Hacker News with Generative AI: Germany

Tesla sales crash continues in Europe, with Germany down 70% (electrek.co)
Tesla’s (TSLA) sales crash continues in Europe, with more countries reporting February numbers, including Germany, down 70%.
Small German town starts testing geothermal power utilizing new techniques (apnews.com)
Residents in the German town of Geretsried have long wanted to run their buildings with clean heat and electricity from geothermal energy instead of fossil fuels.
Putin ally pushes deal to restart Nord Stream 2 with US backing (ft.com)
Ex-SAP CTO walks away with €7.1M payout after scandal (theregister.com)
SAP paid former CTO Jürgen Müller €7.1 million ($7.5 million) after he left the German software company by mutual agreement in September last year.
Germany to build hypersonic space plane (thenextweb.com)
Germany’s armed forces have commissioned Bremen-based startup Polaris to develop a two-stage, fully reusable hypersonic space plane — and given the team just three years to build it.
Political Bias on X before the 2025 German Federal Election (ucd.ie)
In advance of the elections on on 23 February 2025, a team1 led by Assistant Professor Przemyslaw Grabowicz in the UCD School of Computer Science examined whether German X users would see politically balanced news feeds if they followed comparable leading politicians from each federal parliamentary party of Germany.
Bernd das Brot, a depressed German loaf of bread (apnews.com)
Forget SpongeBob SquarePants, Sesame Street and the sourdough starter craze: a depressed German loaf of bread named Bernd das Brot is celebrating his 25th anniversary as the reluctant star of a children’s television program that accidentally became equally popular with adults.
Germany's Water Consumption Down 17% Following Nuclear Reactor Shutdowns (vdi-nachrichten.com)
Die deutsche Wirtschaft hat 2022 gegenüber 2019 gut 17 % Wasser gespart. Ursache ist vor allem der finale Ausstieg aus der Kernenergie 2021, bei dem die letzten drei AKW endgültig vom Netz gingen.
New German leader signals seismic shift in transatlantic relations (bbc.com)
Germany's chancellor-in-waiting didn't wait for the final results of his country's election on Sunday to herald a new era in Europe.
We don't need startups, we need Digital-Mittelstand (mertbulan.com)
Label it a cargo cult or something else, but countless nations strive to replicate the magic of Silicon Valley. The typical approach involves politicians designating a city and branding it as the “Silicon Valley of [Country Name].” They establish technology parks, offer financial incentives, and hope for the emergence of trillion-dollar enterprises. Yet, no country has succeeded in creating its own Silicon Valley. Why?
From Germany, a bold political push for a billionaire-free future (inequality.org)
From Germany, a bold political push for a billionaire-free future.
A World Without Elon Musks. From Germany, a push for a billionaire-free future (inequality.org)
From Germany, a bold political push for a billionaire-free future.
Ask HN: Which country have you incorp. a startup in? (ycombinator.com)
I did it in Germany. It can be quite expansive and difficult. Nowadays, I would actually consider the E-Residency from Estonia. Super interesting initiative:
Germany: Far-right political bias ahead of federal elections in X and TikTok (techcrunch.com)
Recommendation algorithms operated by social media giants TikTok and X have shown evidence of substantial far-right political bias in Germany ahead of a federal election that takes place Sunday, according to new research carried out by Global Witness.
1561 Celestial Phenomenon over Nuremberg (wikipedia.org)
An April 1561 broadsheet by Hans Glaser described a mass sighting of celestial phenomena or unidentified flying objects (UFO) above Nuremberg (then a Free Imperial City of the Holy Roman Empire). Ufologists have speculated that these phenomena may have been extraterrestrial spacecraft. Skeptics assert that the phenomenon was likely to have been another atmospheric phenomenon, such as a sun dog,[1] although the print doesn't fit the usual classic description of the phenomena.[2][3]
Policing the internet in Germany, where hate speech, insults are a crime [video] (youtube.com)
WireGuard iOS Not Available in Germany (reddit.com)
I am not able to download the iOS app and get a warning that the app is not available in my region/region. Is this normal? Also I can’t find the app via the AppStore search and needed to rely on a google link to the iOS store.
Germany's Industrial Slowdown (2023) (apricitas.io)
Germany’s economy has eked out extremely low growth over the last 5 years—recent revisions to GDP data mean its output is once again barely above pre-pandemic levels, but that still means the country has seen less than 0.5% cumulative GDP growth since late-2018.
New Specimen of Archaeopteryx Unearthed in Germany (sci.news)
Paleontologists have described a new specimen of the genus Archaeopteryx from the Mörnsheim Formation in the Franconian Alb of Bavaria, Germany.
The History of S.u.S.E (abortretry.fail)
In 1992, four college students, Roland Dyroff, Thomas Fehr, Hubert Mantel, and Burchard Steinbild in Fürth, Germany were dreaming of independence.
Watchdog ponders why Apple doesn't apply its strict app tracking rules to itself (theregister.com)
Apple is feeling the heat over its acclaimed iPhone privacy policy after a German regulator's review of iOS tracking consent alleged that the tech giant exempted itself from the rules it enforces on third-party developers.
Germany says its warships were sabotaged (businessinsider.com)
Germany's top naval officer said "more than one" of its warships were recently sabotaged.
Russia employing sophisticated DeepFakes to influence German Elections (nytimes.com)
In the first major European vote since President Trump’s re-election, influence campaigns are targeting Germany from two sides.
Tesla sales dropped 60% in Germany (electrek.co)
Tesla’s sales have dropped nearly 60% in January in Germany compared to the same period last year. The same thing is happening throughout Europe.
The World Without a Mask (1934) (scifist.net)
German action star Harry Piel accidentally invents x-ray TV in this 1934 comedy.
German court orders X to hand over election data in legal blow to Musk's platfrm (politico.eu)
A German court handed Elon Musk’s X a legal defeat, ruling that the platform must immediately provide researchers with access to data on politically related content ahead of the country’s Feb. 23 election.
German court orders X to give data access to researchers ahead of elections (techcrunch.com)
Under European Union law, X is one of a handful of major social media platforms that has a duty to facilitate public interest researchers’ access to support the study of systemic risks — such as to elections and other democratic processes. But the Elon Musk-owned company formerly known as Twitter has been blocking civil society access to platform data, according to two civil society organizations, which on Friday secured a summary judgement against X in a Berlin regional court.
Balcony solar is taking off (theguardian.com)
“If 1.5 million Germans have bought solar balcony kits there must be something in it,” he says.
They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 (1955) (press.uchicago.edu)
"What no one seemed to notice," said a colleague of mine, a philologist, "was the ever widening gap, after 1933, between the government and the people. Just think how very wide this gap was to begin with, here in Germany. And it became always wider. You know, it doesn’t make people close to their government to be told that this is a people’s government, a true democracy, or to be enrolled in civilian defense, or even to vote.
Germany: Number of unemployed highest in 10 years (dw.com)
The number of unemployed people in Germany has risen to its highest in a decade. The rise comes as the weakness of Europe's largest economy took its toll on the labor market.