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

Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

blog.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 406 posts

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#141

Post by maxxxxx »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #118
maxxxxx wrote: post #47

I am a little ambivalent about this. On the one hand the intent is probably good but on the other hand companies like YC and Silicon Valley are drivers of a lot of developments that led to the current situation. - Silicon Valley is a great example of growing inequality. Most of the rewards go disproportionally to a select few at the top - A lot of VC companies are killing a lot of previously relatively stable jobs. U…

Silicon Valley is a great example of growing inequality. Most of the rewards go disproportionally to a select few at the top. That's a good thing: http://www.paulgraham.com/inequality.html "Decreasing economic inequality means taking money from the rich. Since risk and reward are equivalent, decreasing potential rewards automatically decreases people's appetite for risk. Startups are intrinsically risky. Without the…

That's probably of Graham's worst essays. Nobody is talking about removing all rewards. The question is how much reward is needed. Did CEOs do a worse job when they made 20 times the average worker income or would Zuckerberg do anything differently if he had made $500 million instead of 20 billion? What was his risk? Wasting a few years of his life? Plenty of small business owners go under after years of work and have nothing left. Silicon Valley founders don't take an extraordinary risk.

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#142

Post by mdorazio »

ryanworl wrote: post #126
maxxxxx wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's easy to say for someone with a good income. For a lot of people wages go down while cost of living goes up.

That's not what I'm getting at. I'm referring to technology specifically. Cost of living is dictated predominantly by the cost of housing, healthcare, education, and food. Food cost as a % of income has decreased significantly since 1960 according to the USDA [1]. Technology and globalization have impacted food a lot. Education, and housing? Not nearly as much. Healthcare is more complicated, and I'm not an expert, s…

Yes, but why is it making things cheaper where it touches? Usually it's because it allows production with fewer people or by people with lower wages than before. Thus things get cheaper because some subset of people lose jobs or wages. That's fine as long as those people are able to find new jobs or supplemental income sources (many do), but I think the point here is that it's not a universal benefit. I have to agree with the parent post here - for some portion of people, technology has led to lower wages while cost of living decreases (food, products, etc.) are offset by increases in things you need to lift yourself up (healthcare, education, housing).

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#145

Post by gregpilling »

RangerScience wrote: post #137
adamnemecek wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While nice, neither of these strikes me as truly disruptive. The downside is that to achieve the best educational environment, you'd have to open a school which doesn't scale nicely unless you plug into existing "world APIs". I guess you could start by opening a co-working space with a supervising adult (not teacher, this adult will be there to ensure that the kids aren't killing each other). There would be teachers…

"A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer", perhaps?

For those that have not read the book - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diamond_Age

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#146

Post by wu-ikkyu »

The problem of "fake news" is the same as the age old Koan of truth vs. falsehood. Truth is subjective and relative to the time period and cultural mythologies, and is always changing. How can we even begin to solve this apparent problem if we can't even objectively define our variables, lest we become digital Don Quixotes?

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#147

Post by RangerScience »

eevilspock wrote: post #112
rjkaplan wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends on how you define progress. Just to play devil's advocate: what if you define progress as "that stuff" that will increase the general well-being of the greatest number of people over the next 20 years? With that definition, does technology-powered automation still count as progress?

It would count as progress if the automated means of production were owned by the labor that is put out of work. Oh wait, that sounds like communism, and we could never ever have a reasonable discussion about that amongst a group of people who thrive off of a system that is the opposite.

I'm down-voting you, here's why:

Instead of claiming that we can't have that discussion, why not try to have that discussion?

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#148

Post by antisthenes »

ryanworl wrote: post #126
maxxxxx wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's easy to say for someone with a good income. For a lot of people wages go down while cost of living goes up.

That's not what I'm getting at. I'm referring to technology specifically. Cost of living is dictated predominantly by the cost of housing, healthcare, education, and food. Food cost as a % of income has decreased significantly since 1960 according to the USDA [1]. Technology and globalization have impacted food a lot. Education, and housing? Not nearly as much. Healthcare is more complicated, and I'm not an expert, s…

> Cost of living is dictated predominantly by the cost of housing, healthcare, education, and food.

> so far, technology seems to be making just about everything it touches cheaper for everyone.

You say this, but only provide a source for 1 out of 4 key indicators of cost of living. Can you provide the same evidence towards housing, healthcare and education becoming significantly cheaper as a % of a budget of an average household?

Otherwise that statement is just incorrect.

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#149

Post by [deleted] »

volkadav wrote: post #72
alva wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is totally false to say Trump has enacted a law to ban people from entering the US based on their religion. Totally false. Is it true that Rudy Giulani has said this. It also true Trump has said in the past he wants a Muslim ban. It is also true that many people believe this action is a step in the direction of a Muslim Ban. But this is not a Muslim Ban at this stage and presenting it as such is a lie and misleadi…

He's instituted a ban based on ethnic origin from countries that are majority-Muslim (for that reason), has in the past called for a Muslim ban, and the architect of the ban has said it's a Muslim ban. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and in a feat of amazing linguistic ability for a waterfowl looks you dead in the eye and says "I'M A DUCK!" what are we supposed to call it, a giraffe? To engage with pedan…

[deleted]

Re: Request for Startups: News, Jobs, and Democracy

#150

Post by FrancoDiaz »

maxxxxx wrote: post #141
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Silicon Valley is a great example of growing inequality. Most of the rewards go disproportionally to a select few at the top. That's a good thing: http://www.paulgraham.com/inequality.html "Decreasing economic inequality means taking money from the rich. Since risk and reward are equivalent, decreasing potential rewards automatically decreases people's appetite for risk. Startups are intrinsically risky. Without the…

That's probably of Graham's worst essays. Nobody is talking about removing all rewards. The question is how much reward is needed. Did CEOs do a worse job when they made 20 times the average worker income or would Zuckerberg do anything differently if he had made $500 million instead of 20 billion? What was his risk? Wasting a few years of his life? Plenty of small business owners go under after years of work and hav…

the question is how much reward is needed

Who decides that?

Post reply on HN