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Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

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Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#31

Post by imranhou »

PaulHoule wrote: post #29
narmiouh wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you believe Amazon would have succeeded as it has with Elon Musk at its helm? Everyone has different qualities and strengths... Amazon's success(in consumer goods) is merely a reflection of our society as to how it wants to live and what its priorities are and Jeff Bezos has found a way to capitalize it.

Elon musk’s greatest weakness that I see is that his behavior (e.g. his bullshit tweets about Bitcoin) drives women up the wall which would not be healthy for a consumer-oriented retailer. (He’s the opposite of, say, Benjamin Disreali.) Musk’s strength, when it comes to SpaceX, is that he takes it absolutely seriously. (Bezos took AMZN seriously, but Blue Origin's main business seems to be suing the government.) The…

Then why isn't there a lot of serious competition to Amazon? Where are these hypothentical CEO's who would have replaced a dead Bezos, why aren't they running walmarts/targets/new startups of this world? I am not actually a fan of the guy, but I like to credit where it is due.

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#34

Post by PaulHoule »

imranhou wrote: post #31
PaulHoule wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon musk’s greatest weakness that I see is that his behavior (e.g. his bullshit tweets about Bitcoin) drives women up the wall which would not be healthy for a consumer-oriented retailer. (He’s the opposite of, say, Benjamin Disreali.) Musk’s strength, when it comes to SpaceX, is that he takes it absolutely seriously. (Bezos took AMZN seriously, but Blue Origin's main business seems to be suing the government.) The…

Then why isn't there a lot of serious competition to Amazon? Where are these hypothentical CEO's who would have replaced a dead Bezos, why aren't they running walmarts/targets/new startups of this world? I am not actually a fan of the guy, but I like to credit where it is due.

I said it.

AMZN has a flywheel. That flywheel is going to keep turning despite what anyone does.

Brick and motor stores have a tendency to fixate on a profile of an imaginary consumer that is bizzare to say the least.

The Staples shopper loves junk hardware from VTech (especially if it only lasts three weeks) and wouldn't even think of buying quality Plantronics hardware. Staples shoppers want a choice of 20 different kinds of glossy inkjet paper and would never buy a coated photo/presentation matte (hint: they are the same thing, art reproductions look great on photo matte)

What about the imaginary Target shopper who an insatiable appetite for chi-chi frozen foods, graphic T-shirt, and shoes and bras that don't fit?

Amazon avoided those fates and also the fate of being an advertising-dependent business that started to believe the stories it tells. (Dan Boorstein, in 1962, said that public relations experts didn't fall for the images they make, but we've had a long time for the culture to degrade. I'm certain that "ad prices are too damn high" because they are bid up by people who get the jollies from hearing their name on the radio.)

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#35

Post by retrac »

null_deref wrote: post #17
retrac wrote: post #6

I, mean, I get what you're talking about. But it's like complaining that most of the writings we have from antiquity were written by the landed aristocracy class. Aurelius's Meditations was, after all, also written by a decidedly rich guy -- the emperor of the known world. Certainly a bit biased there. But they were the only people with the time, and with the access to the resources and labour, to propagate their ide…

> But they were the only people with the time, and with the access to the resources and labour, to propagate their ideas in multiple copies. Marcus Aurelius didn't publish the book, the book contains thoughts he wrote to himself without any intent to make them public.

Yes, fair. Still, his writings were published after his death by men who felt that what he had to say was important, and that it should be disseminated, and they had access to the means to do so. We only have two copies of full manuscripts with the work, I believe. Without the people who owned and duplicated those books in medieval Greece, who were almost exclusively the elites or hired by the elites, we wouldn't have it today.

When pressed for scrap paper, they chose to use something they considered to be B-grade, rather than Meditations. Though who knows if what they tossed was really inferior. Julius Caesar, Aristotle and Archimedes wrote several books which were not considered quite worth preserving. Lost say 1500 years ago because no one bothered to copy and further distribute them. The great editorial filter all of our history went through.

(There has been some recent fascinating work on recovering the writing from painted over and re-used and re-scraped papyrus and parchment. Some of Archimedes's works were rediscovered this way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes_Palimpsest )

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#36

Post by cratermoon »

seibelj wrote: post #8

Self made rich people lived life a certain way and made their money through a combination of hard work and luck. But you need to do a lot of work to be able to recognize and take advantage of luck when it presents itself, plus the risk taking mentality. There is a very big difference from a rich doctor or lawyer and a wealthy entrepreneur. I don’t believe that all rich people “exploited” those that work for them. Pri…

> "Self made" rich people lived life a certain way and made their money through luck

FTFY. Give me the name of a self-made rich person and I'll tell you how they either a) weren't as self-made as their hagiobiography says or b) were luckier than they admit.

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#37

Post by cratermoon »

retrac wrote: post #6

I, mean, I get what you're talking about. But it's like complaining that most of the writings we have from antiquity were written by the landed aristocracy class. Aurelius's Meditations was, after all, also written by a decidedly rich guy -- the emperor of the known world. Certainly a bit biased there. But they were the only people with the time, and with the access to the resources and labour, to propagate their ide…

Is that because only the landed aristocracy has valuable philosophical insights, or because they were the only ones with access to means to preserve their thoughts?

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#38

Post by imranhou »

PaulHoule wrote: post #34
imranhou wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then why isn't there a lot of serious competition to Amazon? Where are these hypothentical CEO's who would have replaced a dead Bezos, why aren't they running walmarts/targets/new startups of this world? I am not actually a fan of the guy, but I like to credit where it is due.

I said it. AMZN has a flywheel. That flywheel is going to keep turning despite what anyone does. Brick and motor stores have a tendency to fixate on a profile of an imaginary consumer that is bizzare to say the least. The Staples shopper loves junk hardware from VTech (especially if it only lasts three weeks) and wouldn't even think of buying quality Plantronics hardware. Staples shoppers want a choice of 20 differen…

I don't disagree with some of the specific points, and to be clear success of Amazon is not all attributed to one individual. I'm sure one can agree that success at this scale is a combination of right strategy, lucky timing.

But I also believe in butterfly effect, the levers a CEO holds on a company have 1000X multiplier effect than a normal employee, and any change of leader means an Amazon with a market cap of 3T vs 3B. Thats is not to say a 3B company doesn't have a flywheel and won't make consistent profit. I look at the likes of eBay, Newegg all were non B&M and still couldn't grow to anywhere near the size.

In the end, it could have been Joe Pizza that was at the helm of Amazon that succeeded to 3T market cap, same argument can be made that replacing Joe Pizza wouldn't have lead to the similar result. All the pieces (luck, personalities, vision, skills etc...), of the puzzle have to match just right for such a large scale success.

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#39

Post by cratermoon »

dinkleberg wrote: post #30
lowmagnet wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People don't teach philosophy for money, they teach it because someone has to.

That is a big assumption. Many teachers teach because someone has to, but there are also always those who do it for the money.

Name one teacher of philosophy who makes enough money, from teaching alone, to even approach the wealth of the revered businessman-philosopher.

Re: Ask HN: Who else sick of “Rich” people teaching moral/life philosophy?

#40

Post by [deleted] »

cratermoon wrote: post #37
retrac wrote: post #6

I, mean, I get what you're talking about. But it's like complaining that most of the writings we have from antiquity were written by the landed aristocracy class. Aurelius's Meditations was, after all, also written by a decidedly rich guy -- the emperor of the known world. Certainly a bit biased there. But they were the only people with the time, and with the access to the resources and labour, to propagate their ide…

Is that because only the landed aristocracy has valuable philosophical insights, or because they were the only ones with access to means to preserve their thoughts?

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