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2023-05-06

Htmx Is the Future

  • Many web applications use complex single-page applications, which can be inaccessible for some users and have high development costs.
  • HTMX is a new approach that enhances hypermedia capabilities, enabling a smoother user experience without JavaScript and reducing development complexity.
  • HTMX allows developers to use their existing toolsets and knowledge, supports users who cannot use JavaScript, and offers simpler development with fewer required libraries.

Industry Reactions

  • The discussion emphasizes the importance of considering the specific needs of an application when choosing a development framework rather than simply following the latest trend
  • HTMX, a hypermedia library, is presented as a potential solution to the complexity of web frameworks, enabling progressive enhancement and decoupling the client and server through a uniform interface

Heisting $20M of Magic: The Gathering Cards in a Single Request

  • An exploit was discovered in Magic: The Gathering Arena that allowed users to purchase millions of card packs for "free" using a user-controlled arithmetic overflow.
  • The exploit took advantage of the client-side price calculation in the purchase order and used overflow to get the price as close to 0 as possible.
  • The vulnerability has been patched, and the discovery showcases the power of simple bugs and the value of digital goods.

Industry Reactions

  • The vulnerability was caused by integer overflow, raising concerns about vulnerable code in the industry and the lack of server-side verification.
  • Discussions around the use and validation of dynamic pricing in games, including validation through server or client-side calculations, and various ways of handling purchases against a changing store environment.

Build your own private WireGuard VPN with PiVPN

  • PiVPN is a solution for remotely accessing home network devices without relying on cloud services or multiple apps for different devices.
  • It runs on any Pi-like device and allows users to pick between two VPN stacks: OpenVPN or WireGuard.
  • With a stable DNS name and IP address, users can install PiVPN and connect to it from another device with WireGuard to access their home network remotely.

Industry Reactions

  • Alternative VPN options include Tailscale, OpenWRT, and Outline/Shadowsocks as solutions to state-wide censorship.
  • Users discuss potential risks and challenges, such as fingerprinting and detection by China's Great Firewall, and improving security with post-quantum key exchanges.

Public Money, Public Code

  • The campaign for "Public Money, Public Code" advocates for publicly financed software developed for the public sector to be made publicly available under a Free and Open Source Software license.
  • The benefits of using publicly available code include tax savings, collaboration, serving the public, and fostering innovation.
  • More than 220 organizations and 35,108 individuals have signed the open letter, demanding legislation requiring publicly financed software to be publicly available under an open-source software license.

Industry Reactions

  • The article discusses a campaign called "Public Money, Public Code," which advocates for code produced with public funds to be open-sourced, with some suggesting exceptions for sensitive government software.
  • Code.gov is a US government initiative that allows for select code to be open-sourced under specified licenses, with supporters highlighting the potential cost savings and transparency, while opponents argue that closed source software is less work and provides some level of privacy.

What is a Vector Database? (2021)

  • Pinecone has launched a vector database that is designed to efficiently process data for AI models.
  • Vector databases offer optimized storage and querying capabilities for vector embeddings, which have a large number of attributes, making storage and querying a challenge.
  • Pinecone's vector database offers various features such as metadata storage and filtering, scalability, real-time updates, backups and collections, ecosystem integration, data security, and access control.

Industry Reactions

  • It discusses vector databases used for storing and querying embeddings and mentions various open-source and cloud-based options available.
  • The challenges of scaling vector databases and optimizing their performance and stability are also touched upon.

Element is one of fourteen messaging apps blocked by Central Indian Government

  • The Central Indian Government has blocked 14 messaging apps, including Element, due to Section 69A of the Information Technology Act 2000.
  • Element is a small company with their Legal, Compliance and Trust & Safety functions based in the UK, and they respect local laws where obligated to cooperate with authorities required by law.
  • The ban on Element may be due to a misunderstanding around decentralized and federated services, and undermining end-to-end encryption attacks people's basic right to privacy and security of communications.

Industry Reactions

  • India's ruling party, BJP, is accused of authoritarianism and hindering democracy. The government defends new rules, saying they are designed to protect national security and prevent criminal activity, but experts argue end-to-end encryption still provides confidentiality of message content.
  • The ban highlights the importance of encryption and freedom of speech, particularly in countries with authoritarian tendencies, and raises important questions about the balance between national security and individual privacy and freedom of expression.

The EARN IT bill is back. We've killed it twice, let's do it again

  • The EARN IT bill has been reintroduced, aiming to scan messages and photos for child exploitation but raises concerns about potential impacts on encryption and free speech.
  • The bill threatens encryption and security of communications by allowing courts to consider using end-to-end encryption as evidence of guilt in crimes related to child exploitation.
  • Opposition from human rights activists and digital rights groups seeks to stop the bill from becoming law, urging Congress to explore more tailored approaches and to conduct a full independent internet impact assessment.

Industry Reactions

  • The bill has failed to pass twice before and has been criticized by privacy advocates
  • Suggestions for fixing the system include repealing the 17th amendment, campaign finance reform, and limiting the government's ability to encroach on privacy.

I found the best anagram in English (2017)

  • The author constructed a listing of all the anagrams in Webster's Second International dictionary.
  • The author was unhappy with the results of the listing as many of the anagrams were uninteresting or trivial.
  • The author developed a scoring system to judge anagrams based on the number of chunks one had to be cut into to rearrange it to make the other one. The author found the best anagram in English to be "cinematographer megachiropteran," which means giant bat.

Industry Reactions

  • One user writes a program to generate anagrams for longer phrases and finds eerie coincidences like Saddam Hussein/damns Saudis and Ronald Wilson Reagan/insane Anglo warlord.
  • The thread also explores best practices for hash manipulation and finding "most rhyming" words in English, with an APL one-liner provided for generating anagrams.

Journalist writes about discovering she'd been surveilled by TikTok

  • A Financial Times journalist discovered that she had been surveilled by TikTok after ByteDance accessed her data through her TikTok account.
  • The incident is just one in a series of scandals and crises that question what TikTok is and whether it has a world-dominating future as it faces security concerns and government scrutiny.
  • TikTok's ever-learning algorithm and personalized content have made it one of the fastest growing companies in the industry, with over three billion downloads and global users spending 52 minutes per day on the app, but such success also made it a target for Beijing's recent crackdown on Big Tech.

Industry Reactions

  • Debate surrounds banning TikTok due to Chinese surveillance concerns and proposed surveillance bills in the US.
  • Suggestions for potential solutions include banning all spy apps or limiting apps from certain countries.

Unlimiformer: Long-Range Transformers with Unlimited Length Input

  • Unlimiformer is a new long-range transformer model that can process an unlimited length input.
  • This model uses a sliding memory mechanism to avoid computational inefficiency in dealing with long sequences.
  • Unlimiformer outperforms other state-of-the-art models in several benchmark tasks.

Industry Reactions

  • Some criticize the misleading title, which could create hype around the idea of "transformer with unlimited context length."
  • Unlimiformer may significantly improve natural language processing technology, but some ML teams may not be aware of it, leading to missed opportunities.