Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video] • Hacker News Board

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#61

Post by Kurtz79 » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:46 PM UTC

Exuma wrote: post #7

larrys wrote: post #2

It's kind of funny how people who have made it as big as Jack Ma are still obsessed enough with Harvard to mention almost as a badge of honor that they were rejected from Harvard. As if to say "see Harvard was obviously wrong here". Harvard or any top school in no way can accept anywhere near all of the applicants that are qualified to attend those schools. As such there will be people that will be rejected and accep…

10 times is a lot worse than being wrong once, however.

On the other hand:

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

Without being knowledgeable about Harvard admission process, I would expect that the same evaluation done for one application would hold, at least in part, for the following ones submitted by the same person ?

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#62

Post by noobermin » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:46 PM UTC

larrys wrote: post #2

It's kind of funny how people who have made it as big as Jack Ma are still obsessed enough with Harvard to mention almost as a badge of honor that they were rejected from Harvard. As if to say "see Harvard was obviously wrong here". Harvard or any top school in no way can accept anywhere near all of the applicants that are qualified to attend those schools. As such there will be people that will be rejected and accep…

"Still obsessed"

If anything, his tone implied that learning to deal with rejection and to keep trying is one of the things that made him successful.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#63

Post by gyc » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:47 PM UTC

yuncun wrote: post #50

I grew up in a Chinese household, and I swear, Chinese people are way too obsessed with university branding. It's not even about quality of education, it's a cultural status phenomenon. If you take 10 mothers, the dick size of each one is directly proportional to the US News (yes, specifically US News) ranking of the university of her child. And if Timmy, some random kid in school, had a 2380 SAT, then as a fellow Ch…

Asian-Americans (including Chinese-Americans) have to have better grades and test scores to have the same chance as your average white American to get into an elite university, so I can see why Asian-American parents would think it's necessary for their children to focus so much on improving their test scores.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#64

Post by cronjobber » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:48 PM UTC

ChuckMcM wrote: post #26

It is an interesting claim. I think Harvard would still reject him, he doesn't seem to fit in with what a "Harvard Man" is. The mistake is thinking that Harvard wants all the successful people in the world to go there, as far as I can tell they don't. Every private University recruits from their "tribe" whether it is 'quirky' at Reed or 'cosmopolitan' at Harvard, while not discriminating on race, religion, Etc they d…

I heard claims that Ivies were analyzing the living hell out of alumni donation probabilities... and Asians flunked.

Also, I think Ron Unz claimed empirical evidence for anti-Asian discrimination.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#65

Post by JanezStupar » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:49 PM UTC

deterselect wrote: post #5

He claims that out of 25 people, he was the only one rejected for a job at KFC. That to me is more inspirational. On the other hand, could he be lying about some of these hardships to make him seem more relatable?

Another possibility was that his family or himself got itself on a blacklist by the government and somebody hinted to his prospective employers that they do not want to hire that person.

Or he could be full of shit.

I like how interviewer called him out when he was talking about how inspired he is by Hollywood - that in reality he is looking to do business in Hollywood, not reach enlightenment.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#66

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:50 PM UTC

arihant wrote: post #48

aianus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Great colleges are extremely hard, and in top programs kids are always fighting for life to not get kicked out. This is a lie when it comes to non-technical degrees at elite colleges like Harvard. Most people get A's. It's a joke. Edit: source: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/12/3/grade-inflation-...

There are classes where a lot of people get A's. But I have a first hand experience to tell you that it's not easy. Just because majority got an A in a very small number of classes, does not disregard equal number of classes where majority fights for a C. It also does not say that people getting A's did not work their asses off. Grade inflation does happen in some courses. But it's not easy and is far from a joke. In…

[deleted]

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#67

Post by a8da6b0c91d » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:53 PM UTC

yuncun wrote: post #50

I grew up in a Chinese household, and I swear, Chinese people are way too obsessed with university branding. It's not even about quality of education, it's a cultural status phenomenon. If you take 10 mothers, the dick size of each one is directly proportional to the US News (yes, specifically US News) ranking of the university of her child. And if Timmy, some random kid in school, had a 2380 SAT, then as a fellow Ch…

For 1300 years the gateway to great status in China was the imperial examination. That must have left a mark.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#68

Post by bdhe » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:53 PM UTC

dkrich wrote: post #59

ChuckMcM wrote: post #26

It is an interesting claim. I think Harvard would still reject him, he doesn't seem to fit in with what a "Harvard Man" is. The mistake is thinking that Harvard wants all the successful people in the world to go there, as far as I can tell they don't. Every private University recruits from their "tribe" whether it is 'quirky' at Reed or 'cosmopolitan' at Harvard, while not discriminating on race, religion, Etc they d…

> I think Harvard would still reject him, he doesn't seem to fit in with what a "Harvard Man" is. I disagree for a simple reason- suppose Harvard could go back in time and reject Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, or Stanford could reject Sergey Brin and Larry Page- do you think they would? Of course not, even though you'd be hard-pressed to suggest that they were great fits for their programs since they dropped out aft…

> Of course not, even though you'd be hard-pressed to suggest that they were great fits for their programs since they dropped out after their first year.

Bill Gates was just a semester shy of graduating and even published a paper in his junior year at Harvard. There are many many Stanford graduate students who take leave of absences to work on entrepreneurship -- Larry and Sergey just were wildly successful with theirs. Both Larry and Sergey got their Masters degrees. I'd chalk up neither case to a bad fit nor did they drop out after 1 year.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#69

Post by x5n1 » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 3:55 PM UTC

yuncun wrote: post #50

I grew up in a Chinese household, and I swear, Chinese people are way too obsessed with university branding. It's not even about quality of education, it's a cultural status phenomenon. If you take 10 mothers, the dick size of each one is directly proportional to the US News (yes, specifically US News) ranking of the university of her child. And if Timmy, some random kid in school, had a 2380 SAT, then as a fellow Ch…

Hyper-competition with over a billion people does weird things to people. Even when they move away from their homes to other places, this leaves a mark.

Re: Jack Ma: 'Harvard rejected me 10 times' [video]

#70

Post by kaitai » Tue, Sep 15, 2015, 4:10 PM UTC

arihant wrote: post #48

aianus wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Great colleges are extremely hard, and in top programs kids are always fighting for life to not get kicked out. This is a lie when it comes to non-technical degrees at elite colleges like Harvard. Most people get A's. It's a joke. Edit: source: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2013/12/3/grade-inflation-...

There are classes where a lot of people get A's. But I have a first hand experience to tell you that it's not easy. Just because majority got an A in a very small number of classes, does not disregard equal number of classes where majority fights for a C. It also does not say that people getting A's did not work their asses off. Grade inflation does happen in some courses. But it's not easy and is far from a joke. In…

People are fighting for As, and maybe working their butts off, but they could be doing a lot less, getting their straight Cs, and not get kicked out. It is easy to be mediocre and stay in Harvard if you already got in.

(What gets people kicked out is a major depressive episode that results in DNFing all their classes for a while, not handing in mediocre homework consistently.)