Evan Hahn

My notes from July 2025: a post about coding quickly, reflections on three books, participation in the @zeldadungeon.net marathon, and a bunch of bookmarks. evanhahn.com/notes-from-j...

Makes sense. Thanks!

Thanks! Out of curiosity, how did you discover my post?

The results are in and our 2025 ZDM has raised $11,839 for No Kid Hungry! We are incredibly grateful to our Marathon team, ZD team, and all of our players this week.

And most importantly: YOU! If you watched, shared, donated, or chatted on stream, thank you! We are grateful for your support!

How do the sizes of local LLMs compare to the size of offline Wikipedia? evanhahn.com/local-llms-v...

@zreosq.bsky.social Small error on your website: the Patreon link incorrectly goes to Bandcamp.

The Woke Virus Continues To Spread: This Government Agency Is Attempting To Solve The Problems It Was Created To Solve In Order To Make Life Better For The Taxpayers Who Fund It

"The Woke Virus Continues To Spread: This Government Agency Is Attempting To Solve The Problems It Was Created To Solve In Order To Make Life Better For The Taxpayers Who Fund It" clickhole.com/the-woke-vir...

How I've learned to build software quickly:

- Know how good your code needs to be for the task at hand.
- Start with a rough draft.
- Try to soften requirements.
- Make small changes.
- Practice specific skills, like reading code and scripting.

More details: evanhahn.com/how-i-build-...

This month, I saw some great stuff about AI ethics, bookmarked a few resources, and doodled a rainbow. My notes from June 2025: evanhahn.com/notes-from-j...

a close up of a woman 's face with her hand on her face Alt: crying with joy

me when i find out my favorite Zeldatuber is vegan...

Notes from "Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI" Notes from Karen Hao's stellar book about OpenAI.

I just finished #EmpireOfAI by @karenhao.bsky.social. Best book I've read all year. It covers the history of OpenAI, from pre-ChatGPT to today. Super well-reported and very critical. My notes here: evanhahn.com/empire-of-ai...

"1999: Individuals use digital tools to steal intellectual property from corporations. 2025: Corporations use digital tools to steal intellectual property from individuals." notes.jim-nielsen.com#2025-06-13T0...

Getting over my grudge against the periodic table My personal grudge against chemistry, and how I softened it after reading a wonky book.

I've held a grudge against the periodic table since high school chemistry. It never made any sense to me!! But after reading "The Periodic Table: A Very Short Introduction", my grudge has softened. evanhahn.com/periodic-tab...

Yesterday, I saw a beautiful rainbow. I think it was the best rainbow I've ever seen. It inspired me to doodle a little rainbow visualization: evanhahn.com/uploads/2025...

When Array uses less memory than Uint8Array (in V8) In my simple test, Uint8Array starts to "win" after 20 items.

I wondered when, if ever, Arrays use less memory than Uint8Arrays (assuming all else is equal). So I did a simple experiment: evanhahn.com/v8-array-vs-...

Notes from May 2025 I read a lot of bad stuff about LLMs, posted a "tech jobs for good" list, and read a bunch of odds and ends.

My notes from May 2025 include a list of tech jobs for good, more problems with LLMs, and a sick C++ burn. evanhahn.com/notes-from-m...

End of 10 Windows 10 ends in 2025. Don’t buy a new PC — revive yours with Linux. It's fast, secure, and help is available to get you started.

"...what if you could make your current [Windows 10] computer fast and secure again so you can continue to use it?" endof10.org

List of "tech for good" job boards The world is in a lot of trouble right now. Many of us are wondering: how can I help?

The world is in a lot of trouble right now. Many techies are asking, "how can I help?" Here's a list of job boards I've used to try to answer that question for myself: evanhahn.com/list-of-tech...

By Default, Signal Doesn't Recall Signal Desktop now includes support for a new “Screen security” setting that is designed to help prevent your own computer from capturing screenshots of your Signal chats on Windows. This setting is a...

"'Take a screenshot every few seconds' legitimately sounds like a suggestion from a low-parameter LLM that was given a prompt like 'How do I add an arbitrary AI feature to my operating system as quickly as possible in order to make investors happy?'" signal.org/blog/signal-...

One Last Time, Discord Is Not A Suitable Replacement For Forums - Aftermath They are not the same thing

"One Last Time, Discord Is Not A Suitable Replacement For Forums" by @lukeplunkett.com aftermath.site/discord-foru...

Very true...please send me more

Notes from April 2025 Just like last month, I wrote some and I read some.

A roundup of my notes from April, including some thoughts about ads, AI, and Roman mosaics: evanhahn.com/notes-from-a...

"At your current job, find your way onto the teams implementing the technology that enables authoritarianism, and fuck it up. Drop the database by 'mistake'. Overlook bugs." drewdevault.com/2025/04/20/2...

UI tip: maybe don't round percentages to 0% or 100% evanhahn.com/maybe-dont-r...

Whoopsie daisy Bitcoin! Not so independent from the rest of the market, huh?

"If Bitcoin were—as true believers often say—a government-free currency, Donald Trump's idiot tariffs should have strengthened it." by @lopatto.bsky.social www.theverge.com/cryptocurren...

What If We Made Advertising Illegal? What if we banned all advertising? Not regulate it—abolish it. This proposal would transform manipulation machines, and maybe save democracy itself. A thought experiment worth considering.

"What If We Made Advertising Illegal?" simone.org/advertising/

@konsti.xyz Loved your post! Some other weird JS things I can think of:

- the name (is it related to Java? what is ECMAScript?)
- null vs undefined
- undefined vs "not defined"
- new Number(), etc
- ASI
- ecosystem stuff: inconsistent module support, build systems, lots of runtimes

Glad they chose this incredible photo of me

Notes from March 2025 I wrote some, I read some, and I joined Zelda Dungeon.

It's the end of March! I just published my roundup of links from the month. Highlights: essays about LLMs (mostly negative), a video guide to UI layout algorithms, and an anime recommendation.