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Matthew Butterick
matthewbutterick.com · Personal blog · on HN since 2022
Matthew Butterick, a lawyer, typographer, and software developer, writes on typography, copyright, open source, AI, and capitalism.
What HN saysCommenters cite his essays on AI and capitalism as a strong argument and praise his fonts, linking him to law and software.
31HN people shared it
8linked it in comments
28stories submitted
913story points
5 months agolast shared
2022people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1Will AI obliterate the rule of law?6 people · 8 points · first shared 2023 · 1 comments on HN
- 2Extinction-Level Capitalism4 people · 10 points · first shared 2026 · 2 comments on HN
- 3Homepage4 people · first shared 2022
- 4The Copyrightability of Fonts Revisited3 people · 4 points · first shared 2025 · discussion on HN
- 5What Copilot means for open source2 people · 107 points · first shared 2022 · 137 comments on HN
- 6The Collapse of Complex Societies2 people · 31 points · first shared 2025 · 8 comments on HN
- 7Please go away, Tim Berners-Lee (2019)2 people · 15 points · first shared 2022 · 3 comments on HN
- 8Does Software Piracy Exist?2 people · 11 points · first shared 2025 · 4 comments on HN
- 9Domination: A contrarian view of AI risk (2024)2 people · 3 points · first shared 2024 · discussion on HN
- 10Justice Stevens reads the fine print1 people · 272 points · first shared 2022 · 219 comments on HN
- 11What we can deduce from a leaked PDF1 people · 251 points · first shared 2022 · 291 comments on HN
- 12Two Vexing Problems in Functional Programming1 people · 183 points · first shared 2022 · 210 comments on HN
- 13Layers of Lawyers and Liars1 people · 7 points · first shared 2025 · 1 comments on HN
- 14The End of the Beginning1 people · 3 points · first shared 2024 · discussion on HN
- 15Chief Justice John Roberts on AI and the Judiciary1 people · 3 points · first shared 2024 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
DarkUranium · 2026-06-16
There's a (IMO) great, if a bit long, article making exactly your argument. I found it on HN a few days ago: (lost the HN link, sorry)
https://matthewbutterick.com/extinction-level-capitalism.html
vorpalclub · 2025-06-13
Just a thought: I think it would be neat if you could include one of Mathew Butterick’s fonts (https://matthewbutterick.com/), as a fellow lawyer/software developer. I don’t know how practical that is, but it’s a smallish club and they are very pretty fonts.
gglitch · 2023-05-12
Nice. A Matthew Butterick [0] font [1], and it feels like a Butterick-informed project [2].
[0] https://matthewbutterick.com/
[1] https://mbtype.com/fonts/valkyrie/
[2] https://practicaltypography.com/how-this-book-was-made.html
Edit: Oops, I see it is explicitly acknowledged: https://www.onedayyoullfindyourself.com/acknowledgements.html
gavinhoward · 2023-05-10
"AI" changes things by making it even harder for individuals to defend against.
Right now, we have FOSS organizations that will help you in lawsuits against companies that don't follow licenses. With "AI" in the picture, companies can launder your code with "plausible" deniability. [1]
[1]: https://matthewbutterick.com/chron/will-ai-obliterate-the-rule-of-law.…
crabmusket · 2023-04-22
This is a great framing. I also appreciated this similar idea in Matthew Butterick's blog:
> Before too long, we will not delegate decisions to AI systems because they perform better. Rather, we will delegate decisions to AI systems because they can get away with everything that we can’t. You’ve heard of money laundering? This is human-behavior laundering. At last—plausible deniability for everything. [1]
While in a corporation there's still a person somewhere who could be held accountable, AI diffuses this even more.
[1]: https://matthewbutterick.com/chron/will-ai-obliterate-the-rule-of-law.…
saint-loup · 2023-01-07
Here is a dedicated website from the plaintiffs team.
https://githubcopilotlitigation.com/
Interestingly, Matthew Butterick (of Practical Typography fame) is co-counsel on this. Programmer, lawyer and typesetting expert, damn.
https://matthewbutterick.com/
gcmrtc · 2022-11-03
Looks like that lawyer guy is not new on hacking stuff: https://matthewbutterick.com/
Not exactly the curriculum of a twitter weirdo.
RamblingCTO · 2022-11-03
Hah, funny. I've used Pollen before and think I've had contact with him a few years ago! The blah blah about AI elevating the world is still bs imho. I still disagree with his views (https://matthewbutterick.com/chron/this-copilot-is-stupid-and-wants-to… and this law suit.
I wasn't actually talking about him specifically btw when saying "this sounds like a crypto bro from twitter". The overly enthusiastic AI talk reminded me of that, that's what I wanted to say.