Hacker News Highlights

This is a recap of the top 10 posts on Hacker News on Oct 31, 2025.

Feel free to leave feedback on Github: https://github.com/denolfe/hacker-news-highlights

• (00:00) - Intro
• (00:18) - Affinity Studio now free
• (01:26) - Free software scares normal people
• (02:39) - 987654321 / 123456789
• (04:09) - How the cochlea computes (2024)
• (05:24) - Denmark reportedly withdraws Chat Control proposal following controversy
• (06:37) - NPM flooded with malicious packages downloaded more than 86k times
• (07:50) - Springs and bounces in native CSS
• (08:55) - Minecraft HDL, an HDL for Redstone
• (09:58) - Outro

Affinity Studio now free
https://www.affinity.studio/get-affinity
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45761445

Free software scares normal people
https://danieldelaney.net/normal/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45760878

987654321 / 123456789
https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2025/10/26/987654321/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45712620

How the cochlea computes (2024)
https://www.dissonances.blog/p/the-ear-does-not-do-a-fourier-transform
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45762259

Denmark reportedly withdraws Chat Control proposal following controversy
https://therecord.media/demark-reportedly-withdraws-chat-control-proposal
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45765664

NPM flooded with malicious packages downloaded more than 86k times
https://arstechnica.com/security/2025/10/npm-flooded-with-malicious-packages-downloaded-more-than-86000-times/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45755027

Show HN: I made a heatmap diff viewer for code reviews
https://0github.com
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45760321

Springs and bounces in native CSS
https://www.joshwcomeau.com/animation/linear-timing-function/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45736461

Minecraft HDL, an HDL for Redstone
https://github.com/itsfrank/MinecraftHDL
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45763877