worked there, run by a bunch of bunker creatures who care only and solely about their pensions.
SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
21–30 of 174 posts
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#22Sounds like standard bureaucracy. They didn’t submit the required information in the required form. SF wants startups to behave, that doesn’t mean that behaving startups get to ignore the standard procedures or get exceptions from requirements.
right only the big startups who fund major lobbying can do that
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#23Yes, this is just standard bureaucracy and it's Skip's fault, as people are saying. But the bigger point is that the SF government apparently places more weight on minor application mistakes than actual, historical "bad" behavior. That's why this is so comical. It only feeds fuel to the truth that rules should be bent and there really is no point in "moving slow" for startups. You won't be rewarded for it. Most tech…
> But the bigger point is that the SF government apparently places more weight on minor application mistakes than actual, historical "bad" behavior. This has been my experience with pretty much any bureaucracy, regardless of locale. E.g. when I incorporated my company, I had to send in the same application four times, each time paying an additional fee. Reason was I had minor, pointless really, mistakes in the applic…
As a general rule that is particularily effective when dealing with government is that it is always easier to ask forgiveness than it is to ask permission.
Government officials will always choose the easiest path forward - and that is almost always inaction.
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#24Yes, this is just standard bureaucracy and it's Skip's fault, as people are saying. But the bigger point is that the SF government apparently places more weight on minor application mistakes than actual, historical "bad" behavior. That's why this is so comical. It only feeds fuel to the truth that rules should be bent and there really is no point in "moving slow" for startups. You won't be rewarded for it. Most tech…
> But the bigger point is that the SF government apparently places more weight on minor application mistakes than actual, historical "bad" behavior. This has been my experience with pretty much any bureaucracy, regardless of locale. E.g. when I incorporated my company, I had to send in the same application four times, each time paying an additional fee. Reason was I had minor, pointless really, mistakes in the applic…
This has been my experience with pretty much any bureaucracy, regardless of locale.
It doesn't have to be this way.
I incorporated my first company in Chicago, and was stunned with how helpful the bureaucrats were.
Yes, it was a little complex, especially in the years before "startups" were a thing, and you could do stuff online. But each department I had to work with had people who would sit me down at their desk and explain what they did, why I should care, and how to fill out the forms properly.
Maybe the difference is that back then, you were expected to form a company in person, and not do everything online all by yourself and be an expert from day one.
A massive thanks to the Illinois Department of Revenue people in the basement of the Thompson Center for all their openness and hand-holding.
(In spite of all this, I still moved the company to another state a few years later because of Chicago + Illinois taxes and corruption.)
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#25Sounds like standard bureaucracy. They didn’t submit the required information in the required form. SF wants startups to behave, that doesn’t mean that behaving startups get to ignore the standard procedures or get exceptions from requirements.
Uou are assuming the forms have meaningful purpose.
The reality is that the bureaucrats just don't wantT more startups and so they use excuses to obstruct them.
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#26It would be nice to have a linter for government forms.
There is. It's called an attorney.
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
In an extremely complex modern society it's nearly impossible to tell the effects that certain actions and policies will have. Popular discourse around politics and economics support this theory, since almost nobody can seem to agree. This leads to one of the best heuristics for evaluating the merits of an action as the intention of the actor or the ethics of the actor.
That is possibly the worst heuristic for evaluating an action. You may be right that it is somewhat natural to arrive at it, but it is by no means a good heuristic. And why is it bad? For one, real intentions are inscrutable, so it is very easy to ascribe whatever intentions you want to an action. For another, the intentions behind an action have essentially no correlation with the effects of the action, at least ins…
Is there an alternative that you feel works better?
The most common alternative that I can see is "you can do whatever you want as long as it follows the letter of the law". However, that doesn't seem to work well either.
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#28The application form requires a paragraph labeled A3, and their application had the required information but didn’t label it as A3. That’s the sort of mistake that can land you in bureaucratic purgatory anywhere in the world, which is exactly what happened, and there’s an ongoing appeal right now. The founder’s take-away from this should have been “double-check the details, especially when dealing with a bureaucracy”…
Classic victim blaming / blaming the user. The takeaway should be that this bureaucracy is broken, not that applicants shouldn't be able to make trivially fixable mistakes.
Bureaucracy should be treated as a computer program, you have to feed it exactly what it expects. If you give to a JSON parser an object with single quoted strings it is your fault if the parser complains even though it is quite clear what you meant.
In the case of software, being clever means that you open yourself to unintended result, vulnerabilities and such, in the case of bureaucracy you open yourself to lawsuits, corruotion charges and lenghty trials
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
Classic victim blaming / blaming the user. The takeaway should be that this bureaucracy is broken, not that applicants shouldn't be able to make trivially fixable mistakes.
Bureaucracy should be treated as a computer program, you have to feed it exactly what it expects. If you give to a JSON parser an object with single quoted strings it is your fault if the parser complains even though it is quite clear what you meant. In the case of software, being clever means that you open yourself to unintended result, vulnerabilities and such, in the case of bureaucracy you open yourself to lawsui…
I don't buy this. The government has more resources to fix UX readibility more than any other company, and I know how nitpicky a HN reader can get on UX details. So why should the government get a pass? It won't get better unless we raise our voices to the point it is heard by them.
Re: SF wants startups to behave, so why did it reject the ‘nice guy’ of e-scooters?
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But the bigger point is that the SF government apparently places more weight on minor application mistakes than actual, historical "bad" behavior. This has been my experience with pretty much any bureaucracy, regardless of locale. E.g. when I incorporated my company, I had to send in the same application four times, each time paying an additional fee. Reason was I had minor, pointless really, mistakes in the applic…
This has been my experience with pretty much any bureaucracy, regardless of locale. It doesn't have to be this way. I incorporated my first company in Chicago, and was stunned with how helpful the bureaucrats were. Yes, it was a little complex, especially in the years before "startups" were a thing, and you could do stuff online. But each department I had to work with had people who would sit me down at their desk an…
This has been my experience in dealing with the German collection office even though all had already been moved to web and I never once met a real person. They would always send me nice letters explaining what exactly was wrong. Even did this in cases in which they themselves corrected the error on my behave.
On the other hand, dealing with private bureaucracies such as internet providers has always been a major pain. Very unhelpful, not accommodating at all.