Swift was the beginning of the end of macOS. It signaled the exit of a ton of NEXT people, and a completely new regime -totally disconnected from what came before- being allowed to run the show.

The quality drop around the time it was introduced was staggering. One example: In the Objective-C days we had extensive, reliable and up-to-date documentation including entire developer guides (book-length PDFs) for all aspects of the OS. These days, besides half-broken frameworks and missing docs, you're lucky if you find out how things work from a WWDC video.

How can one argue against the disaster that is Tahoe? What kind of engineering culture not only produces something this broken but pretends it's OK? Jobs would have fired half the OS division for something half as bad.

It’s hard to argue against what Zitron is focusing on, as it’s just numbers and simple analysis.

What Dan Luu is doing with that post is an act of misdirection (if not clumsy attempt at character assassination): avoiding the entirety of Zitron’s numbers and analysis (which can’t be refuted) and instead narrowly focusing on “predictions” that one can spin a hundred different ways.

If that’s convincing to the extent that you are dismissing Zitron’s numbers and analysis, you have a major critical thinking problem.

Zero calories doesn’t mean it’s healthy, as all those drinks are loaded with artificial sweeteners some of which have a strong insulin response and are also associated with cancer.

> and are also associated with cancer.

Last time I looked into this, the strongest research showed "we looked and couldn't find any evidence it's not associated with cancer".

That is, to hear "artificial sweeteners = cancer, I'm better off with the sugary drinks" was the wrong conclusion to take.

I haven't seen evidence that artificial sweeteners cause a strong insulin response, but would certainly love to. Can you point me to such evidence?

Here are a few papers:

1. Sucralose increases peak insulin response when co-ingested with carbs: "Sucralose Affects Glycemic and Hormonal Responses to an Oral Glucose Load" (Pepino et al., 2013, Diabetes Care) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23633524/ Finding: Consuming sucralose 10 minutes prior to an oral glucose tolerance test increased peak plasma insulin levels by ~20% and decreased insulin clearance compared to water.

2. Microbiome-driven glycemic & insulin dysregulation: "Personalized microbiome-driven effects of non-nutritive sweeteners on human glucose tolerance" (Suez et al., 2022, Cell) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35987213/ Finding: A randomized trial showing saccharin and sucralose alter gut microbiota composition, leading to personalized impairments in glucose tolerance and postprandial insulin responses.

3. Reduced insulin sensitivity from daily intake: "Sucralose decreases insulin sensitivity in healthy subjects: a randomized controlled trial" (Romo-Romo et al., 2018, AJCN) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30535090/ Finding: 14 days of daily sucralose intake significantly decreased insulin sensitivity in healthy young adults compared to placebo.

4. Direct pancreatic beta-cell mechanism: "Sweet Taste Receptor Expressed in Pancreatic β-Cells Activates the Calcium and Cyclic AMP Signaling Systems and Stimulates Insulin Secretion" (Nakagawa et al., 2009, PLoS ONE) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19352508/ Finding: Sweet-taste receptors (T1R2/T1R3) expressed on pancreatic beta-cells bind sweeteners (sucralose, Ace-K, saccharin), mobilizing intracellular cAMP and Ca2+ to stimulate insulin secretion.

Almost nobody programs in functional style in Common Lisp, even though it’s possible. In the vast majority of CL programs there’s tons of global state and yet one learns quickly how to architect and structure the program in order to make image based development and runtime code modification a breeze.

So no, the magic sauce is not “functional”, it’s that CL stemming from the Lisp Machine paradigm is designed for that sort of experience whereas something like Python very much isn’t. And it shows (there’s no image based development in Python that doesn’t end up creating more problems than it solves but image based development is not only the norm in CL but also tremendously empowering).

"one learns quickly how to architect and structure the program in order to make image based development and runtime code modification a breeze."

Are you sure this isn't just doing functional programming, and not realizing it?

Yes I’m sure. Take a careful look at Symbolics Genera or even Emacs and you will realize that functional has nothing to do with it.

I am surprised that Kindle isn’t dead yet just based on Amazon horrible business practices and the fact their product is a DRM hell fest that shoves anti-consumer behavior down your throat. People are either too lazy or love being sheep I guess.

I’ve had a Kobo for many years, with calibre sideloading and managing my DRM-free library of ePUBs fully owned by me, and never looked back.

normies — who make up 99+% of e-reader users — haven't a clue what "calibre sideloading" and "DRM-free library of ePUBs" means. That's why Kindle isn't just not dead but thriving.

Disparaging normies by describing them as "People [who] are either too lazy or love being sheep" is rather judgmental.

I'm honestly surprised that people don't manage to find Anna's Archive when they can save a lot of money there.

I'm not sure about where you are but in Holland everyone was downloading movies and TV shows in the early 2000s. When Netflix came to Europe that changed though I do expect it to go back to that now that the content has been spread over tens of platforms with every rising prices and annoying ads.

1. The fact that effort is required to know about and find Anna's Archive makes it non-existent to normies.

2. I am in the U.S.

3. >everyone was downloading movies and TV shows in the early 2000s.

Not normies; everyone in this case = HN-user types/techies, a very small portion of the general population.

Hmm no, everyone really was.

I would visit people who were totally not technical and they'd have a PC in their livinroom with FTD on it (which was the typical Dutch piracy tool at that time). Popcorntime was there for the even less technical people. It was as easy as click and play, really. They didn't really know what they were doing but everyone has some smartass nephew who can set stuff like that up.

I find it very hard to understand that people who had no issue using windows 95 or XP and installing something like FTD can now not find anything.

I have to agree that it's harder to find Anna's archive than I thought, when I type "Download books for free" in duckduckgo it doesn't come up with Anna's Archive (or Z-Library or library genesis for that matter), if I type the names it does come up though.

Seems pretty pro consumer that you can easily purchase books online and have them at once on your device to read.

That's why they have many consumers.

Productivity modes were used a lot with the AGA machines. By that time, VGA monitors were cheap and plentiful.

I knew a few owners of 1200s and 4000s. They all had 1084 monitors. I had a VGA monitor on my 3000 though.

That's one reason why adding fast ram (= exclusive access by the CPU) to an Amiga 1200 doubled the speed of the machine for most workloads without changing the CPU.

I spent years programming in Objective-C and loved it, it became one of my favorite languages. Swift has been a colossal letdown, as in "what were they thinking?!" but unsurprising if one pays attention to how macOS has (re|pro)gressed in the last decade.

If you can look past the dated graphics, the OG Deus EX is by far the better game and one of the best games of all time. The writing and philosophy alone elevates the game to masterpiece status. They dumbed down down these core elements in sequels to focus on better graphics and simpler mechanics and these games are far worse for it.