Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not • Hacker News Board

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#201

Post by nradov » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:08 PM UTC

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #132

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…

I don't think just giving the money to whoever has a prototype is a good idea. Some culturally relevant projects aren't the sort of thing you can make a prototype of, but I like where you're going. I'd amend it like so: Once I've been a citizen long enough (i.e. paid enough taxes) I get to invoke my free year, which is a year where the government pays me enough to cover my bills and maybe a bit extra for projects and…

As a taxpayer I'm not interested in paying people to take a year off. If they want to do that they can save up their own money.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#202

Post by kstenerud » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:08 PM UTC

If I hadn't had to work jobs just to keep food on the table, I'd have invented the things I did A LOT earlier. I'd probably be finished rewriting the internet's protocols by now, instead of only being 30% of the way there.

But that's not how this world works. Most of the early discoveries were by affluent people or had benefactors and didn't need jobs and thus actually had time.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#203

Post by everybodyknows » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:10 PM UTC

marmaduke wrote: post #10

> list of innovations we need is long but subsequent included nothing vis-a-vis the expensive, industrial lifestyle we have these days. It is unfortunate that cultural innovation doesn't make the list, since it would go a long way toward address some pertinent problems

I'd go farther and suggest that culture is the central problem.

Only better culture can deliver peace and a modicum of justice. In particular, a social culture in which neighbors do not seek to rob or enslave each other.

Self-driving cars, or even a cure for cancer, will not advance this central goal. Better schools on the other hand, just might.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#204

Post by threeisoneis » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:14 PM UTC

krapp wrote: post #137

threeisoneis wrote: post #74

Once again, an article related to utilitarian altruism that doesn't seem to draw a defensible conclusion from the arguments given. This particular type of article, and the works of the effective altruism movement more broadly, always creep up to the edge of demanding meaningful change but, in their conclusions, shrink away from it. They make the case that the world has a lot of issues, that a lot of people have bad l…

>But the real path to liberation isn't the gradual improvement of the bottom while the top gets fatter and richer and more powerful. The real solution is revolution. Take the table, take the world, break free from this failed system. Have fun storming the castle!

We will, thanks.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/live/2019/mar/15/cli...

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/united-auto-workers-uaw-general...

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#205

Post by cryptica » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:17 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #201

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think just giving the money to whoever has a prototype is a good idea. Some culturally relevant projects aren't the sort of thing you can make a prototype of, but I like where you're going. I'd amend it like so: Once I've been a citizen long enough (i.e. paid enough taxes) I get to invoke my free year, which is a year where the government pays me enough to cover my bills and maybe a bit extra for projects and…

As a taxpayer I'm not interested in paying people to take a year off. If they want to do that they can save up their own money.

So you prefer to pay 10 times or 100 times the amount to subsidize debt which drives the capital appreciation of stocks to benefit rich shareholders and executives who either sit around and do nothing, or worse: they use the money to create shitty companies which waste everyone's time and energy... Then when the companies finally go bankrupt after a decade everyone loses except the executives who are actually responsible for the whole mess to begin with... Then they use the proceeds of their years of huge salary and bonuses to fund their next shitty company and repeat the process over and over again.

The situation is so bad now that if you're reading this as an employee, your current boss probably fits the description above perfectly. Your boss right now is probably a serial entrepreneur who created 10 different companies which made him a ton of money but which for some reason are all dead now and either added no value to society or created negative value.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#206

Post by joyeuse6701 » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:18 PM UTC

ta1234567890 wrote: post #147

buboard wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the west is not corrupt. You have to visit eastern europe, latin america, middle east and east asia to experience it The solution is not throwing more free money in public coffers. It definitively exacerbated corruption in greece for example

So you are saying that free money is not a solution. Ok, then what is a solution? Also, how do you measure and compare corruption? The US has gone to war killing millions of people, including hundreds of thousands of their own, motivated by (oil/industrial-military) money and justified with lies. The US political system is controlled mostly by corporations and rich people that pay for lobbying. So are you saying the…

I do agree with the sentiment that via political donations the U.S. political system is corrupted, but I hope you can offer a citation for the millions killed and hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens, and a clear cause and effect of the stated motivation, please. I think most of what you said is an overstatement, not to belittle those that suffered because of greed.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#207

Post by lemiant » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:21 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…

This is basically the pitch for YC

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#208

Post by jlokier » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:21 PM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #193

jlokier wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Will I get a return on that $20k? Yes you will (according the basic theory of the idea). Unfortunately, even though you will get a return, when you get it you will believe that you haven't had the return because it will take the form of $100k of life improvements that you will believe you "would have had anyway" without the investment. You might even get $100k of cash, in the form of your salary increasing by much…

From where I stand, I seems not very far from that argument to arguing in favor of trickle down economics being a success by the same mechanism.

I see parallels too, but trickle down economics is about sending capital "up" in the hope that what's produced trickles back down from wealthy people, whereas the idea of investing in lots of people is more like sending capital "down", or at least sideways.

I think a plausible factor in the failures of trickle down economics to enrich the masses as much as hoped by those who advocate it, is wealthy groups of people acting so as to keep what wealth they have in their own control, away from others. And, over generations, perhaps ceasing to be wealth generators (e.g. inventors and industrialists) and becoming wealth controllers (e.g. "old money" families).

Widespread investing in lots of people isn't subject to the same problem, by definition. (Assuming those people are paid decently, rather than indentured servants to some capital controller).

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#209

Post by tempguy9999 » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:21 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #201

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think just giving the money to whoever has a prototype is a good idea. Some culturally relevant projects aren't the sort of thing you can make a prototype of, but I like where you're going. I'd amend it like so: Once I've been a citizen long enough (i.e. paid enough taxes) I get to invoke my free year, which is a year where the government pays me enough to cover my bills and maybe a bit extra for projects and…

As a taxpayer I'm not interested in paying people to take a year off. If they want to do that they can save up their own money.

That's the sound of a door being slammed very hard with no consideration of what you may get back in return.

The whole model of giving people tax money to do work is called research and is quite a large area and has produced some amazingly valuable things that you benefit from.

BTW I do see what you mean, but I have been trying to start a company for ages and getting the money together is just incredibly hard. It's also hard IT, not pet grooming or similar. It's difficult.

Re: Talent is everywhere, opportunity is not

#210

Post by marcinzm » Sat, Sep 21, 2019, 4:23 PM UTC

eaenki wrote: post #158

marcinzm wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many of those Kickstarters also had or claimed to have prototypes. Let's use your example. I can buy a small reusable toy rocket at a hobby store. It will fly up a few hundred feet and come down by parachute in one piece. I can build a somewhat bigger one from pieces as well, there's college competitions around such things. That provides about 0.0001% of the work, skills, etc. needed to build one that can reach orbit…

Well, that would function as a seed round. And having a breakthrough would mean it’s proprietary. Aka you didn’t buy it at the hobby store. If you have a prototype demonstrating a breakthrough that’s enough imo. I can only recall Oculus from kickstarter and it has been fairly successful

>And having a breakthrough would mean it’s proprietary. Aka you didn’t buy it at the hobby store.

Now define a system that will verify that the technology is proprietary and not just assembled off the shelf components. Keep in mind that you can also have a breakthrough system that is made of existing components. And do it with minimal bureaucracy. Keep in mind that the person applying may honestly believe they have a breakthrough technology made from existing parts even if it's not.