code structure

Casey Muratori shows how typical 'clean code' object-oriented patterns can cost large factors in performance. He benchmarks them against simpler data-oriented code.

Not Just Bikes looks at the cancelled plan to spend over $200 million widening Wonderland Road, a stroad in his hometown of London, Ontario. He asks whether the cancellation marks a turning point away from car-dependent development.

A Y Combinator video on vibe coding, the term Andrej Karpathy coined for letting LLMs write code. It reports what YC founders say about debugging, models and how much of their code is AI-written.

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment on the state of the US power grid, why it needs fixing, and the risks of aging infrastructure.

A fasterthanlime video essay arguing that GitHub Actions is a poorly designed system, with a history of personal computing and CI, and a look at how it works behind the scenes. It is sponsored by Brilliant.

Naomi Wu visits the Shenzhen offices of smartphone maker UMIDIGI in person to get them to release source code they owed under the GPLv2, and they comply.

Medlife Crisis asks whether academic research should sit behind paywalls, covering publisher profit margins, unpaid reviewers, Sci-Hub and Aaron Swartz. It includes an interview with Sci-Hub founder Alexandra Elbakyan.

Patrick Boyle analyzes SpaceX's IPO prospectus, covering its financials, speculative products, AI business, related-party dealings, compensation, and a governance structure with minimal shareholder rights.

Sabine Hossenfelder explains why she left academia, criticizing its incentives, funding and career structure. She gives a personal account of the social problems in science.

Tom Scott recounts the worst typo he ever made, a subtle mistake in code with destructive consequences at a previous job. It is a cautionary tale about irreversible operations.

John Oliver's Last Week Tonight segment covers the working conditions of US air traffic controllers and the understaffing, outdated equipment (including floppy disks) and funding structure of the FAA. It mixes comedy with policy criticism.