Top all-time · #130
Robert X. Cringely
Personal blog · cringely.comhardwarebusinessculture
Robert X. Cringely writes I, Cringely - on technology, a personal blog at cringely.com about hardware, business and culture. Since 2008, 297 different Hacker News readers have linked it 842 times, most often “Cringely suggests job losses at Microsoft should be ten times greater”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-07-16, and you can follow it by feed.
Rarely recommended · 4 of 32 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Robert X. Cringely's blog for decades of IT industry commentary, much of it about IBM, Yahoo and tech companies. Commenters value its insight, and one says he was right about a prediction; another says his past doom predictions were inaccurate.
- Recommended for · 4 comments
- Praised for 3 decades of insight, "very good" posts, and a prediction that "got this one right".
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 32 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
on technology
Most-linked posts?
- Cringely suggests job losses at Microsoft should be ten times greater7 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2009-01-23
- What Americans don’t know about H-1B visas could hurt us all6 people · 9 mentions · first linked 2012-10-24
- Why Leo Apotheker will be fired from Hewlett Packard (February 2011)6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2011-08-19
- The space race is over and SpaceX won5 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2018-04-06
- Requiem for “The Cable Guy”5 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2019-06-07
- /bout-bob/5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2018-01-16
- The Auditor's Opinion5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2026-07-17
- I, Cringely What's happening at IBM (it's dying)5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2016-03-08
- Cringely's first prediction for 2021 is about Trump prospering on the web5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2018-10-29
- Trump’s anti-H-1B order won’t be what it seems4 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2017-02-06
What Hacker News says?
I just found at the bottom of this Cringely website info page, he says there were indeed more than one person calling themselves Cringely. And he was writing for InfoWorld, not PC Week. https://www.cringely.com/bout-bob/ "Through a cruel twist of fate having to do with federal judges and unscrupulous lawyers there is, for the moment, more than one Robert X. Cringely. You are right now reading the one true Cringely,…
Comment linking /bout-bob/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Level3 is without peer, now what to do? as a story · 781 points
HN discussionhttps://www.cringely.com/bout-bob/ On How You Can Reach Him to Tell Him He’s a Dipstick Robert X. Cringely (707) 525-9519 (707) 525-9517 (fax) bob@cringely.com Bob, bob, bob...you freeeeking dipstick. You're not supposed to die that young. That wasn't part of the deal.
Comment linking /bout-bob/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Why Wind Turbines Have Three Blades as a story · 425 points
HN discussionAs far as I've been able to find, this is the last thing that Bob Cringely wrote publicly, 79 days before he passed away: https://www.cringely.com/2026/07/16/the-auditors-opinion/
Comment linking /2026/07/16/the-auditors-opinion/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted What the Heck Is Happening at Apple? as a story · 325 points
HN discussionJust read that here. So sad, tragic. https://www.cringely.com/2026/05/27/where-the-heck-have-i-be...
Comment linking /2026/05/27/where-the-heck-have-i-been-all-this-time/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Cringley: Japan may have just permanently lost 20% of its electricity supply as a story · 254 points
HN discussionDamn. I've loved Bob and his writings ever since I read Accidental Empires as a kid. He went through some crazy shit over the last few years (lost his house, almost blind). And when he started blogging again this year ( https://www.cringely.com/2026/05/27/where-the-heck-have-i-be... ), the stories got even worse (lost his son, heart attack, stroke). RIP.
Comment linking /2026/05/27/where-the-heck-have-i-been-all-this-time/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Why Microsoft bought Skype as a story · 188 points
HN discussionI first learned of the concept of “buffer bloat” from him, and how artificially limiting your upload bandwidth a bit can avoid huge lag spikes https://www.cringely.com/2011/01/04/2011-predictions-one-wor...
Comment linking /2011/01/04/2011-predictions-one-word-bufferbloat-or-is-that-two-words/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Net Neutrality will die, so let’s take the profit out of killing it as a story · 180 points
HN discussionPreviously: https://www.cringely.com/2013/04/07/cringely-comes-back-from...
Comment linking /2013/04/07/cringely-comes-back-from-the-dead-again/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Amazon Is Becoming the New Microsoft as a story · 172 points
HN discussionAnd previously this: https://www.cringely.com/2013/04/07/cringely-comes-back-from...
Comment linking /2013/04/07/cringely-comes-back-from-the-dead-again/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Cringely predicts the second coming of Java as a story · 169 points
HN discussionA sad irony in the title of one of his last blog posts, "Not dead yet! What Bob Cringely has been up to…". https://www.cringely.com/2020/01/23/not-dead-yet-what-bob-cr...
Comment linking /2020/01/23/not-dead-yet-what-bob-cringely-has-been-up-to/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Steve Jobs as a story · 164 points
HN discussionJust to confirm ... this Bob Cringely? https://www.cringely.com/bout-bob/
Comment linking /bout-bob/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted Cringely: Making 400k/yr profit on an eBook about parrots as a story · 157 points
HN discussionWhen searching to verify the veracity of this, this post made me laugh: https://www.cringely.com/2020/01/23/not-dead-yet-what-bob-cr... (Circa 2020).
Comment linking /2020/01/23/not-dead-yet-what-bob-cringely-has-been-up-to/
on “Tell HN: Bob Cringely has died”Submitted iCloud’s Real Purpose is to Kill Windows as a story · 156 points
HN discussionI still read some of the classics (surprised nobody mentioned them so far) and also a few newer ones: https://kottke.org/ https://daringfireball.net https://seths.blog https://www.freedomain.com/blog/ https://www.cringely.com https://www.zeldman.com https://captaincapitalism.blogspot.com http://quirksmode.org/blog/ http://hypercritical.co
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Favorite Blogs by Individuals?”Submitted $99 Mineserver: The Devil Is in the Details as a story · 150 points
HN discussionhttps://www.cringely.com over 3 decades of IT industry commentary and insight. he doesn't post as frequently anymore but I still enjoy it.
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Favorite Blogs by Individuals?”Submitted The Secret of iOS 7 as a story · 146 points
HN discussionRobert X. Cringely has a term for this sort of experience: being an "airport kid." http://www.cringely.com/2013/02/07/accidental-empires-part-6... When aviation was new, in the 1900s and 1910s and 1920s, the technology of flight was growing at an incredible pace. Flying was new and sexy and constantly changing. And you didn't need to be a "professional pilot" to get in on it; all you needed to do was to find someone…
Comment linking /2013/02/07/accidental-empires-part-6-chapter-1c-the-airport-kid/
on “Making the web fun again”Submitted Autodesk's John Walker Explained HP and IBM in 1991 (2015) as a story · 136 points
HN discussionDid you see Robert Cringely's article where he comes to a very similar conclusion? Ironically, although he sees the same gambit, the two of you seem to be interpreting the situation completely opposite. If I'm reading you both right, you believe Scalia was the most likely to side with Apple, whereas he thinks Scalia was a sure vote for the FBI? What’s going on is Justice Antonin Scalia is dead. Had Justice Scalia no…
Comment linking /2016/02/19/the-fbi-v-apple-isnt-at-all-the-way-you-think-it-is/
on “Snowden: FBI obscuring crucial details in Apple case”Submitted Don’t mess with IBM as a story · 135 points
HN discussion
