Root for your friends

https://josephthacker.com/personal/2025/05/13/root-for-your-friends.html

by rez0123 • 1 year ago

437 168 1 year ago

josephthacker.com

aeblyve• 1 year ago

And here I was cynically thinking I was going to learn how to "get root" on my friends.

Still applies I guess.

bigiain• 1 year ago

As an Australian, "Root for your friends" has a hilariously alternate meaning.

AStonesThrow• 1 year ago

I offered to give root and/or ssh to a couple of friends, and they all turned it down. I don't really have any friends anyway.

Perhaps we can parlay this title into a video game. Or simply an alternate title for Core War.

raddan• 1 year ago

Oddly I have found that nearly all of my best friends come from different walks of life than me, and do different things for work. Only one of my very good friends does the same things that I do. Others, like my stonemason friend, have very different lives, and we met by chance. I’ve also found lately that I enjoy socializing with people over a shared activity, like a class. I just got back (today) from taking a drafting (ie, architectural drawing) class. The people in it were very different from me: a mix of tradespeople and artists. Nevertheless, it was clear that all of us shared a love of learning a skill and doing it well, and so it really was a blast. I learned a lot from them.

You might try just doing something different. It was an interesting experience spending the day with people who wanted to talk to me because I was the odd one out—none of them personally knew any programmers or computer scientists and they all had a million questions!

rez01236• 1 year ago

inception is a form of code execution in their brain.

temp0826• 1 year ago

sudo make me a sandwich

(xkcd.com/149)

zaphodias• 1 year ago

Me too, reinforced by author's name :)

photochemsyn2• 1 year ago

It's easier to get root on your friends than it is to get root on your enemies, because they likely trust you. This is why a central tenent of John Le Carre narratives is "fear your friends more than your enemies."

This often plays out in the blood sport of academic politics, incidentally.

noahchen• 1 year ago

Somewhat related: I read the author's name as Joseph T Hacker at first instead of Joseph Thacker.

ketzo• 1 year ago

For a long time, I’ve been this person for other people, but don’t feel like I have anybody to do this for me. That’s okay — I don’t feel bitter about that or anything. And I don’t wanna overstate what a good friend I am or whatever, I just do this a decent amount. But some part of me does wish I had someone celebrating my wins.

This:

“No one comes to mind? Maybe you haven’t really trusted anyone with your wins yet.”

really, really hit me for some reason. I’m pretty averse to praise/congratulations — even if I feel it’s deserved! — so I don’t really share my wins with people. How can I expect to have people hype me up if I don’t let them in a little? It’s obvious when I write it all out but I kinda can’t believe how long I’ve been operating this way.

Anyway, great post!

rez01236• 1 year ago

I’m so glad that line helped. It was a last minute addition, and I was thinking about how so many of my friends just don’t share the awesome stuff they do with the world. Share more!!

darth_avocado• 1 year ago

For a long time, I’ve been this person for other people, but don’t feel like I have anybody to do this for me.

For the longest time I was this and unfortunately I got bitter over time. But then a couple of years ago I got back into the mindset again. A few bad years later I realized that the more happy you are for your friends, the more happy you are. Do it for yourself and nobody else.

danielrm26• 1 year ago

Why not both?

protocolture• 1 year ago

Ditto.

What gets me is when I have a few times found the people I am hyping for are actually putting me down, or selling me out to management.

borski3• 1 year ago

Fair, but the post briefly alluded to this:

Even if you root for the “wrong” friends, it’s still the best way to live. Life is better not feeling jealous. You can sleep so much easier at night by genuinely being happy for your friends, even if they’re a bit jealous of you.

stavros3• 1 year ago

Well, I'm glad you had this realization, and I'm excited for how this will turn out for you. Sometimes you have to show your friends you're excited about something for them to be excited in turn.

Good luck!

xattt• 1 year ago

How much of it is some form of a subliminal superstition where you feel that if you tell your success, your success will be jinxed?

noduerme2• 1 year ago

There's nothing wrong with being humble. It only takes one small display of pride to make most people quietly hate you. For example, I opened this blog post and within 20 seconds I loathed the person who wrote it. I find your approach to be much more decent.

cootsnuck5• 1 year ago

But now you seem miserable and bitter so what's the point? Don't dull your own shine and don't yuck other people's yum.

Profan• 1 year ago

Damn, why not just be happy for people? We're all different, and I might be an outlier here but I think very few people actually "hate" people, unless they've wronged them in some very particular way, at least for me personally someone has to have gone very far in wronging me or my friends for me to "hate" anyone!

samlinnfer• 1 year ago

Let's take this to the extreme, you just won the lottery, which one of your friends will you tell?

nthingtohide2• 1 year ago

I have borrowed some "wisdom" in how particles interact. They exchange particles back and forth which strengthen their interaction. That's what I do generally in real life. I sort of share happenings in my life as a sort of nano-influencer within my group of friends. I would say the advice in the blogpost works, sort of. Even if my "contributions" go into a blackhole, I think atleast the ephemeral Universe is watching what I do.

tome2• 1 year ago

I have borrowed some "wisdom" in how particles interact. They exchange particles back and forth

If particles interact by exchanging particles, how do they interact with the particles they exchange?

Mofpofjis• 1 year ago

"Maybe you haven’t really trusted anyone with your wins yet"

At the end of one of her interviews on youtbue, Kelly McGonigal explains that -- paraphrased -- being praised to the face creates an intimate context around the praiser and the praisee, in which it's the praiser that sets the tone and initiates the dynamics. In a way, they find themselves in a position where they evaluate you. This is why taking praise gracefully is not trivial; people being praised usually show bodily signs of stress. It takes a real effort for the praisee not to dismiss or belittle their own achievement, just to get out of those dynamics as soon as possible.

At the end of said interview, the host praised Ms. McGonigal to her face. In response, she drew his attention to the fact that while he was talking, speaking those words of appreciation, she swallowed. The act of her swallowing was a kind of stress-relief (IIRC). (I'm sure we can all relate to choking up slightly when praised to the face.) She highlighted the dynamics of being praised to the face live, mid-interview, through her own reaction.

You may be avoiding sharing your wins with others because you instinctively might want to avoid the situation where others qualify you. In that situation, you experience being the subject of an evaluation, and that -- i.e., being talked about -- might feel like a subordinate position to be in, even if the judging is 100% positive. My remedy is to just yield, lean back, give in, permit the other person to be in control, allow them to have all power in that context, and just bask in the glorious warmth they're sending your way. It can be an experience that you remember for decades after, and you're going to start to crave it. (Peer recognition can be a huge motivator, i.e., doing things for recognition. Whether that's good or bad, is a separate topic :))

wewewedxfgdf• 1 year ago

I kinda had this maybe assembled in my head in an incomplete bits and pieces way but this really brought together the concept I love it.

Whoever wrote this post is really rocking with the clear human thinking.

rez01236• 1 year ago

Thank you

spongebobstoes• 1 year ago

I largely agree, this is a great way to support your friends.

I would add to bias towards praise, but still be honest and judicious. People know when they hear empty words, and it's important to be trustworthy.

rez01236• 1 year ago

Yeah i only put the one line in there that talks about that: > people who are honest to your face and praise you behind your back.

I could have emphasized that more.

huevosabio• 1 year ago

The way I try to do it is: if you think something nice, say it

keybored• 1 year ago

Blogger says it’s better to be positive than negative. Could that be the case? Is it really so? Yes. And further. Thinking good thoughts is better than thinking bad thoughts about yourself or others. It’s also better to give meaningful feedback on projects. Than not meaningful feedback.

“This is a message that a lot of people need to hear,” says blogger.

Here’s some memes from 2012 to now.

shermantanktop• 1 year ago

Just had a friend leave their company. They had formed a really strong network of people within that company who were in constant contact. This helped them succeed in a lot of ways.

Sounds good? It was, except...most of that bonding was based on lowkey negativity by a set of people who felt powerless, complaining about how others were terrible. Some in this network went down a rabbithole of resentment and are still there. The reality is that yes, there was lots of stuff to be grumpy about.

Rooting for your friends is great. But people sometimes bond over wishing harm for their foes. Shared trauma does that. I personally try to avoid that mindset.

zdc1• 1 year ago

I've met a few people that I like to describe as "walking Reddit". Chat with them and they'll always have a story or gossip that's engaging and somewhat infuriating or rage-inducing. One was a colleague who would telling me all the questionable and unkind things the managers in other teams were doing.

I eventually realised that these interactions weren't joyful... they were easy conversations, but they were also demoralising and lowered my energy. These days I try to "manage" my conversations with people like this by steering the topics and (gently) setting boundaries on what I don't want to talk about.

josephg• 1 year ago

Rooting for your friends is great. But people sometimes bond over wishing harm for their foes. Shared trauma does that.

Yeah this is way too common. And it’s not just trauma which does it. I think it’s its own psychological trap. I think the trap is a self reinforcing cycle of a few thoughts:

1. Other people are bad at things. Look at all the things others do which have flaws! You must be better than all those dolts.

2. You tell yourself you could do something better - but if you try, maybe it’ll have flaws too. Then you’ll be just as bad as anyone else. Uh oh.

3. So you don’t do anything creative, or take responsibility for anything. But you need a reason to tell yourself as to why you’re not doing anything.

4. It must be because other, idiot people stop you. Change is too hard. Doing anything would be “fighting against the system” or something. See point 1.

And the trap is closed. The only way to escape it is to do stuff that you’re bad at. And if you do that, you’ll find all the faults in your own work and feel terrible about yourself.

I think the bottom level of almost any company is packed with people who have this mindset. It’s a disaster on every level - personal and professional. And it’s quite resilient and contagious. People like that are always a little afraid that somebody will call them on it. So they need others to agree with them that staying small is the smart move.

Avoiding them is definitely a smart move. I’ve taken to sometimes needling people like that, just to rattle the cage and see what happens. “You’re so right about those flaws! We’d love your help fixing some of them?” / “I think your idea is wonderful! So what you’re saying is if we got Bob on side, you think we could do it? Let me help - I’ll set up a meeting. With the two of us, I’m sure he’ll come around!”

I generally hate being too positive. But I make an exception for this kind of subtle supportive bullying. This awful mindset can’t survive in the sunlight. It’s fun to see what happens!

anonu• 1 year ago

I believe in this. Just don't get onto to the corporate hype train.

pram• 1 year ago

I’m not trying to be controversial but this behavior seems to be very hard for a lot of men. I’ve noticed it a lot in my life that guys are far more willing to “circle the wagons” over petty slights, and alienate people over it. Then their ego doesn’t let them back down, and they just get more bitter from the (obvious) outcome.

I’m guilty of it myself of course, but it seems like there is some kind of naturally adversarial behavior baked into me. It literally just makes things worse is the funny thing, and I already know this. But sometimes I cant stop it. Life would be easier and better if we were all collectively friendly hypemen but alas.

cootsnuck5• 1 year ago

You're probably not wrong. I'm lucky and most of my guy friends are happy in each other's successes. There definitely can be an under current of something though (almost feels like skepticism) sometimes.

But to be fair, I've felt that vague "skepticism" at my own successes from some of my gal pals too. But at the same time, my friend group that's mostly women will definitely gas each other up more and seemingly show more genuine interest in each other's successes and genuine sympathy in each other's setbacks.

xphos• 1 year ago

I like the sentiment and appreciate when I see an OP in the comments taking feedback

emptybits• 1 year ago

This recent episode of the Secular Buddhism podcast may be worth a listen. It gets into the enduring value and joy we can find in the good fortune of others.

https://secularbuddhism.com/blog/204-beyond-happiness/

irrational• 1 year ago

I forgot for a moment what website I was on and expected the link to be about the board game Root and getting your friends to play it with you.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/237182/root

ianburrell• 1 year ago

I thought it was about giving SSH and sudo to your friends.

hughdbrown• 1 year ago

I thought it was a peevish Kiwi joke about how people of other nations do not use words as they do.

babyent• 1 year ago

I’m generally happy for those around me who are achieving things and doing better for themselves.

I love people like that!!

Friends and strangers who try and aren’t quitters.

the_arun• 1 year ago

Root for all around you.

foobarbecue3• 1 year ago

In my first few years on the job, I would fill out peer evaluations honestly. We have peer evaluations where you rate people out of 5 on various performance elements like "innovative" and "leader" or whatever. Then I survived a couple of rounds of awful layoffs where really good people lost their livelihoods.

Since then, I put 5 out of 5 on everyone for everything always, and say something nice in all the boxes.

dejj• 1 year ago

I do the same. Doing HR’s job is not my job. And yet, some how I do. If I rated any satisfaction metric below 80% my manager’s manager would have him talk to me; there would be flogging until morale improves. It seems all a game of Emperor’s New Clothes.

18172828286177• 1 year ago

This isn’t even HR’s job. It’s the person’s manager’s job.

rjmill• 1 year ago

Goodness, yes. The last time I put (genuinely constructive) criticism in a peer evaluation, it turned out to be the only non-positive thing that was said about that coworker. So it became a focus of his yearly review.

He later told me about how his review went (casually at a conference; he had no idea I was the source), and I fessed up and clarified what I actually meant. The HR process had twisted it to a much more extreme version of what I was getting at, completely undermining the utility of the feedback.

Nowadays, I'm just gonna give perfect scores and if I have feedback that needs to be given, I'll just tell the coworker directly. (And if I'm not comfortable doing that, then the feedback probably isn't important enough.)

zo1• 1 year ago

I think a big factor of that is that usually most people just do the positive feedback and don't say anything negative or constructive. So when someone does do so, it's seen as "wow, this must be so bad that they just had to say something, no matter how delicately or toned-down it is being phrased as". These days I just mention the problems and concerns to the people making the decisions because yearly review time is the wrong time to do it. At best they've only been doing this "bad" thing for a month or so, and at worst almost a whole year and no one did anything.

lupire4• 1 year ago

Never give constructive criticism through management! Management will use it as evaluative feedback. Give constructive feedback directly.

mystifyingpoi• 1 year ago

For real. I have bought a car and the same day discovered a minor issue, I had to get it fixed next day. I rated the service 8/10, it was excellent otherwise. Next day I get a very apologetic call, begging me to change my rating, because anything less than 9/10 triggers some kind of investigation process. I said screw it and took the survey again, I'm not going to ruin someone else's work because of this.

foobarbecue3• 1 year ago

I bought a mouse on Amazon that didn't fit my hand and was uncomfortable to use. I gave it a 3-star review. The company immediately refunded me and told me I didn't need to return the product. I was shocked. I get "the customer is king" but I think it's gone too far. A review system where everything is expected to have a perfect rating is not a useful system!

detaro• 1 year ago

Net Promoter Score (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_promoter_score) has (if it ever was useful) turned into madness in way too many contexts.

lupire4• 1 year ago

Layoffs are arbitrary and not based on performance.

anotherevan• 1 year ago

"root" means something quite different as a slang term here in Australia. I head to read the title several times.

yonatan8070• 1 year ago

I was thinking it was about ways to securely give friends root access to your home server

pwdisswordfishz6• 1 year ago

sudo for your friends

marc_abonce• 1 year ago

For anyone else wondering: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/root#Usage_notes

blitzar• 1 year ago

Nothing wrong with friends that root each other too.

twic• 1 year ago

Sometimes my friends are away on long business trips, naturally their wives get bored, the headline made perfect sense to me?

Brajeshwar• 1 year ago

Hey, I see these greyscale images (the one at the top of the article) quite often these days. Can you please give me the prompt?

rambambram• 1 year ago

You can get the prompt in Japan, but it costs you. There's a whole studio behind it. These people also need to eat, you see.

ctxc• 1 year ago

Get with the times. It's just virtue signaling at this point :)

gs17• 1 year ago

I opened it up to look at the metadata, and I'm surprised OpenAI doesn't include any information like that (I believe ComfyUI generated images do by default). All it says it's by ChatGPT.

echan00• 1 year ago

You are essentially your network. Laugh where you want to laugh. I think this is great advice. Anybody who is bitter of your success should not be part of your network.

fancyswimtime• 1 year ago

legit thought this was about giving root priv to ur mates

neom6• 1 year ago

Someone I'm "friends" with, recently confessed to me that they very much enjoy watching me fail. I was genuinely surprised because I love watching people win, but I dug into it a bit and apparently it's very common, people really do love to see other people have setbacks, but the research I read seemed to indicate it was more prevalent in friendships, people seem fine with other people getting a head if they don't know them personally. Apparently it's also considerably more common than not for friends to want their friends to fail, or at least take pleasure in their failures. This was all news to me till about a week or so ago, and I'm old. That research actually lead me to this, that I learned is apparently also news to me[1] - "The researchers found that boredom's effects on sadism were mediated by people's desire for excitement and novelty-seeking - essentially, sadistic behavior served as a way to escape the aversive state of boredom." - I sense somehow these two things are somewhat linked.

Some reading:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/43119265_Envy_and_S...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-evaluation_maintenance_th...

https://www.scribd.com/document/796080571/Document-2

[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44068463

e402• 1 year ago

I’m curious about how this came out and what the fallout was. If you feel like sharing.

neom6• 1 year ago

I'm going through a really really difficult time right now, 3 major areas of my life have broken down simultaneously over the past five months. I was ranting to this guy I've known for years about it (who is very successful but was once jr to me at work) - I would have called him a "good friend" - he was drunk and giggled out something along the lines of "makes me feel strong" - I reacted as you would expect "uh.. really?". We got into a bit, and talked it out (he basically explained it was normal, hence I then went to research if that is true or not), I can see where it sits in his personality now, and I don't think he and I will be friends anymore.

taylorius• 1 year ago

It's interesting - had they acted this schadenfreude out at all? Or did this confession come completely out of the blue. From what you said, it is the latter - and if so, should this person be judged for this unappealing inner thought, if they take pains not to let that thought influence their behaviour or actions?

neom6• 1 year ago

I have thought about this a lot over the past few weeks. And I think I should stop thinking about it because it's becoming unhealthy, because I've analyzed our whole relationship back years and gotten into too much speculation in my head.

Fnoord• 1 year ago

I wonder how this applies to the army. In the army, the people around you in the same situation as you become your mates, and seeing them suffer or die has a big effect on soldiers.

I'd say spending time together forms / ends up in bonding, and those friends aren't friends (although the English-American definition is more like 'peers' anyway); they're former friends. People you used to spend time with. If it comes to school and work, there's competition. Lots of it. In the army, not so much.

waonderer2• 1 year ago

In the army, competitions are not as much of an issue because the goal is not to make more money or mere promotion, but to serve the country. "Dying in the act of war" is not frowned upon but celebrated as a badge.

Opposite to contrary belief, higher rank individuals (except the topmost levels) are at the front line leading the pack. Army personnel have families, but they kill others who also have families — this is not normal for most people. They get desensitised after practice and war in difficult terrains.

I was told by an army lad, his father had instructions to always move forward. If you turn, your own men can shoot you, mistaking you for an enemy.

jader2012• 1 year ago

I think this is basic competition.

For example, in board games, there are several types:

- Competitive games: every person for themselves; there’s one winner, everyone else loses

- Co-op games: every human vs. “the game”, often in the form of AI opponents, or environmental conditions; everyone wins or everyone loses

- Team games: X vs. Y players (and sometimes more than two teams); one team wins, everyone else loses

I feel like work is meant to be a co-op game, but just like co-op games, even though you’re supposed to be on the same team, you often still want to feel like “the best”. Not to the point of bringing the whole team down, but to the point you can secretly feel like you carried the team.

In some hostile work environments, it can actually turn into a team game (inter-departmental competition), or even a competitive game (intra-departmental competition). I’ve been in all of these types of companies, and the co-op ones are obviously the best, especially the ones that care more about the elevation of the team over individual success.

In the military, it’s very much a team game. You are clearly on the same team, and if you don’t cooperate with your team, you will (likely) lose. Obviously, with military — particularly in war — there can be actual life and death at stake, which elevates this to an extreme level.

fetzu• 1 year ago

I wouldn’t say that there is no competition in the army, in fact some selection processes (special forces, who gets up the ladder and earns a seat on the general staff or a star) are probably more competitive than in civilian life. It’s probably more about the general mindset: those extreme situation (and I am not necessarily talking about the competitive ones) create that positive feedback loop though shared hardships and closeness, and probably outweigh that competitiveness.

mierz002• 1 year ago

I never experienced competition like this in the Army, however I have outside of it.

The Army was competitive in a fun way. Where it’s fun to beat your friends in PT or to laugh as they trip over. But when it came down to it, we were on the same team and you would help out a friend.

Inversely, not being a team player would get you bullied.

madduci• 1 year ago

Having a partner also that roots for you makes wonders for the self esteem

notarobot123• 1 year ago

I have a close friend who's a huge motivator for my work. He deeply believes that I'm destined to fail and I'm determined to prove him wrong.

Cheerleaders are great if you need reassurance and affirmation. If you want to innovate and push boundaries, I'd argue that competition is a more significant driver.

neom6• 1 year ago

I need to learn from you. Also: good for you!

bigstrat2003• 1 year ago

If you want to innovate and push boundaries, I'd argue that competition is a more significant driver.

Competition is great, but there's no reason it needs to be negatively tinged (as in your example). Two people can compete and push themselves hard to come out ahead, but also cheer for each other to do well. After all, if your rival sucks they don't really push you to get better, so cheering for them is in a way cheering for yourself too.

morningsam• 1 year ago

There's a huge difference between believing someone will fail and hoping that they will.

cootsnuck5• 1 year ago

You could be right. It could also be that if your friend was supportive and was excited for you that you would still be motivated to succeed.

I have a feeling that you're striving in spite of the lack of support, not because of it. And also that your own creativity and persistence is able to turn lemons into lemonade. So whatever your friends gave you, you'd take it and make it work.

I'd say all of that is the complete opposite of what people do that are destined to fail.

NetOpWibby• 1 year ago

I’m the hype man and motivator for all my close friends…and URL friends.

The world (Internet) is VERY GOOD at telling you how much you suck and most people are susceptible to that. Having someone who believes in you helps you build confidence and drive.

I think my friends are dope af so why wouldn’t I big them up?

Haeuserschlucht4• 1 year ago

Lets face it once and for all: there are no true friendships anywhere on this planet and there have never been. That's why people read studies and talk about friendships like it was a research topic of an alien species. There is only people, who give more than they get, hoping to one day get a little bit back. Don't chase something that had never been there and won't be there. Thank me later.

xlii• 1 year ago

Ok, so maybe instead of friendship let’s call it platonic love.

I get your point, but we are herd animals. Today distance is bigger than ever so we are more often lonely. Some believe in gods, religions but I rather believe in people and make it a hill I’ll die on.

Haeuserschlucht4• 1 year ago

We need connection with other people but due to fears we make it hard for others to connect with us. Fears that are not always justified.

fredrb• 1 year ago

I’m sorry that has been your experience. The culture you’re brought up in is hardly representative for 8 billion people’s experience.

Haeuserschlucht4• 1 year ago

Don't talk like you don't know first hand what I am talking about if you did an honest review of what you call friendship.

rez01236• 1 year ago

I’m really sorry that someone betrayed/hurt you so much and I hope you are able to forgive them.

Haeuserschlucht4• 1 year ago

Don't talk like you don't know first hand what I am talking about if you did an honest review of who you call friends.

Waterluvian• 1 year ago

I’ve found my way into a small group of incredibly supportive dads. And one of the ways in which we exercise rooting for our friends is to basically commandeer “jealousy” into a positive thing. “Ah man I’m so jealous that your kids sleep so well!”

“Jealousy” in a non-toxic manner feels kind of right for the task of describing wins that we all know are largely just up to random chance.

Being jealous of someone’s hard work doesn’t really feel the same.

47282847• 1 year ago

This sounds beautiful. Thank you for sharing. I think Jealousy is a useful and important emotional state in society, and to wish it away and suppress it only makes it show up in violent ways. Like all emotions, if we allow and appreciate (and share!), it flows through us and does not fester.

anton-c2• 1 year ago

Yes. Also envy may be the right word. You can both have something you are envious of. That's pedantic of me.

What I rly wanted to say is admitting jealousy vs showing signs of it are two diff things and you guys nailed it. Glad you have a good support group.

anshumankmr3• 1 year ago

I root for my friends, but it's hard since the ones who mattered are all abroad. I haven’t seen most school friends in a decade, and college friends since 2020—except one, who’s now in Australia. A relationship ended badly last year, and I haven’t had the energy to start another. I’ve made a few surface-level connections through running/cycling clubs, with one solid bond. Feel bummed to keep rooting for other people, but no one is there that way for me, besides my parents.

Having a cat reall helps though.

rez01236• 1 year ago

Have you made any friends online? A ton of my friends are people I interact with almost exclusively on discord

anshumankmr3• 1 year ago

Need more time offline than online. Especially the past month or so where I have been at home mostly, prepping for an interview, doing nothing but Leetcoding, pretty much.

anton-c2• 1 year ago

I've struggled to make any of those into one's where I'd DM the person if I was in a rough spot or felt I could count on them. You ever manage that?

For a short time in the 2000s with my wow guild I did but that was different. It was always TeamSpeak so I felt I knew the person v discord(where i only voice chat with irl friends... so far)

I'd love to be able to make that happen. Probably my own confidence is the issue.

pwdisswordfishz6• 1 year ago

You just shipped a side‑project that lands on the front page of Hacker News. Who’s the first person you want to tell?

No one, I'd be embarrassed.

diggan• 1 year ago

Ok, I'll bite. Why? You happen to have a sort of antagonistic relationship with HN?

pwdisswordfishz6• 1 year ago

I'm not the poster, I'm Stavros, I just wanted to see if his username was accurate. I wonder how many people have actually done this before me.

InsideOutSanta• 1 year ago

This is probably one of the most essential bits of advice you can get. Not only is it beneficial to your friends and career, but it's also beneficial for your mental health.

It's not easy, at least initially. Jealousy is an emotion that's easy to come by and hard to dismiss. It's also an emotion that makes you unhappy, so learning to feel pride and happiness instead of jealousy made my life immeasurably better. I don't care if it's reciprocal; I do it because it's right for others and it's right for me.

jesucresta• 1 year ago

This feels like advice for the most basic level of empathy (support your friends) with the cherry on top of AI slop as the opener. Americans sure are something else.

gsky• 1 year ago

Everybody wants you to do well, but not better than them. Jealousy is one unavoidable thing

miracoli• 1 year ago

I think this post really shows cultural differences in the term 'friendship'. Where I grew up (in Germany) most people I know would not abandon friendship because they read a blog post. a real friendship is something special that you maintain also in difficult times and sometimes people are jealous, but that can change and I think the understanding of friendship as a kind of 'success accellerator' is something that sounds quite stange for me. From my definition friendship is exactly the kind of relationship that comes without such expectations

fragmede• 1 year ago

I think the contents of said blog post is material to the conversation at hand.

The opposite of a "success accelerator" hypeman would be someone that's constantly tearing you down, talking bar about you behind your back, and constantly and actively trying to get you to fail. If it's the contents of blog post that helps someone recognize such a person isn't really their friend, why is it even relevant what bit if media helped them come to that realization?

actuallyalys2• 1 year ago

Personally, I wouldn’t normally think of a friendship as a “success accelerator” because that reduces a friendship to its material benefits. I think you can have strong and meaningful relationships without this aspect at all.

Still, I do want to acknowledge that if I’m in a position to help accelerate a friend’s success, I will. I don’t know whether I’d say I expect my friends to do the same for me since it’s so contextual. At the same time I would expect a certain level of reciprocity if they’re in the position to reciprocate, although I admit I’m struggling to articulate my expectations clearly, since they’re not simply one to one.

imaginationra2• 1 year ago

THIS is a great post and wonderful tips!

I've always been the hype person for everyone I know and have subsequently been allowed to have an amazing, thriving creative career while I've seen countless jealous, desperate, scarcity minded people fall by the wayside over the years.

Just released an original animated feature film musical where I did most everything myself with help from a few friends I hype https://www.imlivingmylife.com/

cootsnuck5• 1 year ago

That looks weird as hell. I love when people let their weirdness and creativity shine. Congrats on such a big project!

imaginationra2• 1 year ago

Hey thank you and I'm sorry I didn't see this comment sooner. I've been making/releasing original weird stuff for about 20 years now

deviantintegral• 1 year ago

I was expecting an article about giving out root accounts on homelab servers!

lapcat2• 1 year ago

The nominal subject of the article is "friends", but it appears that the article is best understood as about work friends. Perhaps "allies" would be a more appropriate term? I hope that the author has some work/life balance and can feel the difference between these two categories.

I would define a friend as someone with whom you enjoy spending time. There doesn't need to be a goal except to "hang out". Do you really need a friend to "give meaningful feedback on your projects"? The author's conception of a friend, in the article, feels starkly utilitarian, where friendship is a tool for achieving your other ends rather than an end in itself.

If we interpret friends here as work friends, then I think a little jealousy and zero-sumness is natural. The very first benefit mentioned by the author of rooting for your friends is that it "can improve your career". If your work friend's career improves, but yours doesn't, then doesn't that defeat the (author's) purpose?

It’s deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats.

I deeply believe that this is utterly naive.

It's not inherently false—we could make it true, if we really wanted—but it's empirically false, for the obvious reason that those who are lifted tend to be greedy and want to keep all the gains for themselves. Whether that's because power corrupts, because power attracts the corrupt, or some combination of the two, the problem is that those at the top come to feel that they deserve to be at top, that they're better than those who are not at the top and have been rewarded for their superiority, and thus from their perspective it would almost be immoral to "reward" those below who aren't as "good".

waonderer2• 1 year ago

Relationships are of various kinds that extend in various dimensions. What the Author has talked about definitely sounds more like a "work-friend" relationship, but is not entirely separate from a "friend-friend" that you define.

It’s deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats.

This is true, but with context. "Growth" and "Comfort" are two different elements of a good friendship. We can replace "rising" with "happy", and the same quote works for comfort.

Are both necessary? Depends on how you define "friendship". If comfort is the only thing, you dog can be a comfortable companion. But for a human friendship to last longer, both must enjoy each other company for longer time horizon, and that needs growth in both. This growth needs not be only in career, but mental too.

With such growth, envy can't come in and corrode the bond.

lapcat2• 1 year ago

With such growth, envy can't come in and corrode the bond.

Well, if we're talking about work-friends, the classic conflict would be when one co-worker is promoted but the other isn't, and indeed the one becomes the other's boss. That's basically a zero-sum game, and it's difficult for a friendship to survive that scenario.

actuallyalys2• 1 year ago

It feels like it’s probably most applicable to people who do similar work as you and who you talk shop with. I wouldn’t consider these work friends, which to me are people at the same place of work that you wouldn’t hang out with if not for work.

basket_horse• 1 year ago

Agree. The article treats friendship as a career tool rather than a meaningful connection. Real friends aren’t just hype men or professional assets — they’re people who stick around through ups and downs.

> It’s deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats. I deeply believe that this is utterly naive.

While I don't fully disagree, I have often seen younger employees fall into the trap of overly chasing individual advantage over collective benefit. In other words, trying to be an all-star rather than a team player. Perhaps this is from schooling, where all that matters is getting an "A", but in the workplace it often results in being disliked and less likely to be promoted.

photochemsyn2• 1 year ago

The most dishonest fraudulent academic researcher I even encountered made a point of encouraging collegiality, but eventually I realized this was part of his scheme for not being exposed as a fraud. Everyone in his department knew he was fudging his data, but nobody called him on it because he was such a nice guy to everyone else.

This is how you end up with systematic institutional corruption in academic departments along with a lot of non-reproducible garbage science. Thus a better strategy is to support people who do good work, regardless of whether they're your 'friends' or not.

NickC25• 1 year ago

He could have been a fraud or not, but you might have been missing his point.

Perhaps his point was that he just genuinely liked to be a decent human being instead of rolling into work each day with an attitude of "I'm better than all of you peons, fuck you and your families, may (deity of your choice) condemn you all to death and perpetual hellfire"

I've been in a position where I shouldn't have been before. I too was kind to everyone. Whether or not I was good at my job or role has no effect on basic human decency, or holding the door, saying good morning, or not cutting someone off deliberately in the company parking lot.

There's two kinds of respect - earned, and given. People seem to not understand that, and see no reason why they shouldn't slam the door in the person behind them's face. You can be kind to everyone, it doesn't cost you anything. Give people props when they deserve it, but don't smash the homeless dude on the street's face when you walk by him - he's human too.

You should support those who do good work, and call out those who don't. But you don't have to be an asshole to them, either.

bastawhiz• 1 year ago

One of the best things I've ever done for my own career is being mindful of celebrating the wins of my coworkers. Call out a good refactor that would have gone unnoticed. Email someone's manager or skip level in the lead up to performance reviews and tell them how they made things better. Publicly thank the person that took notes or groomed the backlog or had a noisy on-call rotation.

Everybody appreciates getting celebrated. Managers love hearing that their reports are being appreciated. Leadership loves to hear about wins that are normally invisible to them. You're directly benefiting the people around you, and it reflects well on you as someone who cares, pays attention, has empathy, and has a focus on career growth. Maybe it's just because it's normally a behavior associated with senior ICs, but people hear this stuff and start to look to you as an authority and example.

floriferous• 1 year ago

The blinking thing after the author's name in the sidebar is terribly distracting, why make it impossible to scroll past it, or just not have this infinitely running animation? Great article otherwise.

rsanek• 1 year ago

Agree, I blocked it with uBlock

Electricniko• 1 year ago

I saw the link and was kinda hoping his name was Joseph T Hacker.

epolanski• 1 year ago

I have two points I want to make:

1) friends definition is vague and often based on language. In Italian or English friend is a word that could include for a single person dozens of people, in many Slavic countries you only use that word for your very best closest friends (the one you can count on one hand).

2) being a humble rooter at work has done better for me and many I know than being the star player. I'm the same person, I just give to others credit and never brag about anything. People notice, people like you, people want you around in projects, end up rooting for your advancements too.

Perenti• 1 year ago

Given what the verb "root" means here in Oz, this seems extremely friendly, although possibly unhygenic.

sans_souse• 1 year ago

Am I the only one who read the title and the source and thought this was about rooting devices?

+1 tho, we could use some more positivity all around. Root for your friends, family, your peers. Hell root for anyone that you have respect for. That's how you live. That's the real W.

llimos• 1 year ago

Interesting that there's no word in English for this. There is one in Yiddish: fargin

tmnvix• 1 year ago

"Every time a friend succeeds, I die a little."

- Gore Vidal

thewileyone• 1 year ago

I've trimmed those in my life that don't root for me, doesn't matter loudly or quietly. I've deepened relationships that I've had for 10, 20, 30 years by rooting for them, loyally and unabashedly. I've foster new friendships by rooting for them, deservedly or undeservedly. I've realized that it makes my life more fulfilling and it's given me a solid reputation as a side benefit.

Root for your friends

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