Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not • Hacker News Board

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#111

Post by buboard » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #9

Imo Education is overvalued, Capital is under appreciated, And, Because Capital is trapped into networks, that Capital is squandered among an infinite array of companies employing the talent and producing products that don’t make you, or the planet, better, healthier, smarter or happier. (Apple’s SJ era, Google until 2014~ and Tesla fit the useful smarter happier paradigma, and not many other) My solution is: take a…

Thats how biomedical research funding works. Its not pretty, thousands of unambitious tiny studies , tons of overlap, millions dead mice , but progress is slow

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#112

Post by cossray » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

moltar wrote: post #75

sdiq wrote: post #57

I think the better question would have been, how would Steve Jobs have ended up if he were born in Syria

Not identical example. But Elon Musk was born in South Africa. Far from Syria, but still not a major world economic Center.

You may want to refreshen your knowledge regarding South Africa in its apartheid days. I would confidently posit that Elon was more privileged than your average American at that time. Of course he may want/ has created a different picture of his young days.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#113

Post by marcinzm » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:18 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #9

Imo Education is overvalued, Capital is under appreciated, And, Because Capital is trapped into networks, that Capital is squandered among an infinite array of companies employing the talent and producing products that don’t make you, or the planet, better, healthier, smarter or happier. (Apple’s SJ era, Google until 2014~ and Tesla fit the useful smarter happier paradigma, and not many other) My solution is: take a…

>My solution is: take a piece of the federal budget and give $1-3MM to anyone with a far fetched idea that has a prototype to back it up. No long processes. If 30K -mostly students- a year get a mill to develop their thing, I suspect we would find ourselves way into the future in just a decade. And that’s just $30-90B/y

Ideas require good execution to be off any value and money doesn't buy that. Look at all the Kickstarters which over-funded and failed because the people running them had no ideas about manufacturing, finances, physics, engineering, etc.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#114

Post by whenchamenia » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:18 PM UTC

ryanmarsh wrote: post #77

human20190310 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Opportunity is often missed because it looks like work. Man that is 180 degrees from my perception. Opportunity is often declined because a failed inventor (and most inventors fail) looks like someone who got nothing done. It looks like non-work. Upper-middle class westerners can get away with this, because they've got enough capital to weather the period of speculative effort, and when it fails, they've got enough…

Not everyone can afford to be seen failing. Perhaps. There are also a lot of people who think they cannot be seen failing and very well could.

Good businessmen all have more failed businesses that successful ones. There is zero shame for failing a buisness, although quite a bit for fumbling your personal finances.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#115

Post by imtringued » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:18 PM UTC

easytiger wrote: post #19

eaenki wrote: post #9

Imo Education is overvalued, Capital is under appreciated, And, Because Capital is trapped into networks, that Capital is squandered among an infinite array of companies employing the talent and producing products that don’t make you, or the planet, better, healthier, smarter or happier. (Apple’s SJ era, Google until 2014~ and Tesla fit the useful smarter happier paradigma, and not many other) My solution is: take a…

Unbelievably childish idea which would be trivial to gamify. You only have to look at the industrialised corruption of public tenders for legitimate needs in Africa for a glimpse of human nature.

I agree. A lot of people would just secretly buy real estate or some other investment instead of actually doing the work.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#116

Post by buboard » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:18 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #25

easytiger wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unbelievably childish idea which would be trivial to gamify. You only have to look at the industrialised corruption of public tenders for legitimate needs in Africa for a glimpse of human nature.

While this is just a very basic idea I put out, still, corruption is rampant everywhere anyway. I suspect it would be a net positive to have a ton of Brilliant students getting money for their projects even if half of the money are corrupted away.

Cortuption is one of the biggest differentiating factors between successful/unsuccessful countries

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#117

Post by AlexTWithBeard » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:19 PM UTC

The opportunity is there. It's always there. It may not be an opportunity to immediately become the president of an international corporation, but it's an opportunity to improve your life and life of your future generations.

Give your children education. Make sure they grow up in a full family. Move to a better place. All these small things add up. You won't become a millionaire this way, but your grandkids may.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#118

Post by kortilla » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:19 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #82

smkellat wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“...and since one can’t ask a stranger to fund him...” That’s been a solved issue since at least the 17th century with joint stock companies. What else is an IPO but asking strangers for money so you can do business?

Name one company that raised its first million with an IPO in the last few decades. Let alone one that did so while producing something like Google

Last few decades? You do know that includes the dot com boom that was filled with tech companies doing early IPOs with basically nothing to show?

Also, the only reason early IPOs aren’t popular anymore is because capital is so easy to get from VCs, despite what you’re suggesting. The difference is that you want money without a business plan or a plan to grow, which is not how private, nor public, money should be squandered.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#119

Post by dahart » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:20 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #9

Imo Education is overvalued, Capital is under appreciated, And, Because Capital is trapped into networks, that Capital is squandered among an infinite array of companies employing the talent and producing products that don’t make you, or the planet, better, healthier, smarter or happier. (Apple’s SJ era, Google until 2014~ and Tesla fit the useful smarter happier paradigma, and not many other) My solution is: take a…

Perhaps worth noting that the U.S. government already has a grant program with approximately this budget range. Pell grants give money to students who need money.

Is it possible that Pell grants already provide more economic return than is possible with a far-fetched-idea plan for a small number of people? Pell grants do help enable education for millions, and as we see in the article & study, education is absolutely correlated with innovation.

I am curious how you propose to vet far fetched ideas in a short amount of time? 30K startups is a lot to review, even if the cycle was continuous and spread out over the year. And far-fetched ideas are difficult to rank and fund. Whether this program works, I imagine, would depend on lot on whether the vetting process reliably allowed in far fetched ideas with real potential and kept out far fetched ideas that have no potential, as well as people who aren’t likely to bring the far fetched idea to fruition.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#120

Post by easytiger » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 2:22 PM UTC

ta1234567890 wrote: post #105

easytiger wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect it another millenial fantasy much like basic income et al I suspect giving people with no life experience, exposure to failure or real life dynamics will end badly. The single digit number of success stories in limited domains aren't representative of any real meaning

> giving people with no life experience, exposure to failure or real life dynamics will end badly By that measure no one could ever become an adult. Exposure to failure and real life dynamics is exactly what people with no life experience need. At least that's the only way they will gain life experience. > millennial fantasy At least millenials are dreaming about a better society and trying to fight for it. What are…

Apprently I'm a millenial so I'm more than happy to use the moniker .

> spitting out unprovoked hate towards a whole generation of people?

Care to cite the basis of your assertion?