HN user
Why wouldn't they implement a system where you can flag certain photos for promotion and receive a cut if that photo is used for promotion?
Why can Facebook only come up with monetization strategies that take advantage of its users?
Yes but according to the article, he wanted his normal salary and the equity. So the only part of your comment that applies is leaving a stable job for an unstable one.
This is a risk but not a big risk at all if the engineer was "one of the best engineers in his area" because he would be able to find another job easily.
I think the issue that people are picking up on is that if that is how you spend your own money, it is likely that you will spend company money in the same way making you a riskier investment.
I know my comments haven't been full of praise but I enjoyed your post and it seems you have the personality that is needed for success.
But prior to that you say:
Inspired, I hacked out the feature that was the answer to the flunked question and used it on the partners.
If it was such an easy feature to add and so important that you had several strong answers to the issue that required the feature, why wasn't it already part of your product?
edit: If the feature was already present in your product, it would have been almost impossible to have gone blank.
But the more valuable it is the more unlikely it is that it will be given away. Is spending time and money on the extremely small chance of getting hold of zap.com smarter than using those efforts to get hold of zap.co or zap.me? How much more is zap.com worth to your business over other alternatives?
If a few days and a few thousand pounds isn't worth much to him then I understand but if resources are scarce, using them on long shots that might not even pay that much over the alternatives is not good business.
edit: punctuation, grammar
I guess the post can be seen as a cautionary tale about the dangers of spending too much time on your domain name and not enough on your product.
I do not understand your comment at all.
To what do you vehemently disagree? That it is a slim chance of securing the domain name? If so, why does the rest of your comment discuss how important YC is to UK programmers?
That depends on how you define "a top 10% executive founder".
I felt like that at first but I think the issue is that the potential employee wanted his normal salary in addition to equity. He would not undertake any risk for that equity and that can definitely lead to problems in company camaraderie.
Having said that, I think that the post has a slightly angry tone which I do not like. People can ask whatever they want in exchange for their work. If they are not worth it, don't hire them. If they are, get them on board. No need to write a blog post about it though.
Besides the conflict of interest, I find the fact that a significant portion of their articles are about themselves, or other tech journalists, extremely irritating. Like when a documentary is about the filmaker making the documentary instead of the subject matter.
I wish people weren't so obsessed with celebrity.
It is frustrating how the American government is trillions of dollars in debt, waging pointless/dangerous wars and quickly turning America into a police/welfare state but instead of worrying about foreign and monetary policy, the most important issues seem to be abortion and gay marriage (things the government shouldn't even involved in).
I feel that the four day work week is the sweet spot for productivity and I will institute this when I start hiring. 28-32 hours of work a week is better than 15-20 hours of work and 20 hours of facebook and lolcats.
A very refreshing landing page. Simple design that explains what you do. Looking forward to you coming out of beta.
Surely they realised that it was only a matter of time.
It would be interesting to read a preview of the book.
I think that releasing software quickly is completely different to releasing a physical item quickly. You continue working on the software and update as necessary but you cannot update a physical book that is sitting on someone's coffee table.
How much time was spent on the content of the book versus the design? Is the content alone worth the price asked or is the content just a filler for the book design/marketing effort?
Thanks for posting this. http://reformsection5.org.uk/ Looks interesting.
If you are not happy with being in the trenches, it is simple, get out of the trenches.
...Who often had little to no say in the outcome?
No Choice? If you are unhappy, find a new job.
Edit: formatting
+1. I really like bitbucket, especially the free private repositories. I will definitely look to buy products/services from you when the time comes.
Hope you get hold of the .com domain name soon.
I agree that apple did bring it all together rather well (over a sustained marketing and development phase) but I just don't see how anyone could think that smart phones similar to those that we have today weren't inevitable with or without apple.
http://mobile.engadget.com/2006/02/21/review-cingular-8125/ This was released over a year before the first iphone.
I think that apple's contribution was not so much innovation as it was popularisation.
"Would the innovation have happened if Apple hadn't driven it? Not any time soon."
I am fascinated by this statement. What evidence do you have to support it?
Well every one knows that becoming severely ill is a possibility for anyone, that's what insurance is for. Can't afford insurance? Give up unhealthy habits to lower your rates, get a better job, look after family so that they will support you if you need help.
Get made redundant due to unforeseen shifts in the job market? Educate yourself, get a better job, work harder. Innovate, invent, think, mow your neighbors lawns. Use your brain and don't embark on a dead end career.
I agree that some social safety nets are needed for a civilized society (No one that is ill should go without out treatment if they don't have any money etc) but at the same time there are limits and I think paying for people who lose their jobs because of new technology is way past that line. We need to encourage people to be smarter, not dumber.
"People who preach personal responsibility are oblivious to the realities of the world." I live in South Africa and government handouts do nothing but keep the poor oppressed and uneducated. They are used as a tool for control by populist politicians. People will have more children just for another R250/month from the government instead of creating value. Socialism is a huge threat to everyone everywhere. It keeps the populous dumb and gives governments way too much power. Please don't preach about the realities of the world from your $200K/year+ household pedestal. Socialism is obviously working out great for you.
Why on earth should the responsibility (of those that will become redundant) fall on the early adopters of a new technology?
If I had become a fax machine expert would it be fair to charge a tax on those that began to use email to support me?
People should take responsibility for themselves and their own actions.
I can access it from South Africa.
Some good advice, I think our most valuable lessons come from failure. One point that wasn't touched on, and that may be significant in this case, is that is can be very difficult building a business around a domain name.
When you click publish and you are not signed in: http://i.imgur.com/n7ETQ.png
I liked it until I read "fuck it" in the options when publishing.
I would have liked them to move to bitbucket.org because it was built with Django.