A real person, a lot like you

by terpua • 16 years ago

624 139 16 years ago

raffi2• 16 years ago

I remember there was a thread here a while ago about the most vicious attacks we've experienced.

I don't think I get it too bad, but I do get them. I wonder where people come from saying some of the things they do, even here.

billswift2• 16 years ago

A big problem here and most blogs is that you have to respond quickly or very few people will ever read your response. I prefer to think about things longer than is really possible when commenting on-line, which is why I don't comment as much as most people.

abstractbill4• 16 years ago

Very insightful (as is usual from Derek!).

I've developed a nice thick skin while working at justin.tv, but in the early days I'll admit some of the contact I had with our users was pretty devastating. At times I was simultaneously trying to scale the chat server code to handle more and more users, fighting off a bunch of script-kiddie attacks, and replying to emails telling me I must be just about the most useless programmer in the world :)

smokey_the_bear• 16 years ago

One of the best things about my co-founder is that he's thicker skinned than me. Some of our user email makes me really upset, but he just cheerfully replies so I don't have to dwell on it.

patio11• 16 years ago

For those of us who don't have the luxury of human firewalls, I recommend a puppet. The puppet answers the emails so that you don't have to. He says whatever needs to be said to bring the business and customer to a successful resolution. The puppet has no ego, the puppet has no worries, the puppet has no deep-seated need for approval, the puppet exists only to reach mutually beneficial solutions.

My puppet has gotten through a couple of cheerful responses to emails which, if I had read them myself, would have left me unable to sleep for weeks.

My puppet also reports that the worst one had a follow-up "Thanks for getting back to me! Oh sorry I was so stressed yesterday lol." The puppet lols, too.

davidedicillo• 16 years ago

Wanna talk about thick skin? Try being a soccer referee in Italy...

davidw• 16 years ago

But the kickbacks make it all worth it, right? ;-)

duck• 16 years ago

Everyone should read this and think about it. We all do it from one degree or another, especially when you think about the ignoring example. The web connects us to more people than we can imagine, but we often act as though we would never meet them face to face - and that is where true connections come from.

tjarratt• 16 years ago

Looks like not everyone has read the rules of Netiquette! It really amazes me how often people can write scathing letters and not realize that they are going to hurt individuals that are responsible for maintaining / running services and websites.

The only conceivable explanation is that these are people that have never been responsible for something public facing and hence have never been criticized unfairly.

keefe5• 16 years ago

On the other hand side, people should just man the hell up and stop caring. OMG somebody sent me an angry email. I've gotten dozens, who cares? OMG the girl on the dating site didn't respond to me, along with the other 500 I messaged, who cares? All I care about are my goals. I'll manage the client and if I lose him, move on to find another. I'll keep messaging until a girl responds to me, then go from there. People need to understand that there ARE hundreds of people online and just chill out about reacting to things like that. I don't bitch people out because it's counterproductive, but who cares, seriously.

benwerd• 16 years ago

I'm not sure how healthy it is to think about people entirely in terms of goals or statistics.

axod5• 16 years ago

OTOH How healthy is it to get hung-up/offended/upset about random internet strangers?

cynicalkane• 16 years ago

This is the correct response to people that behave rudely, but it's not an excuse to behave rudely.

axod5• 16 years ago

Being rude usually means you care about something. It's better to get 10 angry ranting emails, than not get any emails at all.

generalk• 16 years ago

On the other hand side, people should just man the hell up and stop caring.

Some people take these things hard. I'm one of them, some days. Developing a thick skin is important, but I would never view "stop caring" as a positive way to deal with anything.

axod5• 16 years ago

I think he means "Stop caring about random strangers on the internet".

ubiqts2• 16 years ago

i think of "stop caring" as in...care about it on a professional standpoint but don't ever take things personally.

raffi2• 16 years ago

Sometimes the angry sounding posts online are just a front. When I was a teenager full of angst, I'd write stuff like this online too. If you ever want to get a beer, and you know, share your feelings--I'm here for you man.

ubiqts2• 16 years ago

you bring up a good point. Having been fostered in the world of ecommerce, I've dealt with my share of angry customers. I've found that people find every chance they can get to get a discount or get something if they're remotely not happy with what they get.

sometimes you gotta cut your losses and remind yourself that some customers aren't worth servicing.

mpk• 16 years ago

The book 'The four hour work week' mentions a case where the author eventually decided to cut all the customers that were taking up the majority of his time in support, hand-holding, etc and just went with the bulk customers that were happy with his service.

nazgulnarsil• 16 years ago

I would argue that we seek out communities where we don't have to do this.

antipaganda• 16 years ago

You make good points, but something is definitely lost when someone is forced to give up a sensitive personality due to an overly-abrasive society. Politeness is good for us.

keefe5• 16 years ago

Politeness is good for us. Weakness is not.

dnsworks2• 16 years ago

This used to be why I liked OKCupid. If you rated somebody with a 1-star rating, and they did the same, then OKC told you, and there were no hurt feelings, just "hey they're not interested". At some point someone got hurt feelings, and the instantaneous feedback of "if I give her a 1 star, do I get an email telling me she's not interested, since women tend to be indirect and not want to hurt feelings" went away. It turned into a wall you threw your introductory messages over, with a bottom-less pit on the other side of the wal.

billswift2• 16 years ago

"Moving parts in rubbing contact require lubrication to avoid excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness [good manners] provide lubrication where people rub together. Often the very young, the untraveled, the naive, the unsophisticated deplore these formalities as "empty", "meaningless", or "dishonest", and scorn to use them. No matter how "pure" their motives, they thereby throw sand into machinery that does not work too well at best."

- - Lazarus Long

rokhayakebe3• 16 years ago

Agreed. Everyone should be nice, but sometimes you just have to wear your "Thanks, but I don't give a f$$k" hat.

vinhboy• 16 years ago

Man thanks for posting this. I wanted to post this when I first saw this thread, but I was too chicken shit to say it.

vital101• 16 years ago

Remember when your mother told you "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."? It still holds, except it's even simpler: Keep it professional. Just because you feel wronged, doesn't mean you need to bring someone down. Try to resolve things like an adult, it will probably yield better results anyways.

araneae2• 16 years ago

"I felt for those guys. Each one pouring out his heart, projecting his hopes onto Valerie, hoping she'll reply with equal enthusiasm, hoping she might be the one that will finally see and appreciate him.

She said, “Ugh. Losers. I get like ten of these a day,” and clicked [delete] on all of them, without replying."

While his thesis might be true, this is not a good example of it.

Those guys undoubtedly sent off many such heartfelt messages each day. They're playing the law of averages, and their chances are much better if they indicate they read her profile.

And like she said, she gets 10 of those messages everyday, so she can afford to be choosy. If she answered every one of them back, they would all e-mail her back, and get their hopes up, and she'd have to e-mail back... It's a waste of her time to bother.

It's not callous, it's a reflection of the reality that men are much easier than women, making women a comparatively rare commodity.

This happens in real life all the time, and the only thing that's different online is that men can send such messages without having to overcome their shyness. So women get many more messages, and have to be comparatively more selective with them.

HeyLaughingBoy3• 16 years ago

it's a reflection of the reality that men are much easier than women

Despite what so many people believe, no such reality exists. But it's easy to console oneself by thinking so.

The situation was summed up quite well by a (female) friend long ago: "it's easy to find a guy to sleep with. The much harder part is finding a guy you'd want to sleep with a second time."

I've known a wide variety of people (intimately speaking) and I don't believe that men are easier, it's just that we're socialized to be the initiators and women the receptors. Many, many, many women would love to be the initiators (my friend above certainly), but societal pressures inhibit most of them. Thankfully that seems to be changing, but I'm married now, so lot of good it does me :-)

araneae2• 16 years ago

it's just that we're socialized

Okcupid has the data, and men are more likely to message women than vice versa. Whether or not it's innate is irrelevant to this conversation.

But since you like anecdotal evidence so much, here: http://www.wetherobots.com/comics/2008-01-07-Misinformed.jpg

sofal• 16 years ago

I think maybe you misunderstood what "easy" means in this context. It means casual and unrestrained in sexual behavior. In other words, your friend's quote confirms this. If you want more examples, try Chatroulette.

Whether or not it's easy to find a good man is an entirely different question.

gcheong• 16 years ago

I don't know why she branded them all losers, but it sounded like the old "I would never join any organization that would have me as a member joke" to me. In other words "I would never date anyone who would want to date me".

HeyLaughingBoy3• 16 years ago

Possibly the way they came across. It's best to be somewhat restrained the first time you contact someone online before you know how they react to things. The guys' heartfelt messages could very likely come across as being needy and that's a definite turnoff.

TMI on a first contact is not a good idea!

nandemo• 16 years ago

Funny, that was almost exactly what I was going to write in reply to potatolicious' comment above.

I would just add a bit: she seems to be saying "I'd never date anyone who would want to meet me in a dating website". The thing is, some people do think that dating websites are for losers, and this includes people who go to dating websites.

potatolicious7• 16 years ago

> "It's a waste of her time to bother."

I agree, in this case since she has no interest in them, it would be a waste of everyone's time to write back. She could write a "sorry, not interested" message back, but it's really not necessary.

That being said though, what got me about that example was "Ugh, losers" - it's not so much the fact that she ignored the message, but rather that she has judged these men who have (insofar as we know) shown no such indication, and from what we know wrote well-penned, thoughtful messages.

watmough• 16 years ago

Excellent article.

I support an iPhone app and occasionally get emails where the person is obviously not expecting a real person to read it.

Almost without exception, I write as nice an email back as possible, and usually people are disarmed. As I say, a great article, since it brings to light something that people won't generally see until they are supporting a web-page or app at arms length.

dan_sim3• 16 years ago

That's how I begin to feel about the community here. When I wrote about selling our product for 25K$ (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1212966), some people wrote that it couldn't work and things like that. If I would have been new in business, it would have hurt me a lot. Now, I just say to myself that these people are just bitter. They don't seem to care how much they can hurt others.

holdenk• 16 years ago

Out of interest, did you sell it? Also since your asking for CAD, I assume you are Canadian, do you mind me asking where in Canada you are from?

dan_sim3• 16 years ago

Didn't sell it yet but we had people interested in. We are from near Montreal.

scott_s• 16 years ago

That thread has skepticism, but I didn't think any of it was rude or anything close to a personal attack. That's quite different from what the author of this post described.

The other side of the author's point is that you have to be careful not to take criticism of your work as criticism of you as a person.

mrkurt• 16 years ago

If you chalk everyone up who critiques something you're doing as "bitter", you're liable to miss a whole lot of useful information.

mos1• 16 years ago

I'm sorry, I inadvertently downvoted you.

I actually agree completely with what you said, especially after reading the thread he cited.

gridspy• 16 years ago

The HN community is often trying to be blunt and frank to give you the advice that they think you need. This is a community with many high-end programmers who probably look at your project and think that they could easily recreate it in less than $10k worth of time (probably not true, but whatever).

My immediate reaction is that you need to ditch your eternal beta and immediately offer a paid plan. Make the trial really limited. Talk (in person) to potential clients and really try to really sell this thing.

As long as it is in eternal free beta you have no real discernment between casual and paying customers. You have no money to make it worthwhile to you, you have no advertising budget and no credibility. Sure, turning off "free beta mode" is hard, but better to do it now than to work for years (has it been since 2007?) under the assumption that all you need is more features to make a profitable business.

It is a pity that you want to drop this product in its entirety. If I were you I'd either walk away from it to get a break or spend all your effort on the static sales pages, a billing system and advertising until you have some paying customers.

On the website front:

You really do have to get people to try out the dashboard for Timmy. You should have a really easy demo dashboard. If you want to do more coding you could add a Javascript test box where you can talk to Timmy on-line. Getting people to talk to Timmy using MSN is your first hurdle.

None of the features sound compelling. You need to isolate the one call to action that works for most of the potential customers you have personally talked with and put that on the front page. Right now it feels weak - no feature there calls to me. I can already track my time, so why use your solution (tell me). Instant communication and notifications sound like the features of MSN itself - come up with something that really is difficult to solve that Timmy can solve.

dan_sim3• 16 years ago

Thanks a lot. This is a really great comment that I should have had years before. We had our share of problems with that project but the main reason we want to drop it is not because it's not paying, it's because our hearts are not in it anymore. We don't have passion for time-tracking (and even if it's hard to believe, some people have it). We learned a lot but now it's time to let it go.

But thanks fo the great comment...

sivers• 16 years ago

XKCD comic = 1000 words: http://xkcd.com/438/

swombat• 16 years ago

Most of us need to have things repeated to us many times, in multiple forms, before we get it.

ErrantX2• 16 years ago

I have that as a print hanging on my office wall for this very reason.

RevRal3• 16 years ago

Good timing.

On OkCupid I was just told that I am an asswipe, that I have no personality, and no respect. Brought back some bad schoolyard emotions.

Thanks.

tjic• 16 years ago

The bit in the post where the woman deleted a swath of emails touched on that.

Ouch!

impeachgod3• 16 years ago

Hang in there, buddy. Probably you were just rejected by a bunch of high-maintenance princesses. Look for a decent woman, you probably deserve one.

donaq2• 16 years ago

Out of curiosity, what sort of introductory messages do you send? And how many times have you gotten such a response? I mostly get either nice responses or no response on OkCupid.

RevRal3• 16 years ago

I send lovely introductory messages. Here's a real response: "First, please allow me to thank you for sending me a message that doesn't suck." Everyone I have messaged, who has responded, says something along those lines.

However, in this particular case, the scathing message was a response to a subsequent exchange, not the introductory. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Everything was going as planned, so I asked for her number. She didn't respond with her number. No big deal. I've wrung numbers out of girls on OkCupid before (read: assuaged their reluctance), with stuff like this:

  I understand. You're likely a poor collage student who couldn't pay her phone 
  bill on time. Look, it's okay, you should've told me. I mean, I have extra 
  ramen packets and cans of beans.

Most of the time, the response is like this: "haha, how chivalrous. Here's my number...."

This time it was something like: "WOW. Are you trying to be a dick? Blah blah blah. I'm independently wealthy due to my heritage asswipe blah blah blah and something about me having no respect and no personality."

I don't know what her deal was, being "independantly wealthy" must be a touchy topic. My feelers were injured.

nathanh• 16 years ago

I've received some pretty biting ones from people that were upset about having to pay to use a product or service online. It's interesting that people are willing to put hours into a hate note, yet aren't willing to pay $20 for something online.

d0m2• 16 years ago

In real life, cute girls turn off 10 guys a day without thinking about how they feel. Why would/should they act differently on a dating site. (I'm not saying that I appreciate this act thought, that's just how reality is.)

potatolicious7• 16 years ago

It's not the turn-down, it's the "Ugh, losers". Like, I don't get the opportunity to turn girls down often, but where it has occurred I've certainly never thought less of them for having the guts to approach me.

d0m2• 16 years ago

Of course.. it's hard enough to have the guts to ask, that's a shame when the other laugh of you or something else insulting.

However, my point was that in real life, lots of cute girl would think "huh loser" in her head and would just ignore you. As I said, I don't think it's right, but still, I don't see why if they act like that in real life, they would act kindly on internet.

froo• 16 years ago

(I'm not trying to be a smartass in the following comment, I honestly believe this to be the case)

I think the thing is that women start turning down propositions from horny guys early on in their lives, so that by the time they get into the age where dating sites make sense, they've become proficient at it... almost like second nature.

If us guys are looking for someone to blame, we first have to look at ourselves.

impeachgod3• 16 years ago

A good way to feel better is to think: Wait a sec, what kind of people are these girls? Most likely they are spoiled princesses with a massive sense of entitlement. They, perhaps are not worth much as people. Why is being rejected by them supposed to feel bad?

potatolicious7• 16 years ago

The problem this approach is that you're not committing the same fallacy they have: you have dehumanized them by assuming bad things about them in order to make yourself feel better. Case in point: "they're not worth much as people".

How are they "likely" to be spoiled princesses with entitlement complexes? How do you know enough to make even a wild-ass guess as to their worth as people?

I understand your point about it hurting less, but I think it's an unhealthy track to walk down. Dehumanizing people is never healthy, regardless of the end goal. Not to mention by doing so you've sunk to their level.

Not to mention you'd be missing the entire point of this post: " A real person, a lot like you "

klipt• 16 years ago

Yes, but those 10 guys don't waste time writing long introductory letters in an effort to initiate conversation. Faster rejection based on a simple 'attractivess' filter means less wasted investment on their part.

DaniFong• 16 years ago

That was beautiful. Thank you.

andreyf• 16 years ago

I think those "hurt" in both stories are making something about themselves that really isn't.

The point of a girl "rejecting losers" on a dating site has nothing to do with the losers and everything to do with reinforcing her self-image of "the kind of girl who turns down 10 guys a day". Same with the people who write long e-mails saying "you suck": if someone is looking for it, they can find a lot of evidence people around them suck. The point of writing e-mails about it is to build up one's own confidence, heal some hurt, or vent some frustration about some issue completely unrelated.

The stories are really about people creating a self-image and protecting an identity (call it "reflexive brand management", if you will). While I'll concede that they're narcissistic in their disregard for how their actions affect other people, I think both are natural and healthy in terms of their own psyche.

rokhayakebe3• 16 years ago

Nicely said. Whatever it is you say/write to someone says a lot more about you then the recipient. Also as a recipient you should know that you control whatever emotions you have when reading a letter or listening to someone.

alexyim2• 16 years ago

I wonder if you can get the same effect by writing the email but clicking the "Delete" button instead

shrughes• 16 years ago

Yes, you can. At least it works for me.

abstractbill4• 16 years ago

You definitely can. I write awful horrible insensitive scathing emails to people, and then delete them in the morning without sending them. I get the catharsis, and I don't lose any friends (actual or potential) in the process - everyone wins!

dnsworks2• 16 years ago

In these occasions I find myself writing a draft of a letter, then re-writing it 5 or 6 times as my anger subsides. What starts out as a 10-page tome usually turns into 3 paragraphs of "Hey, this wasn't so great, Here's how I'd love to see it done."

wheels• 16 years ago

I once heard someone say, "The quality of a man is measured by the size of his drafts folder relative to his sent folder."

dkarl3• 16 years ago

The dating site story left out the dozens of real losers who emailed her things like "hey ur hot" or "You might think I'm out of your league, and it's true that I make a lot of money, but I'm actually really into chicks with big legs." I don't buy the scenario that she got eight well-written, nice, well-targeted messages in a single day and didn't get at least that many messages from jerks. Unless she's got some kind of bizarrely good filtering set up, or is on a really, really niche site, those kinds of messages outnumber the earnest well-spoken ones. This is a case where tidying up an anecdote for dramatic effect completely changes its meaning. Her comment was probably aimed at the real losers in her inbox rather than the appealing ones mentioned in the story.

Plus, for a woman, being on a dating site is all about volume control. She probably only has time to go out with one new guy every week or month, so she picks the best guy out of the dozens of men who contact her every week. The rest are just noise. They're a boring and pointless part of her day. Calling them "losers" is unjustified, but none of them heard her, and she isn't obligated to spend an hour a day responding personally to every guy who emails her so he doesn't get his feelings hurt.

derefr2• 16 years ago

If by "really, really niche site" you mean "any site that charges money," that's about how it works, I believe.

The point of her story, though, is that she deleted all the messages, and implied that she regularly deletes all the messages—she's not going out with any of them; she's fishing with no hook.

kareemm• 16 years ago

> I think both are natural and healthy in terms of their own psyche.

questioning why you're harboring beliefs that construct a self-identity that causes you to send "you suck" emails just cuz you're having a bad day seems healthier than practicing reflexive brand management.

call it "examined brand management" :)

sliverstorm• 16 years ago

Ok, so even if we accept your hypothesis, that doesn't change the root message of the article, which is to remember the other end of the line is a person just like you.

The explicit goal of the user may be different, but shooting someone down for pleasure and tearing someone down to pull yourself up often look to be one and the same, and have many of the same side effects.

presidentender• 16 years ago

On the other hand, it can be dangerous to humanize internet people (or real-world people) too much. I have a great deal of trouble disagreeing with clients, and a huge tendency to absorb costs myself.

I agree that it's best not to send these scathing emails to people without considering their humanity. I just have a hard time striking the balance between that and letting others take advantage of me.

brianmckenzie• 16 years ago

I simply don't understand why anyone would send an unprovoked, nasty email to someone else. People on the internet have been pissing me off for nearly two decades now, and I don't recall ever doing this.

But like clockwork, someone does it to me every few months.

hristov• 16 years ago

Wow. That is going to make me think twice next time I flame somebody on HN or Slashdot.

Apparently, it is not just karma I am burning. It is human feelings!

rapind• 16 years ago

The Internet is like your car.

sh1mmer• 16 years ago

One day I want to meet Derek in person, because he just seems like one of those people in life that it's just good to be friends with.

Thanks, Derek.

jnoller2• 16 years ago

What ever happened to being simply polite, and thinking about people before you lash out? Hell; you should even be polite, and keep the tone civil if you hate the person at the receiving end.

I think, to an extent, this is what's gone wrong with online communication and political discourse - when did civility become something we simply wear when it's convenient?

dpifke2• 16 years ago

The corollary to this is that companies also need to treat their customers as people. Too often when I call customer service I'm talking to a robot who can barely speak my language well enough to coherently read the set-in-stone, no exceptions, this-is-how-it-is policy off of his computer screen. His claiming to be named "Bob" doesn't make him any more of a real human being to me.

And while I wouldn't be uncivil (or condone as much) towards "Bob," both sides of the conversation need to avoid dehumanizing each other. I wonder if the client in Derek's first example would have been such an ass towards Sara if large companies hadn't preconditioned us to expect mechanical, uncaring customer service.

jnoller2• 16 years ago

Yes. Completely agreed; companies need to treat customers as people. Treating customer like annoyances, metrics or just "something to be dealt with" helps lead to customers who call up or contact you immediately on the attack.

inimino• 16 years ago

I find it odd that you go on to say "both sides of the conversation need to avoid dehumanizing each other", after "a robot" and "[not] a real human being to me".

dpifke2• 16 years ago

What's odd in starting with an example as to why it's easy to dehumanize someone in customer service and then saying not to do it? The choice in phrasing and imagery was intentional, if perhaps a bit clumsy.

mschaecher• 16 years ago

Sivers.org hasn't loaded for me in a few weeks now :( Anyone else?

tb• 16 years ago

Yeah me too.. I get XML parsing errors because there are a couple of extra bytes of garbage at the beginning of the file, things like: "1caaa" on http://sivers.org/real and "df9c" on http://sivers.org/ff2

jlees• 16 years ago

It's not just about the negative. A lot of us have grown up with machines and technology, and we often forget there are humans involved in the simplest of transactions, such as shopping or customer service.

Instead of fuming that you have to phone up to get your phone account cancelled, rather than click a button online, it's amazing what you can achieve if you put on a positive outlook and remember the other person is just like you, but working some shitty call centre job to pay the rent. Since I had this "eureka" moment (and I find it awful that I had to have one in the first place), I've had much better experiences - negotations, discounts, amazing customer service, etc.

roqetman• 16 years ago

Thanks - something we need reminding of from time to time

extension• 16 years ago

I prefer to think of the internet as force of harmony and understanding, allowing us to achieve unprecedented new levels of brutal interpersonal honesty, you douchenozzle.

quizbiz• 16 years ago

How do you show that those that have you on the top of their priority list that you are on their priority list as well. It gets to a point where it's tough to keep up with various people each with a unique personal approach. I really want to get better at that.

petercooper• 16 years ago

Stupid e-mails and comments used to bother me too, but I run some crazy statistics on it now: At least 1% of people are incurable, malicious idiots who have nothing better to do but spit bile all over the place. If I happen to encounter them frequently it only proves I have reach and what do you do with incurable idiots? Ignore 'em - they're the minority.

mcantor2• 16 years ago

I'm a little amazed (and somewhat disappointed) that no one has mentioned this related Penny Arcade comic yet:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19/

(Sure, arguably, dating sites are less anonymous and have less of an audience than the video game in question, but the gist is the same: "I don't need to take responsibility for my tomfoolery, so here goes nothing!")

By the way, I feel compelled to mention again--as I do on almost every post from sivers.org--that Derek Sivers is a total badass, and we should all endeavor to have our heads on as straight as he does. Thanks, Derek!

A real person, a lot like you

Related Stories