Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit | blacksmith_tb's comments login

It's a catchy name, though ironically tritium is not legal in the US, generally[1] (for "frivolous purposes"). Guess this is serious software!

1: https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/10/30.19


I pine for a DSL for legal documents, both because it’s tedious and tiresome to parse prose like this:

> Except for persons who manufacture, process, produce, or initially transfer for sale or distribution self-luminous products containing tritium, krypton-85, or promethium-147, and except as provided in paragraph (c) of this section, any person is exempt from the requirements for a license set forth in section 81 of the Act and from the regulations in parts 20 and 30 through 36 and 39 of this chapter to the extent that such person receives, possesses, uses, transfers, owns, or acquires tritium, krypton-85, or promethium-147 in self-luminous products manufactured, processed, produced, or initially transferred in accordance with a specific license issued pursuant to § 32.22 of this chapter, which license authorizes the initial transfer of the product for use under this section.

... and also because it is ambiguous / error-prone / subject to interpretation, especially when figuring out antecedents of pronouns, referents, and textual boundaries.

I tried four times to read the above by paragraph without reformatting it with some parentheses etc, but failed.


One thing I would really like to see is the mathematical and/or notation with the tall single curly bracket (with nesting, when appropriate).

I've seen a bulleted list being used for both conjunctions and disjunctions within the same document and in both cases it was not obvious from context (it was related to conditions for receiving funding)


I have designed CSTML with that exact set of usage and features in mind. It would be absolutely perfect for what you describe. I badly need investors though. Know any lawyers interested in investing in a product like you are describing?

.... I think it means that you can make self-luminous products without needing a license, as long as you got them from somebody who does have a license.

I think that's pretty much it but IANAL. Tritium vials are available for sale for use in self-luminous products. The vials themselves are pretty expensive for what they are, and they come with documentation about who initially created the vial (or how it was imported).

I have a gun with a tritium-based night sight (so the sight dots glow with no light), and it came with documentation about the provenance of each of the three tritium vials.

I also believe it is a crime to break open a sealed tritium vial.


Can I trademark that slogan? :)

And if you have a wheel without a wide axle... then you can build narrow paths instead of roads! [1] (so much for establishing rail gauges)

1: https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2011/12/how-to-downsize-a-...


My father is 15y out from a trial (at MD Anderson) that put his CLL into remission. You may already know about The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society[1] but they can help with the cost of prescriptions (including negotiating the prices down with the pharmaceutical companies!)

1: https://www.lls.org/


1st-party would likely be prevented by disabling cookies? Obviously they could fingerprint every visitor on every request, but most just set an ID cookie and check it on subsequent pages I think, since that's good enough for tracking most people (who aren't actively trying not to be tracked). Of course, that breaks things that need a session (like a cart), but depending on what you want from a site, it could be fine.

Those things help, yes. I say that it's impossible to fully block first party tracking because you must interact with the server in order to accomplish anything and those interactions can be tracked. But a third party can be cut entirely out of the loop.

There are ways to maintain a session without a cookie, but cookie is very convenient so that is mostly what is used.

Does that explain why most societies don't permit children to drive cars? Perhaps that's not based on development, but just being too short? I kid, but clearly we don't let children drive, vote, drink alcohol, have sex etc. because of general observations about their limits, including self-control.

We don't let children vote because they are not wise enough: we demand a threshold for accrued mental competence is gained. Similarly, cars give them a power similar to that of guns: hence the restriction past the threshold.

We don't let children damage themselves because it is plain indefensible. If they want to, they must have passed said formal threshold.

These are not matters of self control.


Technically in the US farmer's kids can drive at 12 without a license if they are on "farm business" including hauling massive loads, both with tractors and regular cars and trucks. If they wanted they could put an unsecured goat in the back seat of an unlicensed car and drive to town with it.

This varies by state.

Somewhat relatedly, there are US states where the age of consent (for sex with an older partner) is 13 years old, and the age of consent for marriage is 16.


Define "sex with an older partner". I'm pretty sure that for sex with someone of arbitrary older age, the age of consent is 16-18 in every state. If you're counting limited age difference then you might be right but that phrasing is misleading

Unless they block ADB, I wouldn't say it's accurate to claim they're "blocking sideloading". That said, it's clearly a balancing act between protecting people from installing malware but allowing them to intentionally install things they really do want to install, regardless of what permissions they need.

Every time the technical sophistication required to install apps from anywhere but Google's store (I don't love the term "sideloading" since it kind of denormalizes the act) is increased, the chances anyone will put in the effort to distribute apps any other way goes down. It also means apps Google doesn't want in its store are less likely to get made; I'd really like to see something that prioritizes notifications for me, for example, and I think that's against Google's rules.

I'm sure making it harder to obtain software outside a first-party app store provides some protection to some users from scams, but I really don't want that to be the answer. I don't claim to have a good one myself.


They don't, and they don't even block F-Droid. You can also just disable Play Protect (though Google won't let you while you're on a call, probably a smart move). According to the Singapore police, scammers also have victims download VPNs of Google Play to work around the regional restrictions.

I don't think the restrictions are doing much for victims. I assume Google was pressured into doing this by the authorities, or may be doing this to get in a good spot politically.


requiring a user to own a PC in order to sideload apps (with adb) would, in fact, count as blocking sideloading, albeit partially. so i don't think that's the right limit

I've sideloaded apps for other people. They don't have to own a PC but it's true that it'll slow it down, so you do have a point.

Yeah, just like you can sideload on iPhone by desoldering the flash, decrypting it, and modifying the OS.

Just because something is technically possible does not make it a solution


That's a little higher bar than plugging in a usb cable and running ADB... but I would agree that most users probably won't figure out how to sideload from a terminal.

Also, never expect AWS support to actually help with anything around billing or account setup, I had to close out an org on a project that was EOL and it was like pulling teeth, their answer to every roadblock was "you should have known you'd need to have the credentials of your former employees, because we might have demanded their payment info too, as backup" etc. I ended up having to spin back up several email accounts so I could impersonate people who'd left years earlier, just to close their accounts (including add payment info to their accounts in order to close them... mind boggling).

Ooh, guess that's why I can't log in to admin.


Portland OR has a system of free-to-use tool libraries (you pay 'library fines' if you return tools late, but checking them out is free), each quadrant of the city has one (and you can only use the one in your section of the city). For example[1]

1: https://www.neptl.org/membership/


Except that Thundarr, while having some great weird and zany plotting, took itself seriously, while Samurai Jack is a parody, an homage, and also _really beautiful_ compared to the extremely lumpy animation that seemed cool in the 80s (and I watched it on Saturday mornings back then, so I should know).

Consider applying for YC's Fall 2025 batch! Applications are open till Aug 4

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: