, so places like Twitter end up filled with unreasonable narcissists. At the same time, discu…

This never works because the people attracted to anonymous discussion with no ‘cancel culture’ (no banning/moderation?) ARE those who have been radicalized and would get banned for it anywhere else.

Or maybe it's just people who want to hear alternative opinions that have been banned from the other heavily moderated platforms.

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#598

Post by mattio »

crabl wrote: post #513

Existing mediums for note-taking (Evernote, Notion, Roam Research) are not sufficient for doing knowledge work over long periods of time. The functions these incumbents serve are primarily as “stores of knowledge” that we save because it’s interesting in the moment but never read through or “scratchpads” that we use once and never get rid of, which end up cluttering our information space like a junk drawer full of sh…

I am also trying to tackle this problem in a side project! Dm me if you want to compare notes. <3

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#599

Post by vfinn »

mcaswell wrote: post #502

Loneliness! We have really lost our sense of community with those around us so I’m trying to see if we could supplement that with strangers on the internet.

I think we should get away from our computers, because Internet made this issue worse, and it's continuing to do so.

Re: Ask HN: What weird or hard problems are you trying to solve?

#600

Post by Garlef »

chiefmcloud wrote: post #153

I’m working on a new way to talk online, with the goal of killing cancel culture, increasing understanding, and basically calming down current radicalization. Picture Reddit, but with the ability to anonymously share ideas with other people in your social circles. My theory is that most reasonable people stay off social media, so places like Twitter end up filled with unreasonable narcissists. At the same time, discu…

That's a nice idea. I agree that we need social networks that are designed around fostering good discussions.

However, it would be a good idea to not only approach this from an optimistic angle but keep a pessimistic one in mind by asking:

"How would a malevolent actor abuse my design to manipulate public and/or indiviual oppinion?"

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