startupdiscuss

Three points:

(1) I don't think this is the reason it did not work. There are lots of things that make you look like a dork -- PCs, airpods etc -- but they took off like rocketships (speaking as someone who adopted these dork items whole heartedly).

(2) I agree it is a mystery why Segways didn't work, but I think it remains an unsolved mystery.

(3) We have more information now that we have lime and other similar items available. (*)

(*) This is actually a point in PG's favor because the lime's are skateboard inspired. But they're not undorky.

Is there a tl;dr for the sum knowledge?

This is not a criticism of Blitz which looks fine. From what I can see, it is better than fine.

However, this reminds me of the early Rails (or even Rails 4.0) demos that I saw where they build a blog in 5 minutes.

Here is the thing: The fastest way to get a skeletal app running -- even if it is written in C -- is to

git clone already_written_archetype.lang

And then you can modify it.

So you can put that archetype into the framework. So I always wonder if the right example is not build a blog or to-do-list or twitter clone. The right example might be:

take a blog and change it into a twitter clone

Because you can always download the archetype if you need to but the framework should demonstrate how nimble it is. (Again, I don't claim Blitz is not nimble and I would have to play with it to know.)

If he or she were dead, but their writing and code is extant, presumably they could still be identified.

Not directly relevant but it got me thinking:

Has anyone tried to use the source code and white paper to figure out who Satoshi Nakamoto might be?

If you can figure it out from binaries, surely there is a lot more info. And you have the github and the blogosphere to compare.

Zen Koan:

Before I began my studies in Zen, I thought a tree was a tree and a stone, a stone.

When I started to study Zen, I could see that a tree was not a tree, and a stone was not a stone.

Now that I am a Zen master, I know that a tree is a tree and a stone is a stone.

-- Source: my buddy in college

I think you come full circle to learn that you can only keep so much in your head at one time and that you're always in some sense loading up what you need for the next month or three. At least this time you knew to look for the man su command, and remind yourself of the work you did, that you shared with all these other people.

The issue isn't the tool to get your blog up, but hosting it.

The real solution will be a super easy app that lets you push the blog out to:

- git* pages

- digital ocean/vultr/aws/wherever

- netlify/forestry as an advanced feature

- move it easily from one to the other

(You have to set up an account on the target and provide the app with credentials/tokens or whatever).

Setting up markdown-> html+css themes is what everyone focuses on

The point is, this was not meant to be advice! This was anti-advice.

You can't use the criterion: if it is insightful it has to be actionable on an insight that says "I have no actions for you".

The difference is, it is not trying to trick you.

Note: you had to be kind and nice enough for the former boss to care enough to:

- ask you to email

- read it and understand what you do

- follow up and spend the company's money

edit: simplicity

The things that you think are going to take a long time will take a short time and the things you think will take a short time will take long.

So, for instance, if you have 4 hours scheduled to implement some neural network to optimize X, it may take 30 minutes to type in the algorithm and get it working, but it will take 3 hours to get the environment set up, the version of Tensorflow or whatever up and running, and much longer to type up your results.

So, hopefully, if you expect this, you won't crumple in despair when you find your self 1.5 hours into the time and you haven't even got the right language working with your IDE for that hello world to come up. No, you're right on track, and just keep going.

This looks great so far. Eager to hear from all the people who are going to point out the other platforms that are similar so I can learn about them too.

You’re right.

So you’re saying it great practice! Do a study on the survival rate of the average AngelList offer.

I didn’t say penny stocks. You can try names you know and like: SMAR, SSTI, PS, etc

Have you considered getting your start by investing in micro cap tech stocks?

The transaction is much easier. You get all the risk of total wipe out you may crave. But most importantly you get a lot more information and that might help you get practice.

The most valuable practice is when you think a company has a great strategy and is a no brainer and it shuts down. Or when you do a lot of work and invest in a rocket ship only to notice that Facebook would have been a better investment.

I would absolutely expect people to give that up, as well as any senior economist student would tell you, the labor preference curve is backward-bending after you start making a certain amount of money.

Are you sure this is a good student? The bend in the curve demonstrates the preference for incremental wealth. So you might forego $500k to $600k. Going down to $0 takes you through the steepest part of the curve.

(I guess with interest on savings, the person is going down to something like $25k-$40k.)

There are multiple studies saying that happiness plateaus after a certain amount of income. It's his life and he probably found his own plateau.

I am not sure what you mean by "probably found his own plateau".

Do you mean he found he didn't need as much money to live?

Huh? This seems like a non-sequitur. What does leaving in 2 years have to do with your worth this year? How many years would he have to stay to pay off this year?

By that logic hires are bad deals if they ever eventually leave because you "lost" the money of their last n years.

You're looking at it the wrong way (i think).

The point is not that he is starving, or that he is desperate. The point of that number is what he gave up!

The point is he gave up a job of 0.5 million, potentially 1 million in a few years. To top it off the job had reasonable hours, great people and he was getting positive feedback.

You would not expect people to give that up. The question is why?

Instead, you're pointing out how lucky he was. Well, that is his point! He was so lucky and is giving it up! Aren't you curious why?

confused as to why someone who owns a lot of shares would want to take a "big risk" "without reason" during "normal times."

Wouldn't a person with a lot of stock not want to take a big risk without reason at any time?

The comment:code ratio is higher than anything I write or that I’ve seen.

However, it does give me some comfort. When it’s not gamed, do other HNers also feel that a high comment:code ratio probably indicates quality?

There are reasons why this may be the case. (More thought, more time and a large team etc)

I don’t advocate using this measure to reward anyone because it would be gamed immediately.

I just assume that, in order to qualify as an exaggeration joke, it had to be both an exaggeration and a joke.

Rockstars are definitely a thing in real life. They may have long hair or tight clothes. They sing or play instruments and are often surrounded by fans. Unfortunately I’ve never seen one involved in computers.

There is also another issue with “just works” and meeting specs: specs are almost universally under constrained.

I might describe an admin interface in terms of what it controls but implicitly I want large choice sets to have search functionality and dates to have calendars and so on.

A large choice set implemented as a massive drop down technically works but I don’t have to explain why it’s just wrong. The “practical” programmer may say hey it works and let’s move on. The “clever” programmer wants to impress with a new widget that is intuitive to use. In this particular case (interface design) I’d prefer the clever coder over the practical one.

IMHO the big cultural difference between the sub continent and the US is an emphasis on a particular notion of being “practical” over what I would call a particular notion of being “smart.”

I assume you are familiar with the particular notion of being smart. You are quick to think of solutions, the solutions are supposed to be novel, you have particular cultural knowledge, detailed opinions and a nerd sense of humor.

In contrast the practical person will put no emphasis on a novel way of doing things. As long as the solution works, you use it.

So in the US people may be excited by Haskell or whatever but in the sub continent they’re still using JAVA or PHP because it works.

This is a bit frustrating because of the emphasis on specs and features that are implemented exactly as written.

I also think the latter has to do with the distance and difficulty communicating. But the source of pride (practicality) is part of the cultural difference.

Needless to say none of this is true of everyone and all people are equally smart and capable (except Phil: I know about you Phil).

1. I love techno-nostalgic stories, and this is a good one

2. I love how none of the people were technically experienced at video games

3. I wonder if people knew back then that this was going to be such an influential game (after it was famous, but before time had passed)

Sounds like you can get the results of a premade and trained TF model, but you can't build your own model or train it.

Is there discovery on Facebook?

Most people I add because I meet them in read life. Actually, 100% of the people I add on FB after I've met them in real life.

Maybe if there was a good search and easy add mechanism for people I've met, it would fulfill the discovery aspect. I agree with you, it does feel easier to find people on FB.

So one simple way to solve the scala and excel issue is just to match for the space at the end or punctuation. So search for "scala " and "scala." instead of "scala". Same for "excel " and "excel." In fact you could just combine them all into word + end where end can be [" ", ".", "!", "\n" etc]

I think Slack is sending a clear and strong message: use a VPN!

Tech support issues on HN are like the tech equivalent of putting up medical bills in a newspaper.

The situation is so unfair and one is so powerless, that the best way to resolve it is to get dozens of other people involved.

This is probably tiring to oneself and all the other people who have to work up into outrage. There really ought to be a more systematic way to work resolve these things.

Think back to when COBOL actually changed. This is when the PC was becoming more common. So people would tend to use whatever came with the PC. Basic was the most common language. If Apple and Commodore had opened up into a COBOL interpreter, it would have lasted that generation.

I am not sure why C took over from Basic. Perhaps it had something to do with speed or with control. I don't know if the same reasons would apply to Cobol.