> I also wanted to confirm with a human on exactly what went wrong

They wouldn't be able to tell you. The entire back end system is probaby vibe-coded and nobody really understands what it does.

vs. trusting someone else to do all that for you, and do you then verify that it gets done properly?

When buying the infrastructure as a managed cloud service, yes, I trust that they've got people handling it better than I could myself. The value proposition is that I don't even see the underlying infrastructure below a certain level, and they take care of it.

I will always be in awe of people who can remain diligent doing this level of journaling/personal information management.

I've got scraps of paper and legal pads and post-it notes and just throw them away after they've been sitting around for a while and I forget what they are about.

Just emails? I get all that plus half a dozen text messages.

STOP

Permanently block this number? [yes] [no]

I think a lot of people need prompting for something to talk about. They have no confidence that topics they bring up will be interesting to anyone else. So any kind of gathering that takes that pressure off will be attractive.

I've been trying to come up with some interesting prompts after observing just asking someone "What's been happening" yields nothing but "Oh not much, work". So far the old classics of just probing in to what they do for work, what they did last weekend, etc and then finding any bit of info to drill down in to more interesting topics works best.

Also very important to recognize most conversation starters are someone serving the ball to you, you need to hit it back with a continuation. If you're giving one word dead end answers you've just caught the ball and dropped it.

Tangential, but I've been following your comments for years now and I have to say whatever you've discovered seems to be serving you well.

You're seriously 1000x more likeable than even just a couple of years ago.

I was a bit surprised to read this. I didn't think I'd stand out in the sea of comments here. But to this, since a couple of years ago I had a break up, moved city, quit all social media and went outside to real events. HN is the only place I still comment on.

That’s crazy, you’ve never been to a party?

Sure. Most people are there with an agenda. ABC.

Do you mean most people go to parties to close deals?

Commonly - though the deal to close is marriage (or sometimes a one night stand).

actually its true, I guess:

I have been in partying in my teens and twens, 3 years somehow "heavily". When I turned 40, I found out the only reason I went to parties and clubs for me was to meet girls.

> Do you mean most people go to parties to close deals?

It sounds like the concept of social/civic organizations caught you by surprise.

In one way or another, yes.

I do powerlifting 3x a week but I don't otherwise view myself as obsessed with it. I don't have a coach, I don't enter competitions. I know my PRs in my head but I don't keep spreadsheets or stats or have any kind of real programming. I don't video my lifts, I don't post about it on social media. I'm just content with getting stronger.

I really don't get obsessed with anything, which might be a fault as that seems to be a trait of people who are really successful in what they do.

On the other hand, it's the one type of exercise I have actually been able to stick with for any length of time. Started about 5 years ago at age 55. So never too late to try it, even if exercise has never been appealing to you.

ditto. I don't have great numbers, my bench is terrible, not even 1.5x BW, but I did manage to get my DL to ~2.5x in a competition, then tweaked my back and now only double overhand, which means my grip tends to go when I get to ~2x BW (my gym doesn't allow chalk, and I don't use straps, so it is what it is).

LLMs/Chat-based systems will reach a point where Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads, Instagram, etc. are all unnecessary. The idea of opening a browser or a specific app to do a thing will seem antiquated. You can do it all with your chat-based agent. Meta wants to be part of that.

I don't think everyone only wants to talk to machines going forward...?

I don't want to do it now. But that seems to be where we are being headed, like lemmings running for the cliff.

Sure but they have the platforms, they don’t need their own frontier models for that

The platforms will be irrelevant at some point. "Posting to Facebook" won't be a thing.

This is also the goal of private companies.

The bullshitter does have an objective in mind however. There is some ultimate purpose to his bullshitting. LLMs don't even have that. They just spew words.