Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#141

Post by somatic » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:20 PM UTC

dlojudice wrote: post #119

tools for micro-entrepreneurs: with the growth of automation (e.g. RPA and AI) and the consequent decline of the world middle class, many people are being forced to work informally as a food deliverer or be an uber driver. others will become micro-entrepreneurs (solo-entrepreneurs for many). the opportunity is that these entrepreneurs will need all kinds of specialized tools during their journey (payment, marketing,…

In calling these people entrepreneurs you are really contorting the language. The entrepreneurs in this system are the creators and owners of the system. The other people are something else entirely.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#142

Post by clavalle » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:21 PM UTC

Gestalt, context-aware UI.

We have a lot of different ways to interact with systems but they are all separate and relatively dumb (not context-aware). I think there is a confluence of forces that will lead to a more seamless user interaction with and between systems that will reduce the friction between app and user, app and app, and user to user. Eventually, for better or worse, a lot of the underlying differences between apps and data and modes of interactions will largely disappear to the end user.

Voice commands, AR, gesture recognition, traditional mouse and keyboard, wearables, powerful phones, laptops, bluetooth, environmental devices, smart-speakers, cloud-based microservices, data transfer and description standards, ad hoc contexts, ubiquitous fast internet, etc, coming together to have user and app interaction happen in a smooth, natural , and intelligent way. Machine learning will be at the heart of it all.

Imagine all of the progress made over the years in app-to-app interoperability jumping into meatspace.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#143

Post by kilroy123 » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:21 PM UTC

peterangular wrote: post #38

I work in this field so I'm incredibly biased: automated business solutions that cut entry-level data employees out of the equation. You save TONS on the bottom line, and cut out human-driven process that is error prone and difficult to manage. I'm talking about things beyond "API-driven dev", more in the realms of Puppeteer, Microsoft Office automation, screen-scraping (mouse/keyboard), etc. I make API's out of thin…

I've been thinking a lot recently at trying to do this kind of work as well. I'm just not sure where to start. I have a pretty weak network form living abroad for so long and moving around a lot.

Any advice about how to even get started doing this kind of work? What tools to study or learn? How to find work?

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#144

Post by jliptzin » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:23 PM UTC

peterangular wrote: post #38

I work in this field so I'm incredibly biased: automated business solutions that cut entry-level data employees out of the equation. You save TONS on the bottom line, and cut out human-driven process that is error prone and difficult to manage. I'm talking about things beyond "API-driven dev", more in the realms of Puppeteer, Microsoft Office automation, screen-scraping (mouse/keyboard), etc. I make API's out of thin…

I could use help automating a simple task for one of my businesses involving submitting refund requests to USPS. Please get in touch if you're looking for new clients!

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#145

Post by tsmarsh » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:24 PM UTC

Democratising manufacturing.

CAD / CAM is still hard. CAM especially. You have to know a great deal about materials and tools, even order of operations to help the computer build efficient tool paths. There is a lot of scope for process improvement and there are commercial opportunities to sell to job shops who would like have their engineers working more on CAD and less on CAM.

There is also potential here to make it so easy and affordable that having a 5 axis machine on your property is as common place as having a laser printer. 3D printing offers the ability to create more plastic crap you don't want, or prototype things you want made on a CNC in the future. 5 Axis CNC in the home means that you could download a mocha pot, wait a day (instead of shipping) then screw it together. Drones, motors (winding is still hard), car parts could either be downloaded or you take a video on your phone and let AI figure out the CAD / CAM.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#146

Post by _bxg1 » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:24 PM UTC

false_alarm wrote: post #64

_bxg1 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but i have a feeling that if the climate is changing, eventually it'll start paying very well to attract the people it needs The problem is that it's a tragedy of the commons, so no matter how important it gets, unless governments really start putting money towards it there will continue to be little interest from the private sector.

no disrespect intended at all, but this seems to capture a very non-tech ethos. as an industry we need to have boundless optimism and practice a philosophy of idealism with a healthy sprinkle of realism. we are very well positioned to solve sustainability problems/change culture

I think I partly misread the original post and thought they were looking for a lucrative new field of work; if they just want something worthwhile to put effort into, then I can see how my comment might've come off as cynical. That wasn't my intent.

I'm not saying nothing can be done about our environmental problems, just that it'd be tough to turn it into a career. Unfortunately.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#147

Post by awinder » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:24 PM UTC

I'm gonna go in a different direction: broadly, solutions that deal with the problems of an aging population:

1. Technology that helps doctors/practices service more elderly patients

2. Wellbeing technology for seniors (Headspace/Calm should totally push towards this area)

3. Personnel management for homecare nursing

List could go on and on. None of this is especially "trendy" but there's clear demographic reasons to build startups in this area and there's going to be a natural onramp of capital & solutions for how to care for a radically older population are going be sorely needed.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#148

Post by jeffreyrogers » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:25 PM UTC

tito wrote: post #53

Climate change will create the first trillionaire. Find everything that eats fossil fuels and electrify it. Find everything that requires stable land and predictable weather and put it in a shipping container. Find every infrastructure investment that requires decades to pay off and decentralize it. Instead of water line pipes, pull water out of the air. Instead of copper and fiber optic cables on telephone poles, us…

I don't really see that happening. Most of the things you've suggested would require large amounts on energy to produce. I don't see energy getting cheaper over the next 50-100 years. It seems to me that climate change and reduced dependency on fossil fuels we lead to reduced globalization and population reduction.

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#149

Post by tito » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:25 PM UTC

a-priori wrote: post #130

pjc50 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who's going to pay for it?

As one example, imagine that someone invents a process to manufacture gasoline using carbon extracted from the air, at a price that's cost competitive with gasoline extracted from the ground. Any car running on that as fuel would immediately become carbon-neutral, and it could be produced anywhere on the planet. Almost overnight you could make the entire automotive industry carbon neutral (burning this gasoline would…

Exactly. Elon Musk announced a few weeks ago that SpaceX Starship will be fueled from atmospheric carbon. They're building a process to pull carbon fuel out of the air on Earth -- and on Mars.

Relevant quote on YouTube from Starship Update, queued up here: https://youtu.be/sOpMrVnjYeY?t=3850

Re: Ask HN: What's a promising area to work on?

#150

Post by mrdoops » Tue, Oct 22, 2019, 5:25 PM UTC

dlivingston wrote: post #18

I have a hunch that the Next Big Thing (TM) will be augmented reality: though the technology is currently in its infancy, when compelling AR glasses are finally released (Apple is rumored to be released theirs in 2020) I think that it will have a massive impact. AR frameworks are a dime a dozen, but if you're an Apple person look into ARKit + Swift.

Agreed. With 7nm fresh off the presses and 5nm on the way we're should start seeing some efficient SoC's to do the 3D mapping AR needs. Even if glasses aren't ready to be the primary interface - phones with the hardware to accurately map and overlay the world still has a lot of promise.