Nick Bergson-Shilcock

You can do more than you think you can. New Yorker by choice. Cofounder and CEO @RecurseCenter.

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

From an article my mom wrote almost 30 years ago about what my parents did to support my interest in computers and programming:

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

@yuris @paulg Confirmed -- I remember hearing both of those things in Summer 2010.

Also: the valuations are too high.

[Mark D. Levine @MarkLevineNYC]

I was in the City Council in 2016 when we approved a major rezoning of East New York to create more housing, led courageously by then local councilmember @RLEspinal.

It was by far the most bitterly opposed housing creation plan of the past decade in NYC. Protesters tried to shut down the City Council chamber.

A decade later almost all of the proposed 6,500 homes have been built, two-thirds affordable. There has been new infrastructure and upgraded parks. The African American and Latino populations of the neighborhood have increased.

Remember all this the next time there is fierce opposition to creating housing in NYC.

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

@davidcrawshaw What about `new --cheap`?

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

Link to paper for the curious: https://t.co/DRzVuKEFW6

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

50-year-old Unix tools are better than vector search for AI agents doing search.

At least, that's my rough understanding after reading this recent paper by Zhuofeng Li et al:

"Beyond Semantic Similarity: Rethinking Retrieval for Agentic Search via Direct Corpus Interaction"

The paper formalizes what the industry has been converging on in recent months. Specifically, a good agent harness with access to Bash and standard Unix tools like `grep` and `find` can get more accurate (and cheaper) results than one that loads up its context using vector search. The authors hypothesize that this works better because these tools provide a "higher resolution" interface for the models to interact with.

A good conclusion and reminder for us humans, too: Simple frequently beats sophisticated, and it pays to really know your tools.

[Dave Hale - Concerned Republican @CountryFirstRep]

It is legitimately a tragedy that the 250th anniversary of this country's birth will be presided over by a president who is EVERYTHING the founders warned us against -- a partisan demagogue who fundamentally loathes the separation of powers and denies election results he dislikes

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

@thorstenball I think the key variable is intellectual engagement with your work. You needed to be intellectually engaged to program anything real pre-AI, but now you can get pretty far even if you're not. Lots of potential for folks (like you) who can continue to be intellectually engaged!

[Recurse Center @recursecenter]

Want to find a henge near you? Maybe plan a Manhattanhenge picnic or photoshoot? Victoria Ritvo and John Pribyl built Hengefinder while at the Recurse Center:

[Dave Hale - Concerned Republican @CountryFirstRep]

YOU WERE PRESIDENT ON JANUARY 6TH, 2021, YOU ABSOLUTE CLOWN...

[Andrew Ng @AndrewYNg]

The new White House policy requiring green card applicants to apply from outside the US is a capricious attack on legal immigration. It will hurt families, leave us with fewer doctors, teachers and scientists, and hurt American competitiveness in AI.

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

Every office should have one of these.

[Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump]

These are the people Trump wants to give millions in taxpayer dollars.

Absolutely disgraceful.

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

Rumor has it SFO will issue a travel alert for elevated risk of acquisition by Anthropic and OpenAI. If you plan to visit San Francisco, please know there's a real risk of being acquired by an AI lab after you deplane.

More seriously: congrats to the many friends who have joined the big labs recently!

Also, @RecurseCenter alums: I'll be visiting SF next month and will be hosting an alumni meetup the evening of Saturday, June 13th. DM me or check the RC calendar for details!

(No, I do not plan to sell my company, even if it would make a great post.)

[Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump]

Imagine if Biden:

• Created a $1.8 billion slush fund to hand out to rioters who assaulted police officers

• Banned the IRS from auditing him, his family, and his companies

• Accepted a $400 million luxury jet from a foreign monarchy

Pardoned hundreds of people who assaulted police officers

• Openly promoted his own meme coin while in office

• Had family members cutting international business deals while he was in office and directly profiting from them

• Repeatedly “joked” about staying in office past two terms

• Repeatedly praised Xi, Putin, and Kim Jong Un

The outrage would never end.

The fact that people are becoming numb to this level of corruption is insane.

[Recurse Center @recursecenter]

Our website automatically updates as more people come to join a batch at the Recurse Center. Today, we finally hit 3,000 people!

Thank you to everyone in our growing community! RC couldn't exist without you all. 👫👩🏽‍🤝‍👩🏼👬

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

@joemorton @recursecenter Thank you!

[Nick Bergson-Shilcock @nicholasbs]

200 alums came back to celebrate the @RecurseCenter's 15th birthday last night.

We had a custom cake packed with programming jokes (plus real electronics with edible licorice wires), a giant inflatable octopus, an animatronic octopus that dances with you, robot karaoke, and an interactive art game using projection mapping.

Before cutting the cake, we counted down from 15, CracklePop-style.

Thanks to the team and all the Recursers who volunteered, and to everyone who came out.

[Recurse Center @recursecenter]

As seen in the RC Hub:

[Recurse Center @recursecenter]

Never Graduate Week is in full swing! 💐
Talks, jams, BBQs, and more!

[Recurse Center @recursecenter]

We’ve kicked off our annual alum reunion, Never Graduate Week 2026!

Hundreds of RC alums gather at our Brooklyn hub to give talks, run jams, collaborate on projects, and so much more. Welcome everyone and thank you for coming!

Stay tuned for more across the week.