Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

“I have toyota corola”

daniel.haxx.se

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 365 posts

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#221

Post by ivraatiems »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #219
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your argument is shit. (Another Linus quote) And here's why. "I'm a bastard. I have absolutely no clue why people can ever think otherwise. Yet they do. People think I'm a nice guy, and the fact is that I'm a scheming, conniving bastard who doesn't care for any hurt feelings or lost hours of work, if it just results in what I consider to be a better system. And I'm not just saying that. I'm really not a very nice per…

There's this bizarre thing going on on HN, reddit, and other tech sites. We saw it with Linus and we see it again with Trump. Suddenly, all these people are making excuses for terrible behaviors and outrageous claims. Usually following a "he didn't really mean that" playbook of justifications like "productivity" or "politics" like either excuses acting like a child. Why are we afraid to call people out on the shit th…

It's not about political correctness. It's about what these people make you feel, and how you respond to it. People want to believe that somebody whom they like on one score - Linus's technical achievements, Donald Trump's ability to empathize with the working class and the poor - are likable on all scores.

It's much like the classic literary 'harsh father' figure - he may beat you, he may be strict, he may never show love, but he provides for the family and he teaches you to be moral, so everything he did must have been good. The beatings must have had a purpose. It's hard for us to accept that good and bad exist in the same person, and that somebody who does good things may also do very bad things, not just discretely, but often at the same time.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#222

Post by chc »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #219
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your argument is shit. (Another Linus quote) And here's why. "I'm a bastard. I have absolutely no clue why people can ever think otherwise. Yet they do. People think I'm a nice guy, and the fact is that I'm a scheming, conniving bastard who doesn't care for any hurt feelings or lost hours of work, if it just results in what I consider to be a better system. And I'm not just saying that. I'm really not a very nice per…

There's this bizarre thing going on on HN, reddit, and other tech sites. We saw it with Linus and we see it again with Trump. Suddenly, all these people are making excuses for terrible behaviors and outrageous claims. Usually following a "he didn't really mean that" playbook of justifications like "productivity" or "politics" like either excuses acting like a child. Why are we afraid to call people out on the shit th…

Has Linus Torvalds ever said anything offensive to you or anyone you know? It seems to me that the people complaining about his behavior basically don't have the standing to do so — they're attempting to police other people's interactions that didn't involve them.

(This is different from Donald Trump, where people have actually complained about being wronged by him, rather than complaining about an interaction between Trump and somebody else where neither party had any complaints. And this is ignoring how offensive it is to equate telling somebody to do their job better with sexual assault and racial discrimination.)

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#223

Post by peterwwillis »

chc wrote: post #222
drzaiusapelord wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's this bizarre thing going on on HN, reddit, and other tech sites. We saw it with Linus and we see it again with Trump. Suddenly, all these people are making excuses for terrible behaviors and outrageous claims. Usually following a "he didn't really mean that" playbook of justifications like "productivity" or "politics" like either excuses acting like a child. Why are we afraid to call people out on the shit th…

Has Linus Torvalds ever said anything offensive to you or anyone you know? It seems to me that the people complaining about his behavior basically don't have the standing to do so — they're attempting to police other people's interactions that didn't involve them. (This is different from Donald Trump, where people have actually complained about being wronged by him, rather than complaining about an interaction betwee…

You don't have to get shit flung at you to know it's offensive.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#224

Post by chc »

peterwwillis wrote: post #223
chc wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has Linus Torvalds ever said anything offensive to you or anyone you know? It seems to me that the people complaining about his behavior basically don't have the standing to do so — they're attempting to police other people's interactions that didn't involve them. (This is different from Donald Trump, where people have actually complained about being wronged by him, rather than complaining about an interaction betwee…

You don't have to get shit flung at you to know it's offensive.

Policing other people's interactions without the consent of any involved party is pure paternalism. What you think is shit being flung might be Tootsie Rolls to them, and it is not our place to tell these people how they have to feel.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#225

Post by pbhjpbhj »

linsomniac wrote: post #163
forgettableuser wrote: post #23

As somebody who has written to companies about bugs in their products (and almost always ignored), I would really appreciate a response even if it was some form letter thing to the effect of "I just make a small component that happens to be used in your car, kind of like the people who make the screws in your car. Please contact your car manufacturer directly." I personally just like knowing somebody read my letter i…

It's easy to say that if you don't have experience from the receiving end... For a very long time I ran publicly accessible NTP servers. Usually this required little to no maintenance, sometimes we'd get hammered (like when a large ISP rebooted all of their customers boxes at the same time). But usually it wasn't a big deal. Now, when you have hundreds of thousands of people using your services, it doesn't take many…

>and our support number included an option users could select //

Did you charge callers. I wonder if "you will be billed £20 for this call [or $30 or whatever]; current customers will have this cost refunded" would be enough (even if you never charged) to put people off.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#226

Post by sssilver »

ivraatiems wrote: post #218
sssilver wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unacceptable by who? Some universal morality? Come on.

Unacceptable for communication in a professional setting in North America or Europe. I don't buy the argument that it's acceptable to behave as he does in the workplace in Finland any more than it's acceptable in the US or any other such country. It's also just generally a disrespectful way to treat other human beings, and that is pretty universal, actually. But to be frank, I think that context was perfectly clear i…

I'm an Armenian living in Texas and his communication is completely acceptable to me. If anything the standard American corporate professional speak pisses me off when matters get serious. Why don't we embrace that different things work for different people and there is no communication standard to be imposed per continent or even culture?

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#227

Post by peterwwillis »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #219
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your argument is shit. (Another Linus quote) And here's why. "I'm a bastard. I have absolutely no clue why people can ever think otherwise. Yet they do. People think I'm a nice guy, and the fact is that I'm a scheming, conniving bastard who doesn't care for any hurt feelings or lost hours of work, if it just results in what I consider to be a better system. And I'm not just saying that. I'm really not a very nice per…

There's this bizarre thing going on on HN, reddit, and other tech sites. We saw it with Linus and we see it again with Trump. Suddenly, all these people are making excuses for terrible behaviors and outrageous claims. Usually following a "he didn't really mean that" playbook of justifications like "productivity" or "politics" like either excuses acting like a child. Why are we afraid to call people out on the shit th…

What you're talking about are ego defenses. And yes, it is in part projection. But the two cases are different.

When you see one person who is personally or socially powerful, and that person is a champion of one thing you strongly believe in, you will support that person in order to have that thing come to fruition, as long as the other things that person supports aren't too distateful to you. It's then necessary to defend that person so they can continue to be your champion - either out of ego, or purely to achieve your goals.

But when it's Linus, people don't defend him because they need to achieve something. They defend him mainly because of what he represents to them, and also for the work he does.

When it's Trump, people defend him because he's simply the most extreme choice possible. He makes you feel good, and that combined with anger becomes a positive feedback loop. He could murder someone and people would still find reason to cheer for it, not because they like what he does, but because of what he represents to them: extremism. (and now the thread is going to go down a political spiral... oh jeez, this poor thread)

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#228

Post by ivraatiems »

sssilver wrote: post #226
ivraatiems wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unacceptable for communication in a professional setting in North America or Europe. I don't buy the argument that it's acceptable to behave as he does in the workplace in Finland any more than it's acceptable in the US or any other such country. It's also just generally a disrespectful way to treat other human beings, and that is pretty universal, actually. But to be frank, I think that context was perfectly clear i…

I'm an Armenian living in Texas and his communication is completely acceptable to me. If anything the standard American corporate professional speak pisses me off when matters get serious. Why don't we embrace that different things work for different people and there is no communication standard to be imposed per continent or even culture?

I think you're conflating corporatespeak/not being direct with being rude. Compare these three statements:

"There's a problem with the function you wrote. I need you to fix it tonight." "The function you wrote is non-optimal for our goals. Please reconsider and reevaluate when you get a chance." "You fucked up that function. Fix up your shit NOW."

The first is "standard professionalspeak." It's clear, direct, gets the point across. It isn't rude. The second is worthless corporatespeak. The third is rude and dickish. It's also how Linus tends to communicate.

I agree the second is not great, but would you really prefer the third to the first?

My point is that you can be totally direct and clear about what must be done without being nasty to the person doing the work, and that is the ideal. I don't think there are many cultures that would prioritize being mean over being direct, but if yours does, I'd be curious to understand what advantage you think that confers.

Further, if we're going to embrace different communication styles, then I would say the onus is on people to learn to communicate inoffensively, not to learn to accept offensive communication.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#229

Post by anarazel »

__david__ wrote: post #213
tracker1 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The worst for me, is when I get account creation notifications for a given site, and can't even contact anyone to correct it, etc... For a few months, I was getting student loan account notices for someone else, but not enough PII to actually contact them, and layers of crap and people unable to fix it contacting the company in question. I'm not getting rid of my gmail address... mine ... though I do have another add…

I started getting DirecTV bills with some random person's name on them that I don't recognize (but with my street address). This weekend I also received an overnight fedex with my address, an apartment number, and someone else's name (I don't live in an apartment). Turns out people don't know their actual physical addresses either any more.

> Turns out people don't know their actual physical addresses either any more.

Just move countries and cities often enough, and throw some business travel in for good measure, and it's pretty easy for that to happen. I've e.g. had similar sounding zip codes in a variety of cities and countries, and nearly the same street name within a city. After a while you start to very easily make mistakes.

Re: “I have toyota corola”

#230

Post by quickben »

jaspervdmeer wrote: post #62
forgettableuser wrote: post #23

As somebody who has written to companies about bugs in their products (and almost always ignored), I would really appreciate a response even if it was some form letter thing to the effect of "I just make a small component that happens to be used in your car, kind of like the people who make the screws in your car. Please contact your car manufacturer directly." I personally just like knowing somebody read my letter i…

Yeah you would, but you're on Hacker News and not stupid, like 99.999999999% of users are. To them a reply and it doesn't matter what's in the reply as they're not reading it anyway, means they have somebody to vent to. And if Daniel doesn't solve it. T-mobile is a bad company. DO NOT ever understimate the stupidity of people. No reply is best reply in cases like this!

Thinking so low about the entire human population besides yourself, won't get you far in life.
Post reply on HN