ngdriffiths (via HN)

I think this is a really important point and to add on, there is a lot of writing that is really good, but only in a way that a niche audience can appreciate. Today’s AI can basically compete with the low quality stuff that makes up most of social media, it can’t really compete with higher quality stuff targeted to a general audience, and it’s still nowhere close to some more niche classics.

Why did the space shuttle have 5 identical flight computers? Dave Mohr

The presence of the 5th computer was not to provide an odd number of computers to avoid the ‘dilemma’ situation. In fact, the 5th GPC was programmed with software written by a completely different group of people from the group that programmed the 4 ‘primary’ computers. Early in development, it was feared that some sort of ‘generic’ bug in the primary software could cause a ‘collapse’ of the 4 primary computer ‘set’. If that happened, the outcome would be catastrophic. So, a 5th computer with a ‘Backup Flight System’ (called ‘BFS’) was created. BFS ‘listened’ to the primary 4 computers all the time, and would take over if the primary computer ‘set’ collapsed, or if called into action by a push-button that sits on top of the control stick. BFS was never used in the Space Shuttle program.

Laser writing in glass for dense, fast and efficient archival data storage, Microsoft Research Project Sillica Team

We achieve a data density of 1.59 Gbit mm−3 in 301 layers for a capacity of 4.8 TB in a 120 mm square, 2 mm thick piece of glass. The demonstrated write regimes enable a write throughput of 25.6 Mbit s−1 per beam, limited by the laser repetition rate, with an energy efficiency of 10.1 nJ per bit. Moreover, we extend the storage ability to borosilicate glass, offering a lower-cost medium and reduced writing and reading complexity. Accelerated ageing tests on written voxels in borosilicate suggest data lifetimes exceeding 10,000 years.

Trunk Based Development (via HN)

A source-control branching model, where developers collaborate on code in a single branch called ‘trunk’ *, resist any pressure to create other long-lived development branches by employing documented techniques. They therefore avoid merge hell, do not break the build, and live happily ever after.

Nick Land: Capitalism is AI - Accelerationism’s Arrival (via HN)

A deep dive into Nick Land’s main thesis that capitalism is AI