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The Diminishing Hawker Culture in Singapore
In the 1960s, if you wanted to make some quick money in Singapore, you'd probably become a hawker. You'd set up a pushcart stall, bring your cooking utensils and ingredients from home, arrange some tables, and voilà, you're in business. Not everyone…
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A Brief History of Dota
Blizzard has bundled a map editor program with their RTS games since Warcraft 2 and StarCraft, allowing users to create custom maps with their own rules. These maps could be shared on battle.net for everyone to download and play. The mapmaker scene took…
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Rethinking Enshittification
"Enshittification" is an overused word. Every time a company adds a feature we don't like, it's enshittification. Every time a company raises their price, it's enshittification. Switch to subscription? Enshittification. Redesign? Enshittification. Cory…
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Explaining Passkeys with Way Too Many Analogies
If you think about it, using passwords to log in is really weird. When you sign up, you're basically shouting a secret word over the ether to the server. The server hears your word, writes it down, and stores it. Then when you want to log in, you shout…
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Lucky Now Supports !Bang Syntax
It took some time, but I've finally added the 13,000+ bang shortcuts to Lucky. (It was a somewhat labor-intensive process.) Bangs in Lucky are faster than DuckDuckGo's because they don't need to go through a server. Random things about bangs you probably…
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Launch: Doomscroll
The story begins with me getting overwhelmed by RSS. When I first set up my RSS reader, I stupidly subscribed to some "general" news sites. Soon, I was flooded with news from all of them. Then I unsubscribed from them all. I concluded that RSS is good for…
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Generative AI is a Skinner Box
You already know about the Skinner box, so I'll keep it short: In the 1950s, a scientist named B.F. Skinner did some experiments with pigeons. He put them in a box with a button. In some experiments, pressing the button gave the pigeon food. In others,…
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Most People Don’t Care
Most people don't care about the colors of your websites. Most people don't care about the rise of artificial intelligence. Most people don't care about enshittification. Most people don't care about their privacy. Most people don't care about the open…
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Launch: Lucky Notes
A little while ago, I launched the Lucky app. It turns the Google search results page into "ten blue links." It also removes tracking and lets you block spammy domains. There's a problem, though. Since the search engine doesn't know who you are, it can't…
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AI Advertising
Remember the early 2000s when Google's search results were super accurate? People thought that if it continued to grow, it might become a singularity and control everything. Some even went as far as calling Google "SkyNet." Now people are saying if we…
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Why You Are Having a Hard Time Coming Up with Good, Profitable Ideas
The problem isn't about being "profitable," it's about being "good." Money-making ideas are everywhere. Many people seem to make good money with, say, a CRM. So what's stopping you from creating your own CRM and making some money? Because creating yet…
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How to Market Your SaaS in 2024
I've been thinking about SaaS marketing for some time now, and I think I've finally cracked it. The best way to market your SaaS is by posting on Twitter. Now, I know you probably have a lot of questions, but hold on. First, take $8 out of your pocket and…
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Launch: Imgpls
I wrote this app to fix a personal annoyance. You probably don't need it. I'm not an Imgur user. But in my day-to-day browsing, I sometimes encounter a wild Imgur link. And when I click that link, it takes me to the Imgur website, and the logo loads.…
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Clarifying the Yahoo and Google Confusion with Lucky
Yesterday, I launched Lucky, a Safari extension that removes the clutter from Google search results. Many people are confused by the setup instructions, so let me explain: I thought Lucky improves Google search? What does this have to do with Yahoo? Lucky…
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Launch: Lucky
Lucky is a Safari extension that removes the clutter from the Google search results page, leaving you with the 10 blue links. Update: Clarifying the Yahoo and Google confusion with Lucky. The classic copywriting formula for selling something tells you to…
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Why Do We Need Apps for Everything?
cortesoft: Why does patreon need its own app? Why can't it just be web based? I wish fewer companies had apps. I don't need an app for everything. […] So why do companies make them? Nekorosu: A lot of people (not me) use phone as their main computing…
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The Lunch Machine
Once upon a time, in a small village, there lived an eccentric inventor. This inventor was known far and wide for his strange and wonderful creations. One day, he unveiled his latest invention---a lunch machine that could cook anything you asked…
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Girls Band Cry
I started watching Girls Band Cry after seeing this middle finger video: The 3D CG animation might take some time to get used to, but it's better than a lot of other anime that use 3D CG. I heard that the animators adjust most of the scenes frame by…
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More App Review WTFs
Mittermayr, on Hacker News: I have a free (!) app (completely 100% free) on the macOS App Store. It's getting mostly 5-star reviews and has done so for many years. Good. I used to offer the app through my website mainly, but people asked for security…
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Gibberish Has Made It to the App Store
So, Gibberish has finally been approved in the App Store. I've added an In-app purchase, but it's a bit more expensive than subscribing on the web. So, it might be better to avoid subscribing through the app if you can. When I submitted the original…