Man, you won't believe the stuff that popped up on Hacker News today. It was a pretty wild Monday!

Age Verification and Your Data

First off, there was this huge discussion about age verification online. The article (The Age Verification Trap) was basically saying that trying to verify everyone's age just ends up messing with everyone's data protection. People in the comments were super worried about how governments and sites could collude to track you, even with fancy "zero-knowledge" proofs. Someone even asked, if you can pay for stuff online without the site knowing your credit card, why can't you prove your age without them knowing anything about you?

Ladybird Browser Gets Rust-y with AI Help

Then, get this, the Ladybird browser project is adopting Rust, and they're using AI to help translate their C++ code! How cool is that? People were saying this could totally change how fast big language migrations happen, making Rust a much more appealing choice for complex projects. Even if the code still has a "translated from C++" vibe, it's a huge step.

Americans Fighting Surveillance Cameras

This one's wild: Americans are apparently destroying Flock surveillance cameras! People are clearly fed up with these things. The comments pointed out how these cameras often get "gifted" to police by foundations, which lets them bypass public oversight. So, it's not just about privacy, it's about transparency and local politics too.

Pope Says No to AI Sermons

Even the Pope got in on the tech news! He told priests to use their brains, not AI, to write homilies. Makes sense, right? Comments were saying that while AI can churn out text, for something as personal and context-specific as a sermon, you really need that human touch and understanding of the congregation.

Elsevier Shuts Down Citation Cartel

Big news for academics: Elsevier shut down its finance journal citation cartel. Apparently, they were doing some shady stuff with how papers were cited to boost certain journals. It's a win for scientific integrity, though some folks are still debating if just relying on "social fabric" of researchers is better than flawed metrics.

Binance and the Iran Sanctions Drama

And in crypto news, Binance reportedly fired employees who found $1.7 billion in crypto was sent to Iran. Crazy, right? Just shows how complicated and political crypto can get, especially when it comes to international sanctions and compliance. Lots of drama there.

Hetzner Prices Soar, Blame AI?

Lastly, for anyone using European hosting, Hetzner is hiking prices by up to 38%! The comments were buzzing, with a lot of people saying the AI boom is driving up hardware costs and making things tougher for everyone else. One user even called it "funny money moving around in the AI sector" damaging other parts of the economy. Ouch.

So yeah, pretty eventful day on the internet! Talk soon, man!