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Apologies for a trivial question. I have an odd fascination about the edge cases of birthright citizenship.

If a non- citizen gave birth in an American embassy, would their child be entitled to US citizenship? What about US Antarctic Territory or aboard a boat within US coastal waters?


Congratulations YC! I remember prior to HN, pg used to post his essays to Slashdot under the username Bugbear and all the attendant sniping and lame memes that would come back in response. Hacker News was a breath of fresh air and continues to be my favourite online community.


Thankfully, Natalie Portman setup a Beowulf cluster with hot grits to handle my memes!

I quite like(d) that silliness - but your could always choose to downgrade and hide 'funny' posts. I still miss the post/comment visibility functions from Slashdot.

Looks like pg 'joined' 6 Oct 2006; so we've a bit to wait for the HN 20th anniversary.


I wonder how they start them. Park at the top of a hill?


That's one way, but I suspect that even if they did disconnect the alternators, they could just charge the batteries overnight.

On the other hand, alternators should make way less EM noise than ignition coils.


It's a pity they didn't discuss 2-way charging


I was in your position with web development and went back to uni to get a mechanical engineering degree. Started at 38 and graduated at 42. I’ve been working at it for 10 years now and specialise in designing data centres funnily enough. There’s much less ageism in “physical” engineering work which is positive but I also took a very large hit in seniority and compensation to switch. In hindsight, moving sideways into non-web development may have been a good option too but in the end it all comes down to what you find fulfilling. I’m more proud that I’ve helped build things that last like children’s hospitals and geothermal heating for local swimming pools. Sounds like taking a break first may be a good idea. Good luck!


This was my plan too, until I realized I'd start at 40 and finish at like 45 or 46. Would any company/engineering firm hire a mid-life intern with no engineering experience?


Absolutely. There was a student in his 50’s in my graduating year who was an aviation mechanic previously. There’s also a lot of opportunities at engineering firms for developers. Start that way and see if you like it maybe.


That's good to know, thank you! It's a dream I hope to pursue someday soon...

I didn't know engineering firms hired developers (what for? CAD stuff, or...?) That's a great idea, though.


It's a great way to get started if you're already a developer. Here's some of the stuff my company is doing in the digital space: https://www.aurecongroup.com/expertise/digital-engineering-a...

They like to showcase the visualisation and AI stuff but there's also a lot of development doing stuff like parametric modelling plus everyday CRUD apps for internal systems etc.


Not just that but, if you need to finance that degree, you need to also consider how long you're going to be paying it off.


Fair point. I did my mech eng degree in Australia where university is heavily subsidised for citizens. Total cost for the 4 year degree here was $32,000 (roughly $21,560USD at today’s exchange rate)


What's wrong with Wolfie?


For the culturally deprived, a Terminator 2 reference:

<https://bw.vern.cc/terminator/wiki/Max>

<https://yewtu.be/watch?v=uaWw5wuBPs4>


I prefer the term “culturally challenged”.


Or in this specific instance: unterminated.


Your parents are dead


One of my earliest jobs as a mechanical engineer was checking the pneumatic tube shop drawings for Perth Children's Hospital. Basically looking for bends with too small a radius and appropriate collars through firewalls.

One of the engineers suggested adding a transparent loop the loop passing through the public atrium for a bit of fun but predictably this was denied.


I don’t suppose you have any links to good layman articles about how these work? I am particularly interested in the early systems.


Any specific safety reasons?


No - I think the architects just weren't fans.


It will be interesting to see if there's an Osborne Effect on iPhone 15 (non-pro) sales now that the model is effectively stuck with brain-dead Siri.


Nothing? If you're acting like the sea witch in "The Little Mermaid" you're probably doing something wrong.


Key difference here is that Scarlett still has her voice.


Ah, violating copyright is not a crime, I see.


The comment I responded to made the statement that OAI behaved like the sea witch who literally stole someone's voice. That is not the case here, since Scarlett still has her voice and OAI only (allegedly?) copied it. Whether OAI violated copyright law is a different matter, but steal her voice they did not.


Yoko would have made a great Wormtongue though


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