Top all-time · #10563
Leigh Dodds
Personal blog · blog.ldodds.comdataprogramming
Leigh Dodds writes Lost Boy, a personal blog at blog.ldodds.com about data and programming. Since 2013, 7 different Hacker News readers have linked it 15 times, most often “Licence Friction: A Tale of Two Datasets”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2025-09-12, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (2) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link this blog's critical analysis of the What3Words geocoding algorithm, along with its discussion of related W3W articles and the copyright debate over its word lists. The comments do not assess the writing directly.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 2 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
The blog of @ldodds
Most-linked posts?
- /2016/06/14/what-3-words-jog-on-mate/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-05-02
- Licence Friction: A Tale of Two Datasets2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2020-01-25
What Hacker News says?
Here [1] is the same thread on nitter (a twitter alternative that does not require Javascript to read). Other nitter instances can be seen here: [2] The twitter thread also contained a reference to this interesting article on "Why bother with What Three Words?"[3], which itself links to other interesting articles: [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12] W3W is a neat core idea poorly thought through. Hopefully one day there'…
Comment linking /2016/06/14/what-3-words-jog-on-mate/
on “What3Words – The Algorithm”Submitted Recreating sci-fi terminals using VHS as a story · 225 points
HN discussionYou can't copyright the GPS coordinates of cities, because those are facts. The data would be the same whether you compiled it or not, and it would be absurd to grant someone a monopoly on that data. If you compile a word list yourself, you've created something that doesn't describe the factual state of the world; you've created something new. FWIW, before the debacle, even the (apparent) author of it appears to hav…
Comment linking /2016/06/14/what-3-words-jog-on-mate/
on “A Critical Analysis of the What3Words Geocoding Algorithm”Submitted Licence Friction: A Tale of Two Datasets as a story · 4 points
HN discussionSubmitted How do different communities create identifiers? as a story · 3 points
HN discussionSubmitted Types of agreement you should read when working with data as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Do data scientists spend 80% of their time cleaning data? Turns out, no? as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Let's Talk About Plugs – Standards and Data as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted The limitations of the open banking licence as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Data format design is a UX issue as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted I use my RSS reader as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Why is change discovery important for open data? as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Long Live RSS How I manage my reading as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Licence Friction: A Tale of Two Datasets as a story · 1 points
HN discussionSubmitted Thoughts on Coursera and Online Courses as a story · 1 points
HN discussion
